Welcome @cannassentials and @brian.worrell!
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Thank you very much for this opportunity to join this unique and wonderful collection of innovators. I have been working the last couple of years on harnessing the power of UV in Horticulture…from basil to cucumbers and strawberries to cannabis. In full disclosure, I work for world’s largest UV LED manufacturer, but I promise I am not here to sell to anyone…only exchange ideas and progress and more importantly learn more from you all!
When I am not studying and testing effects of UV on Secondary Plant Metabolites…you can find me with my wife and two boys (1 and 3 yrs old) watching our Red Sox, Patriots, Celtics, and Canadiens play throughout the year.
I cannot wait to meet many of you at the various trade shows and conferences this year…starting next week in Denver!
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Welcome @cannassentials, @brian.worrell, and @pbarber!
It’s good to see multiple sectors of industry coming together, not just growers. Seeing business-people and IT services involved is a great leap forward for the cannabis industry.
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Greetings!!
We are Tanana Herb Company located in Fairbanks AK and are proud to be a part of this community! We are the sixth licensed cultivator in the state & have harvested several times in this new market. We look forward to watching the new LED tech develop in the coming months.
Thank you Nate and Nick!!!
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Hunter,
We are looking at several styles and brands of LED’s. Are you a supplier or
have any suggestions? We have run HPS for years & im excited to see a close
comparison to LED’s!
Thank you,
Sam Hachey
THC
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Hi Sam!
I’m not a supplier, but I know a few companies that people have been talking about. I have seen the Solar System 550 in action, and I really liked it (had a sweet digital control that you could customize the output with). Some of the people I’ve talked to have suggested Fluence LEDs, California Light Works, and LumiGrows too.
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@tananaherbcompany say hello to @garymorgan, he is a fellow AK grower!
Here is his introduction post: Introduce yourself! - #26 by garymorgan
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Good day!
My name is Andrew and I’m the founder of Roboplant. Our product - is an intelligent automated system for growing plants at home. You can grow many plants, but most of our audience - marijuana growers. It is no secret that “groving” is not very complicated task, but in order to grow a really good product, you need to take into account the many nuances. At the moment, we want to gather feedback from fans and professionals in this area.
What are the features we have made already:
- Optimal settings for several varieties of marijuana
- The mode of the day and night, for the period of plant growth and the change of light during the flowering period
- Recommendations for the date change the time of day and night (optimal for each class of marijuana)
- Temperature sensor. With increasing temperature, the system can turn off the lamp (to stop heating) and leave only work ventilation. Once the temperature drops again, the system will include lighting.
- Humidity sensor. By reducing moisture below the recommendations of the system includes a humidifier. After this time in the n-minute moisture check. Once it reaches the optimum value for your plants humidifier disabled.
- CO2 sensor. It often happens that the quality of the plant for maximum lacks CO2 in air. In this case, we have the ability to connect with Balon CO2 through the electronic gear. That will allow to automatically add CO2 while reducing its value is lower than optimal.
- Soil moisture sensor. Each pot of plants established one or more soil moisture sensors. By reducing moisture below the threshold value, the water pump and the watering pot.
- Automatic watering wheelbarrow and water level. You can set a capacity of 5 l (up to any size) of water for irrigation. And as the water level sensor installed in the tank. Your plants will be watered automatically, given the evidence of soil moisture sensors. If you do not come our watering, you can always change the settings of which are considered the best.
- PH sensor and automatic control and value PH. At different stages of maturation of the plants it needs water with a different PH. Our system is able to add acid to smoothly raise or lower the PH. Just set the desired value, and the system will change and it will check the final value.
- Automatic dosage of fertilizers. At each stage of the growth of plants need different elements in different proportions. The system itself will add the required amount of millions of fertilizers are necessary to your plant in the current stage of growth.
- If desired, you can connect HD. The camera and monitor your plants. After the harvest, we will show Timelapse video from your plant, you can show your friends.
- Connect any devices powered by 220 or 12 volts. They are managed in the outer mode, and automatic timer.
We plan to deliver the system for 2 categories of users:
- All-inclusive system: pay, planted and forgotten.
- A system for professionals, where each element of the system you will be able to choose their own, to change any settings. In this case
you buy only the control unit, sensors and software for access from the Internet and mobile applications.
The equipment that you can own (for professionals) to collect and connect to the system:
- lighting
- Ventilation and filter Carboline
- humidifier
- CO2 generator
- Irrigation system
- Capacity 2 to increase and decrease PH
- 3 containers for different types of fertilizers
Now we are engaged in the design of the application and the search for the optimal values for the autonomous growth and flowering of your plants. Therefore we are looking for people willing to test our prototypes and provide guidance and feedback.
And also we are looking for partners and suppliers.
PS: our website is in development, for those interested, you can view our presentation: Roboplant - smart grow platform - Google Slides
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Hey @tananaherbcompany ! I just had an email from Leslea and she mentioned you saw me here. I’m glad you’ve made the connection, and hope to discuss our local industry when you’ve got some time. Hopefully more Alaska growers will come aboard soon. I’ve often thought what we’re lacking in Alaska is a forum like this where we can discuss whats happening locally. I hope to talk with you more soon.
I’ve been away for over a week, so I’m glad I’ve finally had time to catch up a little and see whats happening. My license goes up for a vote this Thursday by the Alaska Marijuana Control Board, and I’ve been swamped with construction, fire marshall submittals, my 9-5 job, and a wife and 2 year old. Life is good though!
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Hey Sam @tananaherbcompany! I’ve researched LED lighting extensively and wanted to start out with LED’s but my wants and budget couldn’t see eye to eye. I plan to do the same as you’re doing by switching out as soon as possible. One reason I’m going with vertical lighting is the inexpensive cost of just a ballast and mogul socket assembly. It won’t hurt as much removing 6 month old lights and replacing with LEDS I figure. It’s a process though… got to have a chicken in order to lay an egg. Congrats on your third harvest. I’ve contacted Leslea a few times now and I’ve benefitted from her advice and perspective. I’m hoping to meet James for the first time while he’s here in Petersburg.
There’s a nice selection of good LED manufacturers out there but I wanted to mention Lumigrow. I have a contact with Lumigrow and had a really great deal that might still be available if you’re interested. They just came out with a new version of their pro 650 (new version is the pro 650e). They offered me a substantial markdown to close out their pro 650 inventory. I’ll private message you the price if you’re interested and the Sales rep. It’s a very nice light with some nice features. The other type of light you might want to shop around for is full spectrum COB LED’s. I was originally thinking of building my own, which would have worked great and saved me a lot of money, but I couldn’t get around the lack of UL or ETL listing that a DIY lacks. (Sigh) The electrician in me knows not to cut that corner in a commercial setting. The full spectrum lights are the way to go IMO. If you haven’t seen any YouTube vids of Grow Mau5 and ChilLed, then check them out. They’re technical artists/wizards and have tested out LED light designs, different chips etc… They’re very informative. Greengenes is another who’s taken it a different direction and has started his own Commercial LED company called Pacific Light Concepts www.pacificlightconcepts.com
There’s definately some other brands worth looking at too. Spectrum King has a very unique high powered COB LED. I personally like the design of the Fluence Bioengineering lights like the Spyder and they have some interesting veg and side lighting too. Illumitex has some nice lights also. There’s a company in Sitka that has gone with all Heliospectra.
Heliospectra is a very nice light in that you can customize the light spectrum. This might be the only light you can do this with, but I’m not sure it has much advantage in commercial cannabis cultivation. With Cannabis you really want to maximize the spectrum the plants need most (McCree Curve). A full spectrum light most closely matches this IMO. Customizing Spectrum is really meant for research where they’re seeing how different light spectrums effect lettuce yields. Personally I want others to experiment and I’m going to do what that research has proven to be most effective for what I’m trying to do. Quality and Quantity 
Here’s my analogy on this; I was an audiophile in my teen years with many thousands of dollars invested into stereo equipment for a lowrider truck. I could have fine tuned each frequency to the exact setting to minimize distortion and had a very clean sound for any type of music I listened to (Full Spectrum Light), or had equalizer settings for certain soundtracks (Customized Spectrum/Heliospectra), but for the most part I cranked the volume up, maxed out the gain control and rattled loose every bolt in that truck (HPS). I’m now hoping my Cannabis business will allow me to afford hearing aids someday.
Ok… There’s some fuel for people to respond to…You should reach out to @Nate from GrowersHouse.com too. He’s done a ton of Lighting reviews and I’m sure would have some good recommendations.
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Welcome aboard @pbarber ! UV light is another topic I’d love to hear more about too. I think its UVB that is supposed to be very beneficial for Cannabis? Maybe you can shed some more light on that? I’m wanting to experiment with some UVC for sterilization and proactive mold/mildew prevention also.
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Thanks Gary! You are correct regarding UVB being the region under investigation for not just Cannabis but all plants. Things are progressing nicely and we can really see a difference in cannabinoids and terpenoids with roughly 5 to 8 DLI applied at the beginning of flowering. We are also seeing some epigenetic memory factors that are creating a little extra layer of complexity…basically, plants with genes tied to high elevation parents need more UV, whereas plants with genes from sea-level need very little. Really cool stuff!
WE have started to apply our disinfection application to plants, but you have to be very careful you don’t burn the plant…we are actually thinking about being a little proactive with this, in that we are applying UVC a very low doses/DLI throughout the seedling/veg stage…to prevent mold and mildew ever showing up by increasing the plant’s resiliency
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@snekaaa Welcome! We’re starting to see a number of incredible automation inventions coming out. Do you think at some point an entire cannabis company’s growing process will be automated?
@garymorgan My understanding is that UVB does microscopic damage to the plants, which actually encourages growth factors, causing the plant to grow faster.
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@Hunter - That interesting and makes sense, I haven’t looked too deeply into UVB yet. I hope to learn more from you guys that study its effect and how it works. I wonder how much is needed and for how long. I looked up DLI that @pbarber mentioned in his last message. Here’s the wiki definition;
Daily light integral (DLI) describes the number of photosynthetically active photons that are delivered to a specific area over a 24-hour period.
@pbarber, you mentioned UVB applied at the beginning of flower. Are we talking about 1-2 weeks, and then stop?
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@Hunter I have not seen any data to support the growth claim using UVB…you are correct that it could cause microscopic damage (associated with DNA damage) but that is usually associated with UVC wavelengths or prolonged exposure using UVB.
@garymorgan correct definition of DLI–thank you wiki–but in this case we are not talking about PAR but rather Photo-biologically active radiation (ill let the grow community make an acronym for that) but it basically covers UV, IR and any other wavelength that generates a response from plant not associated with Photosynthesis. Our studies have shown that exposure can be throughout the total flowering stage and then yes you stop.
Now we are also working on a project/product that is UVB applied a lower DLIs throughout the entire grow cycle from seedling to harvest that will enable greater resistance and resiliency to mold, bacteria, mildew etc…and when the plant reaches flowering, you simply turn the supplemental UVB fixture up in current to increase the photon flux to achieve UVR8 activation and signaling for secondary plant metabolite production, which is where your goodies such as cannabinoids and terpenoids are made from.
I was asked to create a separate thread to “Debunk or De-mystify UV technology with cannabis”…so stay tuned…I plan on doing that to educate everyone of fact from fiction and whats really going on
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Welcome Myron of @cannassentials!
Your company sounds impressive. I’m an Oregonian transplanted in Alaska, and haven’t been home in over 7 years. I’ll be looking for your flowers when my feet hit Oregon ground this summer! I hope to hear more about your company and how you grow.
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Nick - Thanks for the opportunity to join the growers network. I head up Advanced Grow Technologies, a company whose members have extensive experience in energy and water efficiency. On staff, we have growers and engineers who have developed and implemented cost saving energy and water applications in various markets, all of which focus on reducing costs and bring down the ROI on a project.
As this market matures, we will see prices per pound reduce significantly and utility costs that were once considered a nuisance come to have a major impact on the bottom line. Many growers don’t realize that nearly 45% of indoor and greenhouse costs go toward paying utilities. As more and more states (and countries) gear up for recreational cannabis, states will be watching energy and water consumption very closely.
The industry needs to embrace Passive Thermal Storage to offset HVAC costs or demand side management or geothermal heat pump systems or just about any efficiency approach that have become standard in more mature industries. Same on the water side – recirculation, efficient dehumidification, discharge issues or other water related efficiencies never seem to get much mention in the cannabis press.
AGT was developed to address these issues and more. Our approach is individualized for each client. It has been our experience that companies have their own ways of doing things.
Our office in Oceanside CA concentrates on all phases of water efficiency, from system design and implementation to client advocacy for water rights. We work with clients helping them prepare for the upcoming legislation as it applies to water use and discharge. Water is going to be a big deal, not just in the west coast states, but here in the east as well, and those that are prepared will flourish.
I’d like to share a company we are partnering with that might be of interest. They have one of the most exciting advances we have seen: passive thermal storage.
Using an engineered approach specifically designed for cannabis , they can dramatically reduce the HVAC consumption in a grow site. This technology has been used successfully in many markets, including horticulture, but this is the first time it is being applied to growing cannabis. With no moving parts and a lifespan of over 25 years and a strong ROI, you can maintain the temperature in your flowering grow room at a constant 68 – 72 degrees, and your vegetative grow room at a constant 74 - 78 degrees, using little or no costly HVAC.
We’re looking for growers who are looking to reduce the cost of HVAC as well as energy and water consumption. If you know anyone who might be interested, we’re looking for a pilot project - either new construction or retrofit.
If we can be of any assistance – let me know.
Bob
Advanced Grow Technologies
508.380.0003
bob@advancedgrowtechnologies.com
www.advancedgrowtechnologies.com
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Welcome @bob and great learning more about your company. The geothermal heat pump systems in particular sound interesting, not just from a cost point of view but also from a resource conservation perspective.
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Hi All! My name is Bethany Sherman and I own and operate OG Analytical, a licensed and accredited cannabis testing facility in Eugene, OR. I’m happy to be a resource for testing information as I’m available. www.oganalytical.com
I was born and raised here in Oregon, but spent about 5 years learning business development and marketing in Silicon Valley. I took a few classes at UC Berkeley before getting pulled head first into a career as a Project Manager and Business Development Exec for a small software firm, which I had the great opportunity to help grow over 200% in the first two years. I moved back to Oregon in 2013 shortly after my mom was diagnosed with MS and through a lot of personal research, decided to shift gears and launch a campaign to improve consumer safety for immune-compromised cannabis consumers like my mom. That was the start of OG Analytical.
Thanks for inviting me into your community!
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