GERMINATION
To germinate the seeds in the correct way you will need 2 basic things: you have to keep the medium humid, and the temperature in the range of 18-27° centigrades, being the ideal temperature 24°. If you grow in soil, you can germinate the seeds directly in it: insert the seed about 0.5 cm deep, make the soil wet and cover the top of the vase with a plastic film to keep the environment nicely moist. If you grow in hydro, you can germinate directly into the rockwool after the necessary preparation. The seeds should germinate in 2-10 days. Remove the plastic cover immediately. You can also germinate the seeds into some cotton, into specific gel discs, between 2 paper napkins etc.

VEGETATION
Most of the strains require that every young plant grows for 3-4 weeks at least before it can flower. In this stage, that normally happens in april-july in outdoor the plants answer to the short nights accelerating its grow: for this reason in indoor we give 18 hours of light and 6 of dark. About the nutrients, in this stage it’s common a great need of nitrogen. When the young plant reaches 20 cm or is 1 month old, the flowering can start. A longer vegetation however will give much bigger harvests.

FLOWERING
When the nights are long enough (end of july) the plant react starting its flowering phase. In indoor we can provoke the flowering passing to 12 hours of light alternate with 12 of total dark. Since that day you can start to count the number of days that is proper of the strain that you are growing: if you read on its description flowering 8 weeks it means that approx. after 56 days they will be ready to be harvested. Female pistils will start to appear on the plant in 7-14 days. About the nutrients the plant will eat more phosphorus and potassium.

MALE AND FEMALE
The marijuana is the dried female flower (not pollinated) of the plant of cannabis: once arrived to this stage is important to distinguish male and female so you can destroy the males and finish the flowering with the females. The male at this stage develops balls, while the female shows a couple of white pistils for each calix. More clarity on this can be found here: The Sex of a Marijuana Plant.

HARVESTING
After 6-11 weeks, depending by the strain, it’s the moment to harvest. You can recognize the moment when the buds are fully riped looking carefully at the pistils, about 3/4 of them should be brownish. Or to be more precise, you can use a magnifier, the best moment is when the resin start to loose its transparency and become darker. Cut the plants at their base and take away all the big leaves. Now cut all the little leaves without resin around the buds. Now you can let them dry in a dry, fresh and well aerated place. hang the plants upside down, and provide a good circulation of the air around them. The plant will start to be fully dried in 5-7 day. However, it shouldn’t be used before 20 days. Most of the strains give their best after 40 days after the harvest.

The marijuana is the dried female flower (not pollinated) of the plant of cannabis: once arrived to this stage is important to distinguish male and female so you can finish the flowering with the females. The male at this stage develops balls, while the female shows a couple of white pistils for each calix. To clarify this, we have prepared a picture. This picture shows an example of male and female flowers, in a really early stage, within 2 days since their appereance.

Sativa marijuana plants vary from about 6ft to over 25ft in height.Most varieties grow in the 8ft to 12ft range. The marijuana leaves are long and thin fingered and are light green , especially equatorial varieties, which have less chlorophyll and more yellow pigments in order to protect the plant from intense light. Temperate varieties are darker green.The marijuana leaves of some varieties yellow and fall off during maturity. The marijuana plants have long branches. The bottom ones may spread 4ft or more from the central stalk, rather like a conical Xmas tree shape.

The marijuana buds are long and thin, far less densely populated than the Indica, although longer in length, sometimes stretching 3ft in or more along the branch. The stomas of the flowering bud may be tinged slightly purple in a cool climate but in a warmer environment will turn dark orange or even red. Maturation time varies considerably.

The Sativa High :
The sativa high is often characterized as uplifting and energetic . The effects of a sativa marijuana are mostly cerebral. They give a feeling of optimism and well – being, as well as providing a good measure of pain relief for certain symptoms. A few pure sativas are also very high in THC content. They are known to have a quite spacey, or hallucinogenic, effect. Sativas are a good choice for daytime smoking.

Indica is a short plant, usually under 6ft tall, rarely over 8ft tall. Its marijuana leaves have short, wide fingers and are deep green, often tinged with purple.At maturity, the marijuana leaves start to turn even darker purple. It has short branches laden with thick, dense marijuana buds, which mature early, usually about the beginning of September.

The marijuana buds vary in colour from dark green to purple, just like their marijuana leaves. Under cooler conditions, the coloration becomesmore intense. The marijuana buds have little trouble maturing under the cool conditions of our northern climate. Indica marijuana buds smell stinky, you know the type that smell like bad B.O often pungent and their smoke is thick even a small toke will often induce fits of coughing. The best Indicas have a relaxing social high, which allows the person to sense and feel the environment, but does not lead to thinking or analysing the experience.

The Indica High :
The indica highs are most often described as a pleasant body buzz. Indicas are great for relaxation, stress relief, and for an overall sense of calm and serenity. marijuana indicas are also very effective for overall body pain relief, and often used in the treatment of insomnia. They are the late – evening choice of many smokers as an all – night sleep aid. A few pure indica strains are very potent in THC, and will cause the “couchlock” effect, enabling the smoker to simply sit still and enjoy the experience of the smoke.

Growing medium is simply what the roots of the plants are growing in. This can be a vast variety of materials, including Rockwool, perlite, vermiculite, coconut fiber, gravel, sand or any number of other materials, even air can be a growing medium. The growing medium is an inert substance that doesn’t supply any nutrition to the plants, all the nutrition comes from the nutrient solution (water and fertilizer mixed). You can therefore easily control everything the plants receive, the strength and pH of the nutrient solution is easy to adjust so that the plants receive just the right amount of nutrient and water. The watering cycles can be simply controlled by an inexpensive timer so that the plants get watered when they need to be.

Aeroponics is the process of growing plants in an air or mist environment without the use of soil or an aggregate medium. Unlike hydroponics, which uses water as a growing medium and essential minerals to sustain plant growth, aeroponics is conducted without a growing medium.

The name “Hydroponic” comes from Latin and means “Working Water”. In reality hydroponics is the growing of plants without soil.

According to Steven Hager, editor of High Times, the term 420 (pronounced four twenty, not four hundred and twenty) originated at San Rafael High School, in 1971, among a group of about a dozen pot-smoking wiseacres who called themselves the Waldos, who are now pushing 50. The term was shorthand for the time of day the group would meet, at the campus statue of Louis Pasteur, to smoke pot. Intent on developing their own discreet language, they made 420 code for a time to get high, and its use spread among members of an entire generation.

A quote from one of the Waldos in the High Times article states,

“We did discover we could talk about getting high in front of our parents without them knowing by using the phrase 420.”

Unfortunately, we do not have that same option.

So…

Simply put, 420 is a symbol of cannabis and its culture. Today, April 20th events are international and 4:20 pm has become sort of a world wide “burn time”.

Cannabis, also known as marijuana, marihuana, or ganja  refers to any number of preparations of the cannabis plant intended for human consumption as a drug, the most common of which being the natural herbal form.

The herbal form of the drug consists of mature female flowers and sub-tending leaves of pistillate (female) plants. The resinous form, known as hashish, consists primarily of glandular trichomes collected from the same plant material. The major biologically active chemical compound in cannabis is Δ⁹-tetrahydrocannabinol (delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol), commonly referred to as THC.

Humans’ consumption of cannabis pre-dates history. In the 20th century there was a considerable increase in its use for recreational, religious or spiritual, and medicinal purposes. It is estimated that about four percent of the world’s adult population (162 million) use cannabis annually and 0.6 percent (22.5 million) daily. The possession, use, or sale of psychoactive cannabis products became illegal in most parts of the world in the early 20th century. Since then, some countries have intensified the enforcement of cannabis prohibition while others have reduced the priority of enforcement.

SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannabis_(drug)