High heat tolerant strains

This question is for anyone who has had experience with strains that are tolerant of high temperatures. I live in the desert and with my current setup, my grow window is from October to May. June to September is way too hot. My tent is in my garage and bringing it into house is not an option. I’m currently experimenting with some Blue Mystic Autos right now to see their limits of heat tolerance and if they will die before harvest. Today’s outside temps right now is 117 degrees, yep, you heard right, 117 and currently 100 degrees in the tent. To be fair, these temps are record breaking, so it’s not usually this damn hot in June. There is heat stress with the plants but they’re chugging along at week three of flower. I’ll let you guys know if they make it.

So what are high heat, or at least hot climate tolerant strains that you guys may have grown.

Unfortunately, with temps that hot some form of cooling is pretty much mandatory.

For temps like that, all I can really recommend is the purest Afghani Kush you can find or some sort of sativa that performs well in similar weather.. something with an African Landrace in it such as Kilimanjaro or Durban. Anything with Afghani/African landraces are what you want because those come from conditions similar to yours (and mine, 112 as I write this).

Even still, you run a very high risk of heat stress and with that will come hermies and severely reduced yields.

Find some way to cool your garage if at all possible. Evaporative cooling is not only affordable, but is also a wonderful DIY option.

I'm using evap cooling in my greenhouse right now and it's working wonders. Very easy DIY.






Put some aspen pads inside of hardware cloth and mount it to a window, somewhere where air will flow through them. I have a submersible water pump inside of the reservoir connected to pvc piping, the pipe above the pads has holes drilled in it. The water drips from those holes into the pads, with the water being collected into that rain gutter that leads straight back to the reservoir. I have those two big fans (6000cfm each) blowing so much air out of the room that it creates the negative pressure needed to direct the airflow through the pads. Hottest parts of the day out here get to be 110-135 degrees, my greenhouse stays below 85-90 constantly during the hottest 4 hours of the day. Average temps are 70-75 when it isn't noon-5pm.

I did it Mickey Mouse as fuck, but it's functional. The fans were the most expensive part of the equation for me. Not including fans it only cost me about $50-$60 in materials.

If for some reason you can't get a DIY Evap cooler, or air conditioning going then all I can do is recommend Afghani Kush and pray it works out okay..

Obepawn said:

This question is for anyone who has had experience with strains that are tolerant of high temperatures. I live in the desert and with my current setup, my grow window is from October to May. June to September is way too hot. My tent is in my garage and bringing it into house is not an option. I’m currently experimenting with some Blue Mystic Autos right now to see their limits of heat tolerance and if they will die before harvest. Today’s outside temps right now is 117 degrees, yep, you heard right, 117 and currently 100 degrees in the tent. To be fair, these temps are record breaking, so it’s not usually this damn hot in June. There is heat stress with the plants but they’re chugging along at week three of flower. I’ll let you guys know if they make it.

So what are high heat, or at least hot climate tolerant strains that you guys may have grown.

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Many tricks exisit to ease your mind
I use sativas in hot climes they take a little longer to get to harvest but worth the hit
with a few quick autos between the rows ..lol
many Aussies do and grow indoors at night to ease your heat worries save some elec too ...lol

good luck

Sativas, amigo. They just do better.

kratos015 said:

Unfortunately, with temps that hot some form of cooling is pretty much mandatory.

For temps like that, all I can really recommend is the purest Afghani Kush you can find or some sort of sativa that performs well in similar weather.. something with an African Landrace in it such as Kilimanjaro or Durban. Anything with Afghani/African landraces are what you want because those come from conditions similar to yours (and mine, 112 as I write this).

Even still, you run a very high risk of heat stress and with that will come hermies and severely reduced yields.

Find some way to cool your garage if at all possible. Evaporative cooling is not only affordable, but is also a wonderful DIY option.

I'm using evap cooling in my greenhouse right now and it's working wonders. Very easy DIY.

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Put some aspen pads inside of hardware cloth and mount it to a window, somewhere where air will flow through them. I have a submersible water pump inside of the reservoir connected to pvc piping, the pipe above the pads has holes drilled in it. The water drips from those holes into the pads, with the water being collected into that rain gutter that leads straight back to the reservoir. I have those two big fans (6000cfm each) blowing so much air out of the room that it creates the negative pressure needed to direct the airflow through the pads. Hottest parts of the day out here get to be 110-135 degrees, my greenhouse stays below 85-90 constantly during the hottest 4 hours of the day. Average temps are 70-75 when it isn't noon-5pm.

I did it Mickey Mouse as fuck, but it's functional. The fans were the most expensive part of the equation for me. Not including fans it only cost me about $50-$60 in materials.

If for some reason you can't get a DIY Evap cooler, or air conditioning going then all I can do is recommend Afghani Kush and pray it works out okay..

Click to expand...

Swamp coolers do not work at the temperatures he’s talking about.

I’m from Oz and summer is the same I’ve given up on indoors. I won’t grow Indoors after December start back up in April not worth the cooling bill. I do grow outdoors during this time. I put my plants in a green house and on the hot days I add a shade cloth screen in front of it to ease the heat.
I have had success in heat with African, Thai and Hawaiian strains

hotrodharley said:

Swamp coolers do not work at the temperatures he’s talking about.

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A swamper can drop the temps a lot IF the air is dry. Out here there are a lot of homes with swampers because the humidity is often below 20% they work reallly well. You can see a good 20 degree drop in temps when it's 90 outside. When it's 110 you can see a good 25 degree drop. Yeah thats not ideal but it does help a lot and it helps raise the humidity for a better VPD. Combined with a high temperature strain a swamp cooler can really help if he has low humidity.

Renfro said:

A swamper can drop the temps a lot IF the air is dry. Out here there are a lot of homes with swampers because the humidity is often below 20% they work reallly well. You can see a good 20 degree drop in temps when it's 90 outside. When it's 110 you can see a good 25 degree drop. Yeah thats not ideal but it does help a lot and it helps raise the humidity for a better VPD. Combined with a high temperature strain a swamp cooler can really help if he has low humidity.

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I grew up and lived for years in the desert Southwest. The rising RH even there makes them useless. Damp air movers. But I guess everyone has to try what they can. Arizona? Useless anymore.

Palm Springs, dryer air than Arizona but hot as shit still. I have a 260 buck portable evaporative cooler, and it keeps it a few degrees cooler, maybe 5 to 7 degrees. I’ll post pictures of the plants in a couple hours to give better perspective. Today’s forecast is 10 degrees cooler so about 107 - 108 lol.

Cambodian varieties will work i believe

Right now 86 degrees in the tent. You can see that the plants are showing signs of serious stress.




The last one #1 is the runt and is a week behind the other two in development.

Oh, amended soil, water only but have been increasing liquid kelp extract due to it’s ability to help stressed plants. I water about every 4 days. Never been the type to overwater. An another shot.

Skunk ? I thought that and sativas are the most heat tolerant

That's insane levels of heat.

I would quite literally build a 2x4 frame for one side of the tent for a small window AC unit. It would run about 175 bucks to set one up.

Yes, I've done it before for a friend that grew in a storage shed out back of his house. Kept the temps around 80 degrees in a 4x4x6 with temps in the shed of 105.

TacoMac said:

That's insane levels of heat.

I would quite literally build a 2x4 frame for one side of the tent for a small window AC unit. It would run about 175 bucks to set one up.

Yes, I've done it before for a friend that grew in a storage shed out back of his house. Kept the temps around 80 degrees in a 4x4x6 with temps in the shed of 105.

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Don’t you need a window to exhaust those units? No window bro.

Obepawn said:

Don’t you need a window to exhaust those units? No window bro.

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No, you don't. That's what the frame is for. You build it to hold the ac unit like it's a window. Then you cut a hole in the side of the tent just large enough for the face of the ac unit to fit in.

Then you use duct tape to secure and insulate the face/tent seam. Cold air fills the tent, exhaust blows into the already hotter than hell garage.

The only thing you have to do is put a plastic bin/tub to catch the water from the condensation line and empty it when it gets full.

I think I’ll do that. Thanks for the advice bro.

hotrodharley said:

I grew up and lived for years in the desert Southwest. The rising RH even there makes them useless. Damp air movers. But I guess everyone has to try what they can. Arizona? Useless anymore.

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Lived in the southwest all my life, born and raised in Southern California. When I lived in there a swamp would have never worked due to how close to the coast I was at the time. Too humid.

I'm in Arizona now and the coolers work great for the most part, unless monsoon season rolls around. That's when the air conditioner is needed.

~105f out and 10% RH, my house and greenhouse is a cool 75-80f with evap cooling. In my experience, the reasons people don't have success with evap cooling is because their pads aren't getting soaked enough or they aren't using the right pads. Aspen pads get better airflow and hold more water, those blue pads are shit.

Next month when it gets to be 120-135f is when I'll be busting out the AC for my house, fortunately I have misters in my greenhouse for when that happens as the evap wall is only going to bring things down to ~85-90f when it's that hot out.

All that being said, OP says he doesn't have a window in his garage so I suppose it's a moot point

TacoMac said:

No, you don't. That's what the frame is for. You build it to hold the ac unit like it's a window. Then you cut a hole in the side of the tent just large enough for the face of the ac unit to fit in.

Then you use duct tape to secure and insulate the face/tent seam. Cold air fills the tent, exhaust blows into the already hotter than hell garage.

The only thing you have to do is put a plastic bin/tub to catch the water from the condensation line and empty it when it gets full.

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OP, I've done this before too back in the day. It will work just fine. As Taco says, it's just going to make your hot ass garage a little hotter. Unfortunately, it looks like you're already in week 3-4 of flower? Even if you get cooling going, it may be a bit too late. The AC might mitigate some of the stress and prevent you from getting bananas, but your yield is going to be gimped for sure even if you get an AC installed today. I'd recommend CO2 as that'd help with those 80-85f temps.. but the next couple of months are going to be brutal. Palm Desert gets similar weather to me, I'm about 2-3 hours east from you. If your summers are anything like mine that garage is going to get hot as fuck when it's constantly 120f+ outside.

Renfro said:

A swamper can drop the temps a lot IF the air is dry. Out here there are a lot of homes with swampers because the humidity is often below 20% they work reallly well. You can see a good 20 degree drop in temps when it's 90 outside. When it's 110 you can see a good 25 degree drop. Yeah thats not ideal but it does help a lot and it helps raise the humidity for a better VPD. Combined with a high temperature strain a swamp cooler can really help if he has low humidity.

Click to expand...

They really are a situational thing. Evap cooling was nice for me when I had my 4400w shed grow going. Ran the lights at night so it was never hotter than 95-100f out, never got about 80f. He said he's in Palm Desert, so it's similar enough to southern AZ where the humidity is almost always below 10%.

My set up is Mickey Mouse'd as fuck, but it gets the job done.

Obepawn said:

Palm Springs, dryer air than Arizona but hot as shit still. I have a 260 buck portable evaporative cooler, and it keeps it a few degrees cooler, maybe 5 to 7 degrees. I’ll post pictures of the plants in a couple hours to give better perspective. Today’s forecast is 10 degrees cooler so about 107 - 108 lol.

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Humidity is not a problem for your area.

Think ima probably go with the window unit setup that Taco recommend. If not, I can only grow from October to early mid May.Thats a photo per and a quick auto grow.