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Fermenting, burying, traditional curing.

Psyco G

Member
I've been on canna forums for nearly ten years and this thread is up there with one of the best, hats off lads love it:peacock:
 

Kimsan

New member
Awesome thread! I have some related experiments in the works.. should have some pics for yall pretty soon.

Also.. on the note of this debate of oldschool high/potency being greater when you were young.. I think people are seriously underestimating the effect bodyweight has on potency. A 13 year old kid is going to get psychadelically chopped off something that will give a grown man a nice calm buzz.... I certainly remember having near psychedelic experiences when I was young.. but that doesn't surprise me as I'm a solid 70lbs heavier as a grown adult.
 

Raziel819

Active member
One thing I know (being that I was in the service in the mid-70') is that the potency of today's weed is right around the same quality that I(we) were smoking back then when we got the primo stuff... Columbo, Thai sticks, P-Red, Sinsi etc etc etc. But the prices of the stuff ain't like it is today...crazy high. Just be thankful that the genetics of todays crops was saved from yesteryears crops for you to enjoy today and that it doesn't all have to be grown in an outdoor environment.

Remember the words of the Bible... "there's nothing new under the sun"... there were folks that where doing outdoor grows using methods that today would seem like its new methods, they just had different names than those used today.

Soooooo.... sit back.... have a toke... and watch your girls grow and give them time to mellow out and remember you can't live withthem and you can't live withoutthem.

:smoke out:
 

Kimsan

New member
There is absolutely something worth investigating in the fermenting process!


Ok.. so this material is a Midwest landrace.. people call it ditchweed, hemp, shwag, worthless shit, they claim smoking it will give you a headache. I can tell you without a doubt these people have never put their fingers on any of it once - and like many many potsmokers, are talking out of their ass about shit they've never done because they read it on the internet.

I became interested experimenting with this shwaggy herb after using it successfully in a batch of baked goods years ago.. Smoking this stuff raw is truly a horrible experience. It smells and tastes like cut grass.. and the result is a mild high similar to pure CBD products. By no means a headache.. though I could see how the taste might induce one in some people. I usually make hash oil out of it.. which results in, again, a mild high that last only 20-30 minutes. By no means anything special, but definitely not a headache like everyone says. And no, you don't need to smoke an entire field of it to feel something. I've honestly only kept playing around with it every year.. as every year I never fail to stumble across a patch of these monsters.


On to the experiment:

I grabbed a few corn leaves for wrapping after snatching some branches from the 12' tall patch I found growing in a prairie... The herb is entirely, 100,000% seeded.. so there's not much moisture. You can dry this shit crispy in a food dehydrator in an hour.. so I figured it couldn't hurt to wrap it live..

I wanted to emulate the burying in sand method described earlier in this thread.. so after TIGHTLY wrapping it up in the cob leaf with some hemp, I put it in my food dehydrator. The dehydrator is one of those crappy ones that has no heat setting.. but doesn't ever get too hot.. actually.. it gets just about as hot as sand on a beach on a hot day ;) perfect! By night time the cob wrapping was crispy dry.. I turned the dehydrator off at night - as even in warm climates or dry climates like in Africa the nights can be cold.. I wanted to make sure the temperature cycle was at least similar. In the morning, the cob wrap had regained its moisture and was bendable again.. Turned it back on for the day. Repeat for 3 days. Same consistency of drying/rehydrating of the cob wrapper occured each day.. though the grassy smell disappeared after the second night.

I decided to cut it open today.. as you can see in the picture [sorry about the quality.. there's dog slobber on my lense].. lovely brown/golden colors going on.. all seems well.. there was a shininess to the material, as well as a shininess coating the inside of the cob wrapping... the smell.. oh god the smell is wonderful. It's right inbetween a high quality Darjeeling tea and Turkish tobacco.. Yet flowery.. like sweet rosewater. The material was wet, but by no means moldy, rotten, or off-putting in anyway. I let it dry out in the dehydrator for ~30 minutes before it was dry enough to burn..

To my absolute surprise.. the potency has increased 50 fold. It's not like bud.. at all.. its sort of like the high of a low quality hash.. very mellow, very pleasurable.. You can see the color difference in the pics.. but you can't smell the difference.. the green stuff smells horrid... and takes literally about a 2gram joint worth to feel the mellow at all.. the fermented? I smoked a tiny bowl out of my tiny pipe.. probably .1g. instantly can tell the difference.. And it lasts, 2 hours now and I can still feel it... Like I said.. not like bud.. at all, but the difference between before and after is startling.. and it actually smokes like a mild tobacco.

We need more people to start playing around with these methods.. very interesting stuff. Must be some complicated chemical processes going on..

I cobbed up the remaining stuff in the picture.. doing the same thing to it. It's about twice as dry as the last round.. and I spent about an hour picking seeds out of it.. should be interesting to see how it turns out.

That is all.
 

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Rinse

Member
Veteran
Nice experiment Kimsan, Ive always been interested in America's ditchweed and Im sure the oil would get me stoned, although I guess its high CBD.

Might be an idea to make a big batch of oil for medical patients?
People are spending a bomb on cbd oils, what with the price of seeds, equipment and the amount bud needed etc...
The seeds will also be worth keeping,
Make the most of plants that grow in your area I say.

Your fermentation method seems to have worked great, your description of the taste sounds nice, a bit like imported Thai?
Im surprised the potency increased so much, have you tried making hash/oil from the fermented buds?
 
It's because mold won't grow in anaerobic environment, that favors bacteria instead. When the Marijuana is compressed into the cob and then buried, the spores that require oxygen cannot grow. Well some fungi can grow with low oxygen, but it favors bacteria instead and I believe in the cobs it's bacteria that process the chlorophyll.
 
Yes, the smell changes, but it's still going to be "dank".

Have you ever smelled kimchi or cabbage? Those are fermented with bacteria, some lactobacillis, but they are wet fermented with salt. Fermented Marijuana probably has a fermented smell, but the oils will still be present and the terpenes may change, but they will still be there, preserved at least from the pressure.

I'm giving it a try with an ounce from the grow I'm currently doing. I'll be sure to post back here when it's done.
 

Cap. Greenbeard

New member
This is all very interesting indeed. I am just setting up my first grow and am researching curing and stumbled upon this fermentation topic and while it just made the whole issue more complex and spawned more questions it surely made the topic even more interesting.

I would however like to ask you fine people some questions and perhaps you can enlighten me a bit.

As far as I have understood it there are 3 main phases that cannabis needs to go through after harvest and trimming is done and I'll attempt to go through these to the best of my knowledge and anyone here is welcome to correct me if I'm wrong or expand on any of these phases if needed:

1 - Drying

This is quite straight forward it seems - you either...

A - Hang the buds (whole "colas" or the entire plant) upside down in a room, closet or even some kind of cardboard box construction.

Or...

B - you separate the individual nugs/nuggets from the branches/colas, spread them out on some kind of fine screen that is hung from the ceiling.

Either way you need to somewhat control the humidity and temperature (would love to get precise numbers here if possible) and have a good airflow in this area using a fan, but NOT pointed directly at the buds so you can make sure you don't dry out the buds too quickly. But the goal is to dry out most of the moisture content from the buds in this phase. The stems should snap but not break off completely (indicating that there's still some moisture in the core of the buds and stems) and the buds should be dry to the touch but still a bit "spongy" when squeezed between your fingers.

Then it's time for the second phase:

2 - Sweating... ?

This is where the tricky part begins it seems, at least for me as there seem to be so much conflicting and confusing information out there. On most websites, blogs and forums they don't really mention the sweating as a separate phase, they simply describe it as a part of curing, even as the main purpose with the cure - which some people would rather describe as phase 3. The most common process described of sweating is the placing of buds in air sealed containers (often masonry jars) in a dark and quite cool room (would love to get precise numbers here as well if possible). The moisture inside the core of the buds as well as the stems will start "wicking" out into the outer parts of the buds, equalizing the moisture content in the entire buds. So basically re-moisting the buds again. This will in turn raise the RH (Relative Humidity) of the environment inside the jars so you then open the jars to let this excess moisture out and close them when you feel that this has been achieved. Some people use hygrometers to check this and some just seem to feel their way through this (so the same applies here - I'd love to get precise numbers). Most people however seem to do this opening and closing (burping) about 2-3 times a day in the beginning, closely monitoring the RH in the jars. This process will continue until a RH of 65-70% is achieved and then you can open the jar less frequently and not for as long periods. And like I said - please correct me if I have misunderstood anything).

This is where the curing phase seem to begin...

3 - Curing/Oxidation

Oxidation when described in terms of organic chemistry is when substances react with oxygen in some way but to be honest this is where it all seem to be a messy jungle in terms of info. Some say that some anaerobic bacteria starts feeding on left-over chlorophyll while others say they are in fact aerobic bacteria (which would make more sense as this process - at least according to Farmer - should be considered oxidation rather than curing:

Curing happens only when the plant is still alive; after harvest but before it's fully dried out. It can more accurately be called oxidation.

Perhaps this part should even be considered part of the sweating?

One guy in another forum said that there were anaerobic bacteria present in the process but only at the end, after the aerobic bacteria has done it's job so one should burp the jars in order to get fresh oxygen inside the jars and thus keep these aerobic bacteria alive to continue their job. After their job is done (the guy never said how I should know when) then you don't open the jars anymore so the aerobic bacteria dies and the anaerobic bacteria takes over. And as there seem to be anaerobic bacteria that stands for the fermentation process described in this thread this would mean that there actually is a 4:th phase and some mild form of fermentation actually takes place when the curing is done and you start storing it.

Either way - can anyone please break down the 'after-harvest-phases' and describe what actually happens, what temps, RH etc. that I need to make sure is correct in order to succeed with my curing/oxidation/fermentation? Because this only becomes more and more complicated the more I read about it.
 

sourpickle

New member
I have experience baling wheat hay for cattle. Large round bales. When baled correctly the Hay comes out of the role looking like it did the day it when in. fresh and clean and still slightly green. When baled to dry it comes out yellow looking like straw and brittle. Bale to wet and they cook like compost and slump and mold. But only three times I've seen a bale that was apparently between just right and to wet that made what looked like tobacco. It was brown like tobacco smells like tobacco and molasses and the cattle ate it like it was ice cream. From the outside the Bale looked normal as the others but they were very heavy but not slumped any. where air could get in on the outside 8 inches it was regular hay colored. But on the inside where it was anaerobic is where it fermented and turn brown.

So it seems that there's a place between two wet and just right that is anaerobic that it will firment and will end up looking like tobacco.
 

exploziv

pure dynamite
Administrator
Veteran
I think keeping it away from sunlight and fresh air it the key to getting that right medium for fermentation. Your hay bales story would fit right in with this..
 

idiit

Active member
Veteran
great comments on this thread. very interesting.

the cure can often improve potency/high effects from my experiences. lots to learn re proper curing techniques. once bud gets too dry it seems that the curing progress is stymied. cigars could be a valuable area to garner knowledge from.

on ditchweed; there are a lot of ditchweed hybrids growing wild. some ditchweed can get you a moderate buzz. i hate to see ppl thinking the "headache weed" strains can be made more potent by curing, fermentation. i personally grew in hemp territory for years and many, many folks tried to work with the free tons and tons and tons of locally available hemp bud (fermentations, oils). no one ever succeeded. just because a feral plant was found in hemp territory does not mean that plant was a true hemp plant.
 

MadMac

far beyond driven...
i really like the cob curing method by Tangwena...
seams logical and cleaner than the other earth method...
would be great to get more infos... temperature and humidity...
someone else did the cob curing method with success?
Please post the results here :)
many many thx.... can't wait to try it my self... :)
 
W

wegobigupnorth

There is absolutely something worth investigating in the fermenting process!


Ok.. so this material is a Midwest landrace.. people call it ditchweed, hemp, shwag, worthless shit, they claim smoking it will give you a headache. I can tell you without a doubt these people have never put their fingers on any of it once - and like many many potsmokers, are talking out of their ass about shit they've never done because they read it on the internet.

I became interested experimenting with this shwaggy herb after using it successfully in a batch of baked goods years ago.. Smoking this stuff raw is truly a horrible experience. It smells and tastes like cut grass.. and the result is a mild high similar to pure CBD products. By no means a headache.. though I could see how the taste might induce one in some people. I usually make hash oil out of it.. which results in, again, a mild high that last only 20-30 minutes. By no means anything special, but definitely not a headache like everyone says. And no, you don't need to smoke an entire field of it to feel something. I've honestly only kept playing around with it every year.. as every year I never fail to stumble across a patch of these monsters.


On to the experiment:

I grabbed a few corn leaves for wrapping after snatching some branches from the 12' tall patch I found growing in a prairie... The herb is entirely, 100,000% seeded.. so there's not much moisture. You can dry this shit crispy in a food dehydrator in an hour.. so I figured it couldn't hurt to wrap it live..

I wanted to emulate the burying in sand method described earlier in this thread.. so after TIGHTLY wrapping it up in the cob leaf with some hemp, I put it in my food dehydrator. The dehydrator is one of those crappy ones that has no heat setting.. but doesn't ever get too hot.. actually.. it gets just about as hot as sand on a beach on a hot day ;) perfect! By night time the cob wrapping was crispy dry.. I turned the dehydrator off at night - as even in warm climates or dry climates like in Africa the nights can be cold.. I wanted to make sure the temperature cycle was at least similar. In the morning, the cob wrap had regained its moisture and was bendable again.. Turned it back on for the day. Repeat for 3 days. Same consistency of drying/rehydrating of the cob wrapper occured each day.. though the grassy smell disappeared after the second night.

I decided to cut it open today.. as you can see in the picture [sorry about the quality.. there's dog slobber on my lense].. lovely brown/golden colors going on.. all seems well.. there was a shininess to the material, as well as a shininess coating the inside of the cob wrapping... the smell.. oh god the smell is wonderful. It's right inbetween a high quality Darjeeling tea and Turkish tobacco.. Yet flowery.. like sweet rosewater. The material was wet, but by no means moldy, rotten, or off-putting in anyway. I let it dry out in the dehydrator for ~30 minutes before it was dry enough to burn..

To my absolute surprise.. the potency has increased 50 fold. It's not like bud.. at all.. its sort of like the high of a low quality hash.. very mellow, very pleasurable.. You can see the color difference in the pics.. but you can't smell the difference.. the green stuff smells horrid... and takes literally about a 2gram joint worth to feel the mellow at all.. the fermented? I smoked a tiny bowl out of my tiny pipe.. probably .1g. instantly can tell the difference.. And it lasts, 2 hours now and I can still feel it... Like I said.. not like bud.. at all, but the difference between before and after is startling.. and it actually smokes like a mild tobacco.

We need more people to start playing around with these methods.. very interesting stuff. Must be some complicated chemical processes going on..

I cobbed up the remaining stuff in the picture.. doing the same thing to it. It's about twice as dry as the last round.. and I spent about an hour picking seeds out of it.. should be interesting to see how it turns out.

That is all.

I know you posted this post awhile back and probably won't even see this response but your "test" really is just silly and a big waste of time....Putting the bud in a food dehydrator is literally almost the opposite of wrapping it in corn cobs and burying it in the sandy ground...

First of all, wrapping it and burying it would mean their is NO airflow at all, in a freaking dehydator its got wind the speed of a hurricane wizzing by at all times. Secondly you state that you feel your test yields a similar result because the dehydrator gets the same temperature as the sand at the beach on a sunny warm day...

Have you seriously never dug a hole in the sand or ground for that matter? It gets COOL underground not hot. Even when the top of the sand is burning your feet if ya dig down just a foot or two it is much cooler....People use to use root cellars before they were fridges for a reason.

And lastly you said you kept screwing with the temperature to simulate night and day. Again, do you not know how temps underground work? You do not have to dig very deep at all for the temperature to remain close to the exact same no matter what time of day....I can't remember the exact depth but it is not that deep where the temperature stays exact same year round...

Sorry to say but ya just really wasted time smoking nasty ditch weed. People have been trying to smoke that shit for decades and the verdict is ALWAYS the same. Once in a blue ass moon you find a plant that is an actual "drug variety" (as the hippies call cannabis strains of cannabis that got ya stoned as opposed to hemp) that will get you a little stoned but it is still always gonna be shit even if a first generation "drug variety" as it will be so fucking full of nasty ditch weed seeds...People have made all kinds of oil out of ditch weed and it does NOT get you stoned but now lots of companies are pumping out hemp extracted CBD oils and people seem to like them for certain minor ailments
 

GET MO

Registered Med User
Veteran
Do you trim before cobbing? I got some whispy sativa buds i was thinkin bout cobbing, maybe sprinkle some dry sift on um before i wrap um up too...
 

Sam_Skunkman

"RESIN BREEDER"
Moderator
Veteran
Not true, mold, fungi, bacteria, and yeast can all grow in canned and bottled containers do you really think your corn cobs in the ground are more anaerobic then that? Have you seen a can that puffed up and when opened was all rotted? With no air. Do you have any proof it is bacteria processing the chlorophyll?
There is nothing you can do to improve the Cannabinoid profile, or improve the terpene profile of a harvested plant. There are lots of things you can do to harm them. I won't argue that you can't compost, ferment, or sun bleach away much of the chlorophyll to try and help improve taste, but low nitrogen levels at harvest, and a 2 week dry and a 3 month boxed cure does the same with much better results. And no nasties.
Here is a 20 year old article on the subject:

http://www.internationalhempassociation.org/jiha/iha01205.html

No medical patient should be doing this, I would not even smoke it.
I would remove the resin instead of putting buds in cobbs, and then smoke just the resin, better taste, better high, definitely stronger, and no chlorophyll taste at all, if the hash is very clean.
The problem with a cobb cure is it is not good for the resin, and that is what you want in Cannabis, as herb is just the messenger, resin is the message!!!

-SamS


It's because mold won't grow in anaerobic environment, that favors bacteria instead. When the Marijuana is compressed into the cob and then buried, the spores that require oxygen cannot grow. Well some fungi can grow with low oxygen, but it favors bacteria instead and I believe in the cobs it's bacteria that process the chlorophyll.
 

Madjag

Active member
Veteran
I just loves the Tang..........takes me to another place well beyond most edibles.
Grab a cob and trip out friends.
And Sam, I've got a lab lined up and I will be testing all the cobs (Tang) that I make in the next 6 weeks for botrytis, aspergillus, mucor, and all other biological contaminants. I'll post my results later.
 

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