[Litz_C]

hello everybody! i about to harvest within 2 days and it my first time to harvest. All i know is cut all their fan leaves and left them hang on dry place about a week to dry right? i jsut want to make sure what is the tempurater and the RH should be good when on the drying processes. And do i need to cure it for a long time in order to get the crops in order to get the stinky smell out of it? thank

[spicecowboy]

Originally Posted by Litz_C

hello everybody! i about to harvest within 2 days and it my first time to harvest. All i know is cut all their fan leaves and left them hang on dry place about a week to dry right? i jsut want to make sure what is the tempurater and the RH should be good when on the drying processes. And do i need to cure it for a long time in order to get the crops in order to get the stinky smell out of it? thank

I recommend to not only cut the fanleaves, but also the budleaves before hanging the colas to dry.

This is much easier and more effective.

You can leave a few of those christal covered budleaves on, in order to let them protect the calyxes, or just for aestetical reasons and use the trimmed goodness to produce some nice homemade hash.

Make sure you have enough time, as a good clipping may take much longer than you would expect.

Prepare a nice clean table and a comfort chair.

Get yourself some really sharp scissors with relatively slim blades, as you need to make your way deep into the bud to cut those small leaves on their stem base.

To clean the scissors you need rubbing alcohol or olive oil.

You should clean your blades because too much resin built up on them reduces their sharpness, and can cause trichome heads from the flowers being stuck to the blades(those heads you unintentionally hit while moving around the bud in order to trim the leaves).

The humidity in the drying area should be low, the area should be dark and releatively cool.


My personal recommendation would be:


As soon as the outside of the buds has a real crispy touch, take the buds down and put them into some of those brown paper bags you can get in many stores.

Seal the bags very good on top and place them in a dry and cool area.

I would call this being a first step in the "curing" process.

Leave the buds in the bags for about 10 days, but open them once daily to air them a bit and to GENTLY turn them over so they can dry out more euqually.

Opening the paper bags once a day for a few minutes will most likely be enough
to prevent mold, because those paper bags "breathe".

They hold in enough humidity to prevent the bud from drying out too fast, but on the other hand exessive humidity can evaporate through the bags.

As the buds seem to have become overall crispy and seem to have also lost humidity stuck deep inside:

Take the buds out of the paper bags, and pack them together tightly (but DON´T PRESS THEM) in a plastic bag over night.

Open the bags next afternoon, and check the buds.

Are they still dry?

Then they can be put into glass canning jars or tupper ware for the storage.

The so called curing process goes on while the buds are resting in those end containers...

Store your goodies in a cool, dry and dark place.

The buds smell will certainly develop during the drying and curing and go through different stages.

Don´t worry about your buds having a grassy or even ammoiak like smell, that´s a natural sideeffect of the drying process, as chlorophill and other stuff is broken down and transformed into more desireable stuff like sugars...

The smell of a well cured bud is different to the aroma of "fresh" buds immediately cut from the stem.


But don´t confuse "curing" with fermentation.

(Oh well, that´s another story...)



For any further information, feel free to post along, or send me PM!

May your first harvest turn out nice and make you in a positive way



One Love,


the spicecowboy

nice write up spicecowboy

[spicecowboy]

Originally Posted by jumblyjoe

nice write up spicecowboy

I tried to do my best.

This is a pretty complex topic...


One Love,

spice

I plan on hanging for 3-4 days and then transferring to my drying rack (see threads I started..)

Then jars for cure.

Do you really need to remove all the bud leaves doesn't that remove alot of product? I plan on just trimming it up to match the flow of the colas shape...

[spicecowboy]

Originally Posted by Turkish

Do you really need to remove all the bud leaves doesn't that remove alot of product? I plan on just trimming it up to match the flow of the colas shape...

The highest THC level is usually concentrated in the single female flowers.

The christals on those sticky budleaves also contain a lot of THC, but they are ususally harsh tary smoke compared to the flower material.


I make hash out of them(can easily turn out better than the average imported products).

Others use this sticky trim to make Cannabutter or other extracts for cooking.

Man some good brownies or Firecrackers, and you may end up stoned and buzzed out for many hrs...


Of course you don´t need to perfectly trim your buds, but I personally prefer a well manicured piece of Marihuana, as I´m very picky and don´t wanna smoke leave and stem matrerial.

One Love,


spice

[spicecowboy]

Originally Posted by jumblyjoe

I plan on hanging for 3-4 days and then transferring to my drying rack (see threads I started..)

Then jars for cure.

I used to cure/store in glass jars for years, but the buds should be really dry before you put them in.

Open the jars after being sealed for the first 24 hrs to check the buds for excess moisture.


Good Luck,


spice

[Litz_C]

wow thank man. Now i know where those grassy smell are where it from my simples.

[Libalau-Timmay]

good luck with your harves LitzC

nice writeup spicecowboy Im a noob who is about to go through this process in the next week or so and this JUST what I was looking for.

when during this process is the first time to smoke a sample ?