If you’re new to planting cannabis plants, you may be wondering, “how many plants can I fit in my 4×4 grow tent setup?”
Well, answering this may not be as simple as answering a math equation.
The answer depends on many factors, such as the planting technique you plan to use and certain variables in your grow tent. However, you can expect to harvest more or less six medium to large plants every three months.
Keep in mind that six won’t be a fixed number here. New growers should know the relationship between tent size and how many plants they can produce.
What Are the Different Sizes of a Grow Tent You Can Get?
First, you should know that you have many options for growing tent sizes. You have options including 2×2, 2×4, 3×3, 4×4, 5×5, 4×8, 10×10 tent sizes.
Your size tent should match the plants you’re planning to grow. Of course, smaller tent sizes can fit most small plants only. Large plants and more plants fit in bigger tent sizes.
What Are the Different Planting Methods to Use?
The first determinant of how many plants you can fit in your tent size is the planting method you will use.
Here are the most common training techniques when it comes to planting cannabis:
Sea of Green (SOG)
- Estimated Number of Plants: 16
- Space Needed per Plant: 1 sq. ft.
Have you ever heard of the Sea of Green or SOG technique? It’s a popular growing method because of its ease and speedy results. The idea is to keep your plant small to fit more plants in your growing area.
The result will look like a sea of green, hence its name.
This is how the Sea of Green method works. You trim the leaves about two weeks into the vegetative stage to direct the plant’s energy into bud growth. This accelerates your plants to go into the flowering stage earlier.
Expect to have small plants with commonly one bud site and smaller buds.
You’ll end up with about the same number of bud sites per area as you would with a few larger plants with many bud sites.
Think of the Sea of Green method as your shortcut to moving on to the flowering stage quicker. It allows you to have more harvests and harvest more often.What’s more is that with this method, you can grow different strains at once! Talk about maximizing your 4 x 4 grow tent.
Screen of Green (SCROG)
- Estimated Number of Plants: 3 to 4 plants
- Space Needed per Plant: 4 to 6 sq. ft.
Aside from the SOG technique, another planting method you can turn to is SCROG.
However, in contrast to the Sea of Green method, Screen of Green (SCROG) needs you to have more space.
It’s worth it because you get a higher grow tent yield. You can get 1.5 to 2 lbs. from about 3 plants versus 1 to 1.5 lbs. from about 16 plants.
You may be wondering, “how is this possible?” This is how.
The Screen of Green method uses a screen for your cannabis plant to grow horizontally during its vegetative stage. It brings the upper branches low and the lower stems high.This allows light to easily reach the lower portions of your plant to grow more buds. For better results, you can induce flowering when your plant covers 50% to 60% of the screen.
Topping or Pruning
- Estimated Number of Plants: 4 to 8 plants
- Space Needed per Plant: 2 to 4 sq. ft.
If you don’t want to do the extra work of putting up another setup for your plants, you can turn to topping or pruning. You’ll only need enough space between your plants to make this method effective.
This is a simple method that only requires you to do one thing. That is to remove the growth tip of your cannabis plant for it to split into two more shoots at the same place.
Naturally, cannabis plants usually grow one huge top or cola. Topping forces your cannabis plant to grow more than one cola, resulting in more yield in buds.
One pinch will make two tops, two pinches will make four, four will make eight, and so on. Expect your plants to grow sideways rather than up.
You’ll have a cannabis bush or an inverted Christmas tree with all your leaves concentrated at the top in no time.
Low-Stress Training (LST)
- Estimated Number of Plants: 4 to 6 plants
- Space Needed per Plant: 2 sq. ft.
Topping or pruning your cannabis plants has its limits. It puts them under a lot of stress, which can affect their growth. An alternative you can turn to is low-stress training.
Low-stress training prevents you from trimming your plant as often. This helps your plant bloom more quicker.
The method involves slowly moving the top of your plant out of the bottom’s way to access more light. This facilitates more bud growth for your plant.To do this, you’ll need to use twine, string, or wire to tie around the branches of your plant. This puts enough pressure on the branch to move your plant wherever you want it to go without putting too much stress on it.
What Cannabis Plants Are Good to Grow?
The strain you should grow depends on the season you’re growing them. This may sound confusing, but many cannabis growers face the same uncertainty. Most growers don’t even know the kind of strain they’re growing.
To give you an idea, the three most cultivated strains of cannabis are Indica, Sativa, and Hybrid.
Aside from the suitable season, growers should decide on the final product they’d like to harvest to know the strain they should grow.
How Much Light Exposure Do Your Grow Tents Need?
How much light you need in your growing space goes hand in hand with other factors, such as temperature, relative humidity, and growth stage.
It also depends on the type of light you choose.
- High-Intensity Discharge (HID) – One 400 to 600 W bulb per sqm. is a good rule of thumb for this grow room illumination, but you can scale down to a 250 W bulb because HIDs can run hot and increase temperature.
- Light Emitting Diode (LED) – You can get 3 W LED grow lights, which produce less heat and more usable light per watt.
Compact Fluorescent Light (CFL) – CFLs are better for vegetative growth and rooting clones, but they have only to supplement HPS lights during the bloom stage.
Factors to Consider When Managing Your Plants and Grow Tent
Theoretically, one plant needs at least one square foot of space to grow. However, that doesn’t mean that a 4×4 tent can hold 16 plants.
These are the factors that can affect your grow tent capacity:
Legal Restrictions
Individual growers can only grow up to 6 cannabis plants. Medically licensed growers can have a slight advantage regarding the number of plants they can grow.
Space
Where are you planning to put up your grow tent? Make sure to add space so you can easily walk around your grow tent.
If you want a small grow tent, consider checking out what the best small grow tents are in the market!
Price
How much are you willing to spend on your grow tent?
As a new grower, you should know that there is a wide range of brands for grow tents, illumination, and ventilation. You might even have to add a carbon filter for odor control.
Plant Size
What plant size are you aiming for? Smaller tents can only accommodate a few large plants.
Alongside the plant size, you should consider getting the best pots in the market! The right pot will make a plant flourish even more.
Lighting
What illumination system are you planning to use? If you want to use LED lights to save on electricity, you’ll have to have a grow tent at least 5 feet tall.
Tent Suck
Here’s something new growers don’t know about. Tent suck causes your walls to cave inwards as your ventilation system creates a negative pressure in your grow tent.
Because of this, you’ll have less space inside your tent.A 4 x 4 grow tent won’t exactly be 4×4. If you want to know the best 4×4 grow tents to get in the market, you can check the best 4×4 grow tent kits!
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
Aside from the question, “how many plants can I fit in a 4×4 tent?” here are your possible other questions answered.
How Many Plants Can Fit in a 4x4x6 Tent?
It depends. Like a 4 x 4 grow tent, how many plants you can fit in a 4 x 4 x 6 tent depends on many factors, including the growing style you’re using.
If we’re talking about producing a good outcome here, these are the best plant density you can have to achieve maximum growth in this setup size:
- If you’re growing SOG, you can have 4 to 16 plants per square meter.
- If you’re growing Pruning or Topping, you can have 1 plant per square meter.
- If you’re growing with Low-Stress Training, you can have 4 plants per square meter.
- If you’re growing SCROG, you can have 1 plant per square meter.
Remember to consider the other factors in your plant growth to grow healthy and high-yielding cannabis plants.
How Many Lights Do I Need for a 4×4 Grow Tent?
You can have 2 of 100 to 200 watts each in terms of LED light.
Choose lower wattage for vegetative plants and choose higher wattage for flowering plants.
Keep in mind the right distancing as well. Place your light around 3 inches above your vegetative plants and 6 inches above your flowering plants.
What Size Grow Light Do I Need for a 4×4 Grow Tent?
A 4 x 4 grow tent needs about 500 to 600-watt LED light.
The average wattage required per square foot is 32 watts, but this can vary depending on the plant you’re growing.
Conclusion
How many plants you can fit in your grow tent depends on many factors, including your planting method.
However, it would be best to remember that the number of cannabis plants you’re growing won’t correspond to your total yield.
Decide on which you want to prioritize and choose the planting method for you.
