Salvaging Botrytis bud rot material.

Gray Wolf · Jan 22, 2010

Botrytis may produce the highly sought after Noble Rot that the wine makers hold dear, but it sucks when it comes to cannabis.

The question of what can you do with bud rotted material continues to come up and this year we were blessed with some mild bud rot on an outdoor plant, so we decided to see what could be done with the buds besides throwing them away.

Emboldened that while it tastes and smells badly, it is non toxic enough for the vintners to use grapes riddled with it, we decided to remove all the spores and fungus material, to see if that would eliminate the odor and taste, as well as the issues associated with smoking fungus.

We first dried the material at 200F until frangible and then passed it through a wire strainer to remove the stems and finely divide the material without pulverizing it. We then used butane to extract the cannabis oil, which still smelled and tasted of Botrytis.

Next we filtered some Everclear, by passing it through both a .45 and a .2 micron syringe filter and then dissolved the cannabis oil containing the Botrytis spores into it.

We then filtered the alcohol with the cannabis oil and Botrytis spores in it through a .45 micron syringe filter, which removed all of the spores, the smallest of which is 7 micron. It also takes out all bacteria, but sadly doesn’t catch the submicron virus.

After allowing the alcohol to flash off through evaporation, the cannabis oil was actually slightly denser than the parent material, and was Botrytis odor and taste free. It tested at about normal potency, so the process appears to works.

GW

medi-useA · Jan 22, 2010

Thanks for the info...would cooking with the resulting oil make it a bit safer?

muA

Sam_Skunkman · Jan 22, 2010

Did it cause anymore coughing then normal for that variety BHO without mold? Any headaches? Anything different? Did it still have taste and smell of the weed?

-SamS

hanuman · Jan 22, 2010

I am facing the same situation, i.e a shitload of molded (moldy?) material from last OD season, but I'm going to go the bubblebag way, hoping the spores and other crap will float with the veg matter while the trichs sink.

h :ying:

Gray Wolf · Jan 22, 2010

medi-useA said:
Thanks for the info...would cooking with the resulting oil make it a bit safer?

muA

Hi MUA!

Don't know safer from what. None of the mold is left at that micron level, and it is not necessary with wine.

As a tongue in cheek, almost all the oil that I produce goes to either oral or topical application, and I normally cook off the alcohol, because I need it decarboxylated.

When I do that however, it drives off the low flash point non cannabinoid constitutes and changes the regional flavor of the oil if it is smoked. No one ever complains, because it just tastes more hashy and is still highly potent, but a true oil connoisseur might notice.

Perhaps we could hear from one of the forums oil masters on the subject?

GW

Gray Wolf · Jan 22, 2010

Sam_Skunkman said:
Did it cause anymore coughing then normal for that variety BHO without mold? Any headaches? Anything different? Did it still have taste and smell of the weed?

-SamS

Good question and no, its cough index was indistinguishable from the non Botrytis affected oil, and there were no side effects noted amongst us four conducting the experiments in house.

It had a nice flavor and effect, but has not yet passed through the volunteer panel yet, so there may be additional comments. If so, I will pass them on.

GW

Gray Wolf · Jan 22, 2010

hanuman said:
I am facing the same situation, i.e a shitload of molded (moldy?) material from last OD season, but I'm going to go the bubblebag way, hoping the spores and other crap will float with the veg matter while the trichs sink.

h

Adding a cup of cider vinegar to ~ 5 gallons of process water will kill the spores without trashing the hash, but leaves their dead carcasses behind.

I was unable to taste either the vinegar or Botrytis after making bubble hash with it, but there were still some spores’ observable under the microscope, so we looked further.

GW

jump117 · Jan 22, 2010

Hi Gray Wolf,

I've read baking soda water solution spray is a good cure against mold on buds,
they say pH up kills mold.

Will you post your opinion on how does baking soda affect the final product quality, please.

Gray Wolf · Jan 22, 2010

jump117 said:
Hi Gray Wolf,

I've read baking soda water solution spray is a good cure against mold on buds,
they say pH up kills mold.

Will you post your opinion on how does baking soda affect the final product quality, please.

Never tried it Jump 117, but mold is actually pretty fragile, so bumping the ph high or low should work.

As to effect on final product quality, I don't know. The cannabinoids are in their acid form, so on the surface it would seem that some reaction potential is there, especially if heat were involved in an extraction.

Since I am just guessing, I will pose that question to the clever young bio chemistry illuminati in our group and get back to you.

GW

GDK · Jan 22, 2010

Hey GW.
This is some awesome info. Thanks for doin the research and posting it up. Makes removing spores seem much easier all of the sudden. Never heard of these syringe filters, but will look into them. Sounds like an ideal tool when cleaning up solvent extracts.
Great work!!!

Stay Safe

mayan · Jan 22, 2010

Fascinating information...thanks!

chrill · Jan 22, 2010

Hey guys, I jumped the drying gun and now I have about 240 grams of slightly molded blue-widow.

What should I do with it? Throwing away 2/3rds of my yield is the last thing I want to do. I am considering letting it dry completely and getting some sprung bags. Any advice?

Bumble Buddy · Jan 22, 2010

I'm aware of the use of noble rot in wine making but using moldy buds for extracts makes me a bit nervous nonetheless; various mycotoxins produced by molds are an additional hazard apart from spores that should be considered, these molecules could potentially make it through the processing, I wouldn't want to smoke it.

THC123 · Jan 22, 2010

for me mold= garbage bin

Vorsprung · Jan 23, 2010

Yeah personally I would only use moldy bud in butter or oil... butter/water mix boiled for a couple hours would give me peace of mind. not worth the health risk any other way, if you ask me.

Sam_Skunkman · Jan 23, 2010

Vorsprung said:
Yeah personally I would only use moldy bud in butter or oil... butter/water mix boiled for a couple hours would give me peace of mind. not worth the health risk any other way, if you ask me.

If you think that boiling is safer then filtering the spoors out, you need to understand that several of the fungi produce toxins and aflatoxins that are even worse then the spores.
Boiling does not destroy all the toxins.

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

-SamS

Gray Wolf · Jan 23, 2010

Sam_Skunkman said:
If you think that boiling is safer then filtering the spoors out, you need to understand that several of the fungi produce toxins and aflatoxins that are even worse then the spores.
Boiling does not destroy all the toxins.

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

-SamS

Thanks bro you for posting this article. It makes the counter points well and I would like to point out that this thread is about salvaging Botrytis infected plant material, not some of the pernicious strains of mold like Aspergillus, pumping out aflatoxins which take out the liver, besides being carcinogenic, hepatotoxic, and mutagenic.

Their spores are not uniformly killed at the brief cannabis combustion temperatures and can set up colonies in your lungs, and cause death by pneumonia. The thought of my lungs filling up with grey filaments is not pleasant.

Besides potential chaos and death, this old retired engineer and wananbe alchemist has always cringed at the thought of drinking water that has been refined from urine and fecal waste; even though my engineering brain sorts through the details and realizes that the concerns have been addressed. Having tasted recycled urine, I can tell you that I did not die, and its taste was unremarkable one way or the other, because it was just water.

After much thought this gray haired old alchemist decided to share this experiment designed by one of our younger illuminati, knowing full well it was cold water in the face of the opposing concerns.

My boldness in sharing was knowing that challenge would not go unmet and hoping to draw valid data that flies in the face of it, and either validates it or discards it, by pummeling it to death one way or the other.

Taking out all the spores, bacteria, and protozoa through .45 micron filtration, pretty much eliminates all the mold players excepting the myco and aflatoxins, which is the major reason that I limited my thread to Botrytis.

Does anyone know of any research data linking Botrytis and health issues with myco or aflatoxins?

GW

Telegraphist. · Jan 23, 2010

What about bombarding uvc photons on the effected material? or ozone?

Just ideas, no idea if they would work or kill spores etc

Good luck with your experiments and thank you for taking the time to document them

Salutes alchemist

chrill · Jan 23, 2010

Vorsprung said:
Yeah personally I would only use moldy bud in butter or oil... butter/water mix boiled for a couple hours would give me peace of mind. not worth the health risk any other way, if you ask me.

I appreciate your honesty, you could have just sold me a set of bags, but advised against it. Ill trash this bud and not make the same mistake I just did. I bought a set of your bags anyway. Whats the shipping time like? (sorry if off-topic)

Gray Wolf · Jan 24, 2010

Telegraphist. said:
What about bombarding uvc photons on the effected material? or ozone?

Just ideas, no idea if they would work or kill spores etc

Good luck with your experiments and thank you for taking the time to document them

Salutes alchemist

Thanks TG! The spores are pretty easy to kill and UV or ozone might very well do it with enough intensity and exposure time, but some method is still required to remove the dead carcasses.

GW

Salvaging Botrytis bud rot material.

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