8 Tips for Growing Death Star Marijuana [Grower’s Guide]

If you are a marijuana lover, there are few things more satisfying than growing your favorite strain at home. This guide provides you with eight tips to help you get the best result when cultivating Death Star. It is a clone-only strain that first became available in the early part of the 21st century.

It was initially bred in Ohio and is a cross of Sour Diesel and Sensi Star. The breeders named Death Star after the gigantic enemy space station in Star Wars. It is an indica-dominant (75%) hybrid with a THC content ranging from 18% to 27%. As a result, it is not a smoke for newbies because it is so potent, and it acts fast.

Although you get a cerebral high, Death Star’s effects on the body are most striking. You will feel so euphoric and high that you may see Darth Vader aboard the Death Star! When you take a high enough dose in the evening, it works as an effective sleep aid.

It may also help with depression, stress, anxiety disorders, and insomnia. If you are wound up tighter than Kim Kardashian’s pants, this is the marijuana strain for you.

1 – Growing Death Star – Is an Indoor or Outdoor Setting Better?

Overall, Death Star is a novice grower’s dream because it is so easy to cultivate. It is incredibly resistant to most molds and mildew and doesn’t seem to appeal to pests. If you elect to grow it indoors, its flowering time is 8-9 weeks. You receive a yield of approximately 14 ounces per square meter planted.

Outdoors, Death Star prefers a moderate to a high temperature range of 68 to 80 degrees Fahrenheit, with relatively low humidity. As Death Star grows relatively dense, it is susceptible to bud rot if you expose it to excess moisture. It is usually available for harvest in mid-October outside and provides approximately 12 ounces per plant.

2 – Consider Using a Greenhouse

Using a greenhouse will boost your overall yield. As we mentioned in #1, Death Star is likely attacked by bud rot if grown outdoors in humid conditions. With a greenhouse, you get to control the light cycle. You can ensure your crop remains free from unseasonably harsh weather conditions.

Unfortunately, we now live in a time where the climate is no longer as reliable as it once was. Farmers are reporting excessively hot summers in one part of the world. Meanwhile, in another location thousands of miles away, farmers complain of excessive wet spells.

When you grow your Death Star in a greenhouse, you keep it protected from the unpredictable outdoor climate.

It is common for unexpected heavy rainfall to damage plants and cause bud rot. Fortunately, a greenhouse protects plants from the rain. You can also install heaters, air conditioning units, and dehumidifiers. You can do all of the above in your basement grow room, of course. However, with a greenhouse, you have the bonus power of the sun.

3 – Handling Bud Rot

Also known as botrytis cinerea, bud rot is the primary cause of concern for Death Star growers. It is a form of mold that develops in the core of your weed’s buds. The infection begins inside the bud and spreads outwards. As a result, you may not spot the problem until it is far too late. When left untreated, bud rot spreads all over the plant and produces spores that spread throughout the garden.

Initially, buds turn white, and they become unusable when they turn grey and slimy. You can remove the infected area and try to grow the rest of the plant. However, there is a danger that the rot has set in across your garden. It is no exaggeration to say a bad bud rot infestation could destroy your crop.

As there is no way to cure bud rot, your best option is prevention. It thrives on low temperatures, high humidity, dense buds, weak plant immune systems, and inadequate ventilation. Death Star is a prime candidate for bud rot because of its dense buds. This is especially the case if you grow it in a cold and wet room with low airflow.

As well as training and pruning your plants invest in a high-quality dehumidifier, lighting system, and air-conditioning unit. Also, make sure you water your crop early in the morning. If you grow outdoors and it rains heavily, go through your garden and shake each leaf to get the water off.

4 – Choose Organic Nutrients

It is vital to pay attention to the initial quality of the soil. You can save time by purchasing pre-mixed soils. They will contain all the nutrients your crop needs. However, these so-called ‘super’ soils are expensive. You can potentially save hundreds of dollars by creating a super soil. This process also aids the environment.

When building your soil, choose loam as it offers better drainage. It is easier to work with than clay, sand, or silt soils. When you buy basic soil, make sure you check to see the ingredients and nutrients it offers. If you want to use soil from your garden, pay for a soil test to ascertain the quality.

Although your Death Star plants require dozens of nutrients, nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium are the building blocks. Bat guano, crustacean meal, and worm castings provide ample nitrogen. You can get phosphorus from rock dust and bone meal. Wood ash and kelp meal take care of the crop’s potassium needs.

Once you’re happy with your soil, mix it up. You can use a spade, but a rototiller is faster. Add manure with water every few days until the soil feels cool between your fingers. Some gardeners swear by annual tilling because they add further amendments to ensure the soil remains fertile.

5 – Play Music to Your Plants

This idea is not as preposterous as it sounds. According to old research by Dr. T. C. Singh, of the Annamalai University in India, playing music to marijuana plants helps them to grow!

As you know, sound waves are little more than vibrations that travel through a medium such as water or air. In humans, sound waves result in our eardrums vibrating. They convert pressure into electric energy that our brain says is sound. Plants are a little different because they feel sound waves.

It seems that when plants experience the vibration from sound waves, they can deliver nutrients more efficiently.

In Dr. Singh’s research, he discovered that plants enjoyed a 72% increase in biomass and a 20% increase in height when exposed to music. He also found that germinated seeds produced plants with more leaves and grew larger and heavier than average.

In one MythBusters’ episode, the team used green beans to test this theory. They divided the beans into seven separate groups and exposed each one to a different type of music, or encouraging/discouraging speech from a male or female.

It turned out that intense death metal had the best results. You’ll probably feel silly playing music to your marijuana plants, but it makes sense that Death Star would like death metal!

6 – Maintaining the Right pH Levels

The pH scale is a measure of a solution’s alkalinity or acidity. The scale goes from 0 (most acidic) to 14 (most alkaline). As the pH scale is based on logarithms, it only needs a small change to make an enormous difference. For example, a solution with a pH of 4.0 is 1,000 times more acidic than pure water at 7.0!

The ideal pH for soil is between 6.0 and 6.8. For a hydroponics setup, the ideal pH range is between 5.5 and 6.0.

Don’t focus all of your attention on the pH of the water you use to feed your plants. The nutrients you add also play a significant role in pH. For example, Nitrogen sources such as fertilizer, legumes, and manure either contain or form ammonium. The result is an increase in soil acidity (a decrease in pH) unless the plant directly absorbs the ammonium ions. The higher the rate of nitrogen fertilization, the greater the acidity of the soil.

As a rule of thumb, it takes 1.8 pounds of pure calcium carbonate to counteract the residual acidity of 1 pound of nitrogen as ammonium. The nitrate formed may also combine with magnesium, calcium, and potassium to leach from the topsoil into the subsoil. Once again, this causes the pH level to drop.

If you find that the soil is too acidic after using nitrogen fertilizer, you can increase pH and fertilizer efficiency, and decrease soil acids. Did you know that when you use nitrogen fertilizer on soil with a pH of 7.0, you waste none of the fertilizer?

However, if you use it on soil with a pH of 5.0, over 53% is wasted! Check the pH of your soil regularly to make sure it doesn’t fall outside the recommended ranges.

7 – Growing Death Star on a Budget

You can grow Death Star from start to finish for a lot less than you think. There are many ways to cultivate on the cheap, but you’ll end up with low-quality bud. Here are a few essential pieces of equipment you’ll need, complete with low-budget options.

Genetics

Instead of purchasing cheap seeds, make sure you pay whatever it takes to get top quality. As Death Star is an autoflowering strain, it can begin flowering within 2-3 weeks of germination. This cuts down on expenditure during the vegetative stage. It also enables you to invest money in important weed growing equipment.

Create Your Own Grow Tent

There are grow boxes available online. These are rigid grow tents with ventilation, lights, and a few other amenities. However, you may find a better deal by checking out the prices of individual components. You can create a DIY grow tent that has twice the area of the tiny readymade grow boxes on sale. These boxes also provide weak light and arguably don’t offer value for money.

Lighting & Electricity Bills

If you want to save money on your energy bill, invest in LED lights. Fluorescent bulbs are cheaper to buy, but LED lights provide more heat and a lower energy bill. You should also invest in an exhaust system to vent heat. If your grow room is small enough, use a strong fan rather than investing heavily in a sophisticated AC unit.

Reflective walls help light bounce around the room so that it reaches every part of your plant. Adding them to your grow area will increase the yield without raising the cost of your energy bill.

Nutrients

Store-bought nutrients are convenient and expensive. If you go down this route, you should focus on a brand’s cheaper ‘base’ product lines. They usually have enough nutrients to do the job. Whisper it quietly, but most brands sell you nutrient lines that contain far too much nitrogen, potassium, and phosphorus. All you need is up to three bottles of a base nutrient line if growing weed residentially.

One final note; make sure you purchase nutrients with a long shelf life. Unfortunately, most nutrients that last a long time after the container is opened are not organic.

While there are never any guarantees, you can grow Death Star for a reasonable price. All you need is the seeds or a cutting; a small DIY grow tent, reflective walls, soil, nutrients, lighting, and a fan to provide airflow. Additions such as supplements and CO2 buckets aren’t necessary if you’re a first-timer. We would recommend investing in a thermometer, hygrometer, and pH meter to measure temperature, humidity, and pH.

8 – Keep Your Mouth Closed

Although medical marijuana is now legal in 33 states plus D.C., not all of these states allow you to grow it.

Check your state’s cultivation laws to see if you can grow, and how much is legal. Next, don’t tell anyone about your marijuana garden. Even if it is legal in your state, it is federally illegal, so you could technically get arrested. By announcing to the world that you have an indoor marijuana garden, you also give thieves a new target.

You need to seal your grow space to ensure that the smell of weed does not spread around the neighborhood. A good ventilation system will also help you. Fans and ventilation systems make a lot of noise that could attract unwanted attention. Consider investing in foam floor mats or acoustic treatment to soundproof the room as much as you can.

Last but not least, don’t sell your cannabis unless you have a license to do so. It isn’t worth ruining your garden, incurring a huge fine, and going to jail to make a few hundred bucks.