Night harvest for flavor

Is this why so much outdoor maintains the distinct flavor of its substrate through cure? The plant is pulling nutes from the soil during day, and emptying during night.

I dont have room for clones or Id do a side by side. Been doing 2 days of dark to stew the terps, but i think it's keeping my bud from tasting like shrooms, also.

Some bud taste exactly like it's mix and never cures into a weed flavor.. Im guessing it was harvested during lights?

I think that has a small % to do with the flavor. The more important aspects are how the plant was grown. Never allowing nutrient build up. Proper even dry, and cure.


The idea behind the night harvest, or lights off harvest, is that there will be a maximum # of terpenes left, before the sun, or light, starts to degrade them during the day cycle. Indoors some people leave there plants in the dark for 24 to 48 hours before harvesting. I know some that let the plant dry completely on the stalk in a dark room before harvest. Outdoors, I guess the best you could do is right before sun up. Or if its in a pot, bring it inside, in a dark room. I personally haven't proven it to be beneficial to myself, yet, I still follow the practice as best as possible, to harvest after a night cycle, right before lights on. The idea seems solid, but id like to see testing confirming what % difference there is in terpene amounts.

Leaving the plants in darkness for 24 hours before harvest is pure nonsense IMO. It does not make a blind bit of difference, chop them when it's most convenient.

I always harvest my herbs (basil, oregano, etc.) first thing in the morning before the sun hits them. It is the preferred way according to a lot of herb gardeners. The natural oils are more concentrated and not degraded by sunlight.

Probably would also apply to cannabis since it has similar oils and terps. I have to harvest my outdoor when I’m able since I grow a lot of it guerilla but I do try to harvest at night, partly for this reason and partly for stealth.

The thc is supposed to bild up all night and peek in the mornings befor first light also starches are more prevalent in the plant matter vs the root system in the day time so a night time or early morning harvest would prevent most of those starches from being in the smoke

I chop 'em after 1-2 'days' of darkness, due to the plants processing during light versus dark cycle. Only been doing it that way 2-4 years. Used to just hack 'em when I had time.

Know many old schooler's here have read grow books saying the exact opposite. I remember the authors saying to harvest in the peak of the afternoon, when resin content is at its highest.

Reckon things could have changed since then, however it is common to see contradicting advice on cannabis so who really knows.

Been known to keep indoor crops in the dark for up to 3 days while waiting to be trimmed. Did this to give the lights a break more than anything.

The sun rarely takes a three day break

Speed of green said:

The sun rarely takes a three day break

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True, but that's a hurdle overcome with 6-mil black poly/visqueen or agricultural cloth if one is in a greenhouse...

Or a light-switch, if indoors...

Some folks up north I've known move plants in larger containers, on up to 1/3 of a 55-gallon drum, into sheds, if need be with the use of a hand-truck, etc., too.

Where there's a will, there's a way.... Or.. where there's a will, someone is getting ready to pass on an estate.

i mean that the plants have not evolved to expect three days of darkness, so i doubt the darkness promotes any benefit.

when i first started growing several years ago i tried it side by with a couple plants and didnt notice a difference.

Do you guys hang and dry in a light filled room?

Treetroit City said:

Do you guys hang and dry in a light filled room?

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I don't hang plants at all after/during harvest. I take manageable length stems with buds/colas attached, trim with scissors by hand, pack fairly tightly, side by side, single layer, in large pizza boxes (new when purchased, and never used for pizza; figured I should add that), open the lids for a few days tucking the 'wings' to the outside of the box in order to hold the box minimally open at the front, then after several days, when minimum shrinkage to the material from drying has created less density to the layer of bud in the box, close the lid to slow the drying down.

As written earlier elsewhere, you can get a dry finished weight of 3-4 ozs. in most of the larger boxes, and you can stack them up to 3 boxes high, alternating the opening of the lids so they stack straight despite the angled lids, and by limiting the stacks to 3 high, avoid squishing or crushing the contents.

With the drying stacked boxes, routinely move lower boxes to the top, and boxes on top to the bottom of the stack, and so forth, throughout the process.

When superficially dry to touch (but still moist in the center of the buds), I bag into gallon zip-locks, sealing them over-night, or up to a couple days, in order to reach equal distribution of the remaining moisture. Then gently return to the trays/boxes, lids again closed. When they're springy dry, not bone dry, place back in gallon zip bags, or what ever they're going to cure in, and place several of those bags inside unscented kitchen trash bags, typing them shut, for about 2 weeks or so, then vacuum seal and freeze.

May sound tacky, but has worked quite well for me and others for a couple of decades now.

You can simultaneously dry up to 5 lbs in 20 boxes this way, stacked three boxes to a stack, 3-4 oz to a box (dry-weight). I use a chef's rack or one of the 4'x4' grow cabinets to stack them on.

No direct light through the process, and the room they're stacked in gets filtered air movement at a rate of over 400 cfm, in an area measuring about 20'x12'.

Probably more info than you wanted...

Edit: When the buds are moved from the boxes to the gallon bags the very first time, or shortly before, they are hand-trimmed ('finish clipped') from stems at that time.

Speed of green said:

i mean that the plants have not evolved to expect three days of darkness, so i doubt the darkness promotes any benefit.

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The whole idea of growing massive, un-pollinated colas is based around subverting & stressing the plant's evolution/expectations, for whatever that's worth.

thesloppy said:

The whole idea of growing massive, un-pollinated colas is based around subverting & stressing the plant's evolution/expectations, for whatever that's worth.

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Worth a lot.

How many people complain they don't want to stress their plants by doing "blah blah blah"?

Without pollen, the entire flower cycle is one big ol' batch of stress.

moose eater said:

I don't hang plants at all after/during harvest. I take manageable length stems with buds/colas attached, trim with scissors by hand, pack fairly tightly, side by side, single layer, in large pizza boxes (new when purchased, and never used for pizza; figured I should add that)

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Did the pizza thing once and I much prefer the results of a dark, slow dry of hanging branches.

Douglas.Curtis said:

Did the pizza thing once and I much prefer the results of a dark, slow dry of hanging branches.

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Just a matter of space here. The trich loss to the boxes is minimal overall.

And the curing, etc., can be slowed down by the methods I referenced.

The bldg was 'shrunk' from original plans in both foot-print dimensions (L and W) by 4 ft. each way, and while it doesn't come up often, there've been a number of times I've wish I'd sprung for that extra sq. ft-age. Greater area for more mothers, greater area for processing, one of the cabinets would've been larger, etc.

But the boxes work well for me now, & for quite some time. No complaints on the outcomes from others.