8 Advanced Outdoor Growing Techniques

If you want to reap massive yields with resinous flower buds under the sun, our advanced outdoor growing techniques can take your backyard garden to the next level.

Strategic pruning, bending, tie-downs, and other gentle and aggressive cannabis training techniques can focus your cannabis plant’s energy on growing trichome-rich flower buds full of flavor and aroma.

Of course, these techniques require trial-and-error. Even the most advanced growers took their time perfecting these methods. Growing marijuana outdoors comes with its own advantages and disadvantages.

From battling the region's climate to choosing seeds that can thrive in that environment, there are many cultivation factors to consider. We recommend trying these advanced outdoor growing techniques when you’ve mastered the basics.

Top Advanced Outdoor Growing Techniques

1. Topping Cannabis

Generally, cannabis plants have one main stem that grows vertically. A training technique called topping involves the removal of the, you guessed it, top of the plant. But, why would you want to purposely damage and stress your plant?

While it may seem counterintuitive, cutting off the top of the main stem causes a plant’s 2 lower growth tips underneath to grow into their own stems and, eventually, into colas in the flowering stage.

2. Fimming Cannabis

Similar to topping, fimming is a type of high-stress training (HST) technique that removes the top of the plant. Instead of completely removing the top of the main stem, however, fimming requires removal of about 50-75% of the stem.

Think of it as a botched topping technique. Despite its messy look, fimming can result in four new stalk growths compared to 2 when topped. In addition, both techniques can spur lateral branch growth over vertical growth.

3. Super Cropping Cannabis 

Super cropping is a form of HST that involves gently crushing (without completely breaking) a part of the top branches from your cannabis plant to create an even canopy. Crushing the inner core of a healthy branch makes it more pliable and easy to bend as you please.

At the site that's been compressed, you can bend the stems at a 90-degree angle away from the weed plants to allow the lower bud sites to get enough light. Perform the technique across the entire canopy.

4. Monster Cropping Cannabis

Monster cropping involves taking healthy cuttings from a mother plant during the third week of the flowering stage instead of during the vegetative stage, which is the traditional method of cloning.

By taking the cutting during the flowering stage, the plant re-enters the vegetative stage and may produce many more branches full of nodes. If done right, monster cropping yields extremely bushy plants with tons of new bud sites on top of your mother plant’s buds.

5. Screen of Green (SCROG) Cannabis

The screen of green (SCROG) method is an effective way to increase your cannabis yields. In this advanced technique, you must stretch out and weave the branches through a trellis netting using posts to hold the netting in place.

Essentially, you use the netting to train the plants to grow horizontally, which increases air flow and provides light for the entire plant. In addition, SCROG can help support heavy branches and buds from breaking off.

6. Flushing Cannabis

Flushing is basically a method of removing as much of the nutrients from the plant as possible. By only feeding your plant water, you can improve the quality of your buds right before harvest. However, timing is everything.

Growers can flush their plants of nutrients starting anywhere from a few days to a couple of weeks before harvest. Flushing can also be performed when nutrients are locked out from overfeeding or during the transitioning of the growth and feeding cycles.

7. Lollipopping Cannabis

Lollipopping involves removing most of the lower and underdeveloped branches of your plant and leaving behind the top and most productive branches. In the end, your plants will have a lollipop look with a thin lower stem and a bushy upper part.

Essentially, you're removing the branches and leaves that don't get enough light to focus growth on the bud sites on top.

8. Main-Lining Cannabis

Main-lining combines LST and HST techniques such as lollipopping and topping to create a manifold of branches directly connected to the main stem.

When a young weed plant has developed about five or six nodes you can start to top the plant above the third node and remove all foliage under that node to focus growth on everything above.

In addition, the new branches are gently tied down for them to grow at a 90-degree angle. Subsequent topping and tying eventually creates 8 colas at the very least on an even canopy.

Learn From the Pros: Cannabis Training University

If you've got the basics of growing cannabis down (or even if you don't), Cannabis Training University can give you the knowledge you need to optimize your cannabis garden.

Dive deep into a comprehensive curriculum assembled by master growers with decades of experience in the industry. CTU is perfect for growers of all skill levels. Our curriculum is simple enough for anyone to understand and detailed enough to help you become a master grower yourself. Earn your online cannabis certification today.