CO2 - Make your own booster for your indoor cannabis plantation
Andreas Leschke While humans, as well as animals, need oxygen for the combustion of nutrients in the cells to produce energy, which is necessary to carry out cell functions, plants need CO2 for this process.
Therefore, it is normal that our air contains both oxygen and CO2 to ensure smooth cell function for all living beings on earth.
Cannabis plants also grow and flower with the CO2 content in our air, otherwise they would not be able to exist outdoors.
However, experience shows that plants can be given more vitality, growth and flowering by adding additional CO2 to the air they breathe.
Excessive CO2 levels in the air we breathe are harmful to humans and animals. Therefore, to counter these concerns, I would like to point out that neither the expensive CO2 packs for plants sold online, nor our following recipe for mixing your own CO2, are harmful to humans or animals, as they do not lead to a dangerous CO2/oxygen balance in the air we breathe.
The internet offers a simple method for obtaining CO2 for your plants. However, in my opinion, this is completely unnecessary. The packs offered are priced well over €10 and guarantee a CO2 supply for approximately 1-3 months for a 5 square meter area!
Firstly, the one to three month timeframe is too imprecise to ensure that your beloved cannabis plants will be adequately boosted with CO2 over this period. Furthermore, for legal indoor growing, we only need an area of 60 cm x 60 cm in the grow box. Therefore, you can save yourself the expensive CO2 packs and mix your own CO2 for just a few cents.
The only thing needed to provide an area of 60 cm x 60 cm with sufficient CO2 so that the plants become more vital and stronger and thus achieve more growth and flowering is sugar, yeast and water.
To do this, measure or weigh 200 g of sugar (costs: approx. 20 cents) and add half a level espresso or teaspoon, or alternatively a quarter to a maximum of a third of a level coffee spoon with baking or fresh yeast (costs: approx. 10 cents) and mix the whole thing roughly with a spoon so that it is somewhat mixed.
Fill this into a 1.5-liter PET bottle (old water or sparkling water bottles from discount stores will do the trick). It's best to use a funnel to avoid spills.
Then fill the bottle with one liter of lukewarm water (approx. 30° - 40°) and gently swirl the bottle with the water to activate the fermentation process necessary for CO2 production.
You can now place the bottle with your BIO-CO2 in the grow tent, preferably in the middle so that all plants are ideally supplied with it and have a guaranteed CO2 supply for at least 3 weeks.
The amount of CO2 is now sufficient. A higher supply wouldn't harm your plants, but it wouldn't provide any additional benefit either, so it's unnecessary.
After 3 weeks, the contents of the bottle can simply be poured away and filled with new sugar, yeast and water to produce fresh CO2 for your ladies.
A small note at the end:
Please don't be surprised if it smells like liquor when you throw away the old CO2 mix. This method actually produces alcohol. This is obviously not suitable for consumption. DO NOT DRINK!
We thank the author Jorge Rieger for this blog post on the topic of the right equipment for your grow. Feel free to follow him on his Facebook account. --> Click here
