How to Grow and Harvest Weed Outdoors in Canada

Your practical guide to outdoor cannabis cultivation, time-tested, and tuned for Canadian growers.

Intro: Why Grow Weed Outdoors?

Growing cannabis outdoors is a rewarding way to produce high-quality flower without the overhead of indoor gear. With the right strain, soil, and strategy, you can pull in impressive yields while staying compliant with Canadian home grow limits.

Growing weed outdoors is one of our favourite summer activities. We’ve grown scores of plants in backyards across Southwestern Ontario over the years. Here’s a primer on how to grow and harvest your own weed outdoors, wherever you are in Canada.

Planning Your Outdoor Grow

When to Start Growing Weed Outdoors

Outdoor cannabis is all about timing. In SW Ontario, we germinate seeds indoors around mid-April (or earlier) and transplant outside after the May long weekend once the risk of frost is past. Most North American growers should aim for a similar window. Start your seedlings indoors, then move them outside once nighttime temperatures are consistently above 10°C (50°F).

When growing from seeds, it's best to germinate indoors in early spring. A moist paper towel in a ziploc bag, placed in a warm location has always worked well for us.

Strain Selection Matters

Not all weed strains thrive outdoors. Here in Zone 6b, fast-flowering indica-dominant or hybrid strains tend to finish before fall rains ruin your buds. Autoflowering strains can also be a strong option for beginners, since they’re resilient and finish quicker regardless of daylight hours. Sativa growers should consider hybridized genetics that are bred for a quicker flowering period. 

Choose strains that finish fast, or you'll end up like we did one year. This equatorial landrace was still budding well into November!

Soil, Sun, and Setup

Pick a Sunny Spot

Cannabis thrives in full sun. For best results, choose a location that gets a minimum of six hours of direct sunlight per day. A south-facing garden is ideal. Avoid areas with dense shade or heavy, soggy soil.

Weed plants love to bask under the hot Ontario summer sun. An ideal planting site should receive plenty of direct sunlight, shelter from strong winds, and access to fresh water.

Soil Prep

We build our beds with compost, worm castings, and bone meal. If you're using containers, choose 10 to 20 gallon pots filled with a living soil mix or a soil-less mix like Pro-Mix HP enhanced with organic nutrients. Large containers produce large plants!

Pest and Weather Protection

Expect to deal with slugs, bugs, and powdery mildew. Gently spraying off foliage occasionally with water or a diluted neem oil mixture, and creating physical barriers can prevent most issues. In Ontario, the biggest threats are early fall rain and wind. Stake your plants and consider using mesh netting to keep branches from snapping under heavy colas.

Your outdoor cannabis garden will get a lot of visitors, and some can be valuable helpers in keeping unwanted pests away.

Flowering, Feeding, and Finishing

When Does Cannabis Flower Outdoors?

Most outdoor cannabis in Canada will begin flowering between late July and early August when the days begin to get shorter. This is when you switch from nitrogen-heavy feeds to bloom nutrients focused on phosphorus and potassium. Making this switch encourages the plant to produce bigger and heavier buds.

Watching your outdoor buds ripen can be one of the most rewarding experiences. It can also kickstart a lifelong interest in gardening and plants, like it did for us.

Trichome Watching: When to Harvest Weed Outdoors

Don't rely solely on a calendar. In Ontario, most strains finish between late September and mid-October. Use a magnifier or a jeweller’s loupe to inspect trichomes. For a more energizing effect, harvest when they appear mostly cloudy. For a heavier, sedating result, wait for a higher percentage of amber trichomes.

Digital microscopes are an inexpensive tool that can hook up to your phone and help you keep an eye on trichomes as they develop. It can also alert you to pests before they become a problem, like the spider mite eggs in the bottom right photo.

Harvesting Weed Outdoors: Timing, Tools, and Technique

Timing Is Everything

Harvest in the morning once the dew has evaporated but before direct sunlight warms the plant. Cut whole branches rather than individual buds. Handle them gently to preserve trichomes.

Drying Your Buds Properly

Hang branches in a cool, dark, and well-ventilated space. Aim for a temperature around 60 to 65°F and humidity between 50 and 60 percent. Hygrometers are cheap and widely available. Invest in one so you can monitor the climate of your drying area, you’ll thank yourself later.

Drying typically takes 7 to 14 days, but check on your buds daily. If you bend a stem and it snaps, the plant is probably dry enough for curing. Avoid overdrying!

Cure your buds in glass jars. Open the jars for a few minutes daily for the first two weeks to release excess moisture and maintain a stable environment. Curing your weed post-harvest can really make or break the flavour, smoothness and potency of your flower, so it’s worth it to be patient at this point.

Outdoor Harvest Yields

With healthy plants and good weather, growers in Ontario can produce 500 grams or more per plant. Even small backyard setups can yield enough to last through the year.

Final Thoughts: Growing Weed Outdoors Is Worth It!

It takes planning, patience, and a bit of pest control, but the payoff is real. Sun-grown cannabis is rich in flavour, cannabinoids, and character. When you smoke your first home-grown buds, you’ll feel like a kid on Christmas morning.

But if the weather doesn’t cooperate or the garden doesn’t go as planned, you can always count on us to deliver premium craft cannabis straight to your doorstep all year round!