Tips,ricks and stories from experienced gurilla growers.
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If you can’t have full sun, chose morning sun. Earlier ,the better. Daybreak brings a red shift light just when the sun is coming up.
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Finding photoperiod plants that will finish in your area, don’t put all your eggs in one basket.
I would plant many many seeds knowing most will be lost to the elements and pests. Give them minimal attention. I might water or feed one time. A few grams here, a few grams there…
Also fem autos are interesting for this purpose as the dont require 12/12 to flower.
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I was a small town commercial grower for 43 years. Everything you have mentioned is very helpful. I would add, keep them short or tie them down with green cord. Try to plant on the edge of the woods slightly under the tree line. Dont put a lot of plants together in one spot. Plant them among the surrounding plants and dont clear the ground around them. They will stretch to find enough light on their own.
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Guerrilla growing can be the easiest and most rewarding growing you can do. It can also be the largest disappointment you can have. Everything depends on your methods.
Here are a few tips I have learned over the years:
- Pick a strain that will acclimate easily to the conditions of your local environment. If you get a lot of rain or have humid conditions pick strains on the Sativa side or are resistant to mold.
- Pick a grow spot that gets sun all day, shade is your enemy.
- Choose a spot to grow in well. Make sure it’s far away from any foot traffic.
- When checking plants (do this as little as possible) always approach from different directions so you don’t make a path to your grow spot.
- If possible pick a huge briar patch, clear out the center by cutting a few of the briar bushes down and grow inside of the patch. This way no one can see them and deer and animals will have a hard time getting to them.
- Grow not far from a source of water. If a drought or lack of rain happens you can hide a bucket in the center of your patch and water them.
- Use clones from proven females, you don’t want to have to come back to cull males or lose plants due to harvesting males.
- Tell NO ONE, not you best friend, wife or anyone else!
Good luck and happy growing!
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I use to take a cruise down the interstate highways and look for suitable locations by mile marker posts along the highway. If the spot looked good, I would park the vehicle on the shoulder of the road, wait for traffic to clear, just long enough to run down to the fence denoting highway property, again waiting for traffic to clear, climb the fence and plant one or two seeds. Usually just one.
Back in the vehicle, I would write down which mile marker this was done at. One year, I did a 60 mile run on an east/west interstate planting on both sides, although I learned that the north side is usually better because of the direct sunlight.
It was too cool to be driving down the highway at 70 mph and looking for some shrubberies at those particular mile markers. Imagine my delight and surprise 4 to 5 months later when driving by at the speed limit, I could see some very respectable specimens as a direct result of my Johnny Appleseed approach. Never more than two at any given spot.
These spots the other side of a highway fence never saw pedestrian foot traffic, or hunters as no self respecting hunter would sit next to a highway fence while waiting for a whitetail.
Less of them get molested by critters, especially deer when they are growing 10 to 20 yards from the highway.
I never watered them or went back until it was time to take them home, which I did after dark as there was less traffic, as well as trying to carry some of these shrubberies to the truck was so very obvious. Very scary at harvest time, and yet so highly rewarding.
That has worked for me a few times back in days of yore.
I’ve never mentioned that before to anyone, and now that our State has legal recreational use, I can now see a bunch of you looking off to the sides of the highway when passing mile markers. 
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Some solid advice here as always. In the 90’s it all i did. I kept a couple moms and would take alot of cuttings. After a few years i learned to except your going to lose half or more. Plant extra!
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Plant a few in different areas just in case someone cuts down your plants
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I liked to grow somewhere where there was a stream. Not near the stream, but where there was one. I’d always take a fishing rod (always had a license of course) and that was my reason for being there. Parking on the side of a road can make people suspicious of what you’re doing (poaching, growing weed, burying a body ) Parking at a stream with a fishing rod = “what a nice man”.
@Oldjoints gave you some good info…NOT leaving a trail is very important. Clones are a good idea, though I never had a problem pulling out males either. I always looked after my crop, I was in there once every 2 weeks, weeding, fertilizing, watering if I had to, though I started using cedar swamps so rarely had to.
Find places you hate walking into…if it’s easy, odds are it’ll get found. That’s why I liked swamps…bugs and wet feet will turn a lot of people away.
I carried camo gear in a small backpack. Regular clothes in, change in the bush, regular clothes out.
Plant smaller patches. Big patches are easy to spot from the air. Better to have many small ones. And don’t make your patch rectangular shaped…make it look natural.
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We used an acronym in the Army: OCOKA.
Observation
Cover and Concealment
Obstacles
Key Terrain Features
Avenues of Approach
-Observation means what you can see from that spot, and whether you can be seen
-Cover and concealment means places you can hide plants or even yourself
-Obstacles, as the name suggests are things that make approaching or leaving the area difficult
-Key Terrain Features are hills, draws, ravines, or even man-made structures
-Avenues of Approach are the possible ways into the area and how likely they are to be used
Remember, the cops are looking for certain things like debris (trash) obvious trails, unusual breaks in vegetation and spots of green on other wise bare ground, obvious man-made clearings and anything else indicating human activity in a place where there isn’t supposed to be any.
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LITFA….it’s a frikkin weed let it grow. Throw some 14/14/14 osmocote in the hole with some worm castings and come back a few weeks later….
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I would take number 8 and make it number 1. All the guys that I knew who got busted for growing ( and they were many) , got drunk and showed their plants to someone. Dont do it. Also I dont have anymore 
so these are for everyone.
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I’m sitting by the side of the road right now because my wife’s car broke down. AAA says it’s going to be an hour. So I did a little scouting, and found some perfect spots right here. This road runs through nature that for certain reasons I know nobody is going to build there - if you know what I mean.
Anyway forest service crews just went through and cleaned up for fire risk, and there are Gambel Oak thickets just getting started. Between six and twenty inches tall, with little clearings everywhere. There’s nothing here that would interest anyone, either. I’m on a six mile stretch and thinking about planting five plants around here. I’d plant more but I’ll have to visit them frequently because this is a dry area.
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I was wondering if any of you might be able to help me with a recommendation for a lower odor strain that would finish fairly fast. Midwest outdoor. My initial thought is Cindy 99 but I would love some input.
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VX-1000 is supposed to be loud, but after growing a few that have been really quiet I think it’s a good stealth strain that’s always been good in the potency and buzz department.
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Here is a stand of " staghorn sumac". It is about 10 - 12 feet tall.
And this is what it looks like underneath the canopy.
It is the perfect environment for healing in seedlings.
Here are some Sheelavathi from @Tracker .
When the seedlings have recovered from transplanting, you can break individual branches off the sumac to open the tree canopy a little at a time to get more light on your plants.
Here are some Peshawar sativas from @Upstate growing in dappled sunlight.
The old-timers know that the best head stash comes from growing in partial shade at the forest edge.
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That looks like a nice spot to set up. Just to clarify, @Oldjoints grew the Sheelavathi seeds in his garden. He gave me excess seeds to give away, but he’s the one who did the seed increase.
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Ok. Thank you for that clarification @Tracker .
And thank you @Oldjoints for keeping this strain alive for the future. May the Universe bless you.
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I used to tie the tops of the sumac out as the plants got bigger, Eventually letting the plants’ leaves replace the sumac leaves. Soil is usually good beneath that conopy too, in old sumac patches. Plants are looking good!
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Midwest corn fields were the best and most reliable.
Every 24 rows there is the next pass. There will be wide rows, swerves and triangles where the planter turned. These can only be seen in the very early season when plants are just starting.
East West rows are best. Plant North side of rows. The soil generally doesn’t need any amendment. Roundup is used, but not after mid June. A grass burn can be seen at the field edge. It’s Ready the next day.
Plants in solos about a months old and stripped of all side shoots and fans will be trained to be tall around 12". This also reduces transpiration and early water demand.
Depending on the genetic limitations planting June 20th will be triggered into flower by early mid August. The conditions are so ideal these plants will often still be 8’ 1/2 lb.
Grain corn is harvested after the first hard frost. It’s about 10 degrees warmer in the field protecting the plants further.
I have taken it down to 300’ in a Cessna. Even knowing the exact location in mid day the plants can’t be identified. The shadow line of the spot can, but nothing can be identified.
The only time plants have ever been lost is because they were lost. It’s a maze never seeing more than in front of your face. Exact entry, row count and paces are needed.
Before light dep I beat California every year by 2.5 weeks. The azimuth of the sun had us trigger flower week earlier so our harvest was equally ahead. Fully stocked and the first one in the middle of the dry spell when no one had anything good.
One out in June about 40 plants an hour could be planted. 1 visit in August to cull males or herms and strip top corn leaves on South row. 3rd and last visit was about October 1st to collect it all. Nothing more to it.
Those were the days. Legal here now, but I miss the adventure of it all.
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