"Since the beginning, our goal has been to do a craft production. That is what our greenhouse is designed for. We have eight 300-square-meter greenhouses, with each nurturing over 600 plants," says Tomas Ribeiro, Head of Cultivation at the Portuguese company Herdade das Barrocas. The company has opted to grow bigger plants instead of doubling the amount of plants in the area. "We noticed there are fewer humidity issues to deal with and our yield increased as the bud sizes are bigger."
Click here to see a tour of the facility.
Turning to nutrients
Tomas explains that he was first a bit skeptical about whether adding nutrients was going to be worth it. "It's a bit of an investment, but you definitely see the difference at the end of the plant's life cycle." The company uses the Advanced Nutrients products. "When we started using the Big Bud booster, we saw a lot of difference. The yield increased a lot, to the point where we are actually producing almost double in some strains," Tomas says. "We take a day per week to add all the boosters."
Growing in a greenhouse means that you need to keep up with the weather changes throughout the year. "Sometimes we're using blackout curtains, other times we're augmenting with our lights. The bays are quite sizable, so we've added a lot of fans to keep the area cool and the humidity under control. It took a while to get the airflow right, but over time we managed to get it right. Growing in a greenhouse, you have to take into account the science of VPD, so that if you're operating at higher temperatures, you can still keep the plants in the optimal growing range. We notice a big difference between summer and winter, but we have a great team and we're able to adapt."
For more information:
Advanced Nutrients 
www.advancednutrients.com
Herdade das Barrocas 
cannabis.hbarrocas.com
Sign up for our daily Newsletter and stay up to date with all the latest news!
Subscribe I am already a subscriber