Curing and Why you do it!

[chubbynugs]

All i know is that weed tastes the best when fully dried on the line before the cure. You cant grow a shitty tasting strain and expect it to not taste like shit even after ten months cure. The toke will just be smoother cause the chlorophyll is gone but the taste will be the same. The first thing imo when it comes to weed is that it needs to taste top shelf. Potency is a distant second.

 

[THC123]

I hope I'm not coming off as arrogant again. I'm just trying to make sure the facts are clear about curing.

Lol no worries m8 , when u are typing something i can't see your face right , so it's hard to see how something is ment sometimes.

Yeah a lot of it is psychologically

The better smell, taste and look of cured cannabis makes me feel A LOT better about the cannabis itsself. It's impressive. Therefor when you ingest it, you feel better about doing so. This creates a euphoric effect...But unfortunatly, technically, the affect on the body is not changed...

I never looked at it that way , i'm gonna pay more attention when smoking , good argument

 

[L-Thirt33n]

I'm not sure I agree with you 100%..
Harvesting doesn't necessarily kill the plant immediately, and during the cure, the lifeforce that is left in the plant (perhaps lasting as long as moisture exists in the plant material) could possibly allow those chemical reactions to exist that could in theory increase potency.

Determinig the exact time of plant-death would be helpful in this argument.

True, it's not an instantaneous death...So I guess that particular aspect of the argument is a little flawed. As far as how long it's alive after harvest would have to be tested...But in all honesty it's actually irrelevant to the curing process...

But curing takes place after the plant has been manicured, dried and placed in the jars. It's definitly dead then.

Lol no worries m8 , when u are typing something i can't see your face right , so it's hard to see how something is ment sometimes.

Yeah a lot of it is psychologically

I never looked at it that way , i'm gonna pay more attention when smoking , good argument

Indeed...

 

[rebo]

But curing takes place after the plant has been manicured, dried and placed in the jars. It's definitly dead then.




Indeed...

Conceded.. but as Clinton put it.. (it depends on what the definition of is, is) If that is the definition of curing then you could be right..

I look at curing as starting the moment the plant is clipped and trimmed.. surely all cellular activity hasn't ceased at that point, a slow low temp dry is better than a fast hot dry, I'm sure most would agree with this point. I'll wager that on a microscopic level, cellular activity only ceases when a certain (low) moisture content has been reached.. but now I'm merely arguing symmantecs.. very interesting subject though, and I can see valid points on both sides of the discussion.

 

[Strainbrain]

The plant may be Definitely Dead when you put it in the jars to begin the cure... but that doesn't mean it's chemically inert. Chemical interactions and degradations can occur independent of metabolism. The chemicals we're dealing with are awfully volatile, after all.

If in fact cannabinoid precursors undergo chemical changes into cannabinoids during the curing process then I can absolutely believe that potency changes.

As to the other aspect of 'potency' increasing, I think the point is being missed.

THC measured and expressed as a % - say 10% - is a ratio. 10% THC means 9:1. As the buds cure, the oils stay relatively unchanged. The plant material portion of the show continues to break down. It loses weight, and the bud overall loses some weight. Let's say (for the sake of math) it loses 20% of it's weight in 30 days. Now our ratio is 7:1. Expressed as a %, that's 12.5.

Bam, your THC content just jumped from 10 to 12.5%. In some eyes - let's say that you buy buds by weight - that's more potent. It doesn't have to magically create more THC to increase potency.

Check out race cars - HP/Weight ratio is paramount. They don't just add more horsepower to get it - they use carbon-fiber and fiberglass bodies, aluminum engine blocks and chasis components... a ratio can be attacked from both ends.


-s

 

[rebo]

THC measured and expressed as a % - say 10% - is a ratio.
...
-s

point well taken.. and makes perfect sense.

 

[L-Thirt33n]

The plant may be Definitely Dead when you put it in the jars to begin the cure... but that doesn't mean it's chemically inert. Chemical interactions and degradations can occur independent of metabolism. The chemicals we're dealing with are awfully volatile, after all.

If in fact cannabinoid precursors undergo chemical changes into cannabinoids during the curing process then I can absolutely believe that potency changes.

As to the other aspect of 'potency' increasing, I think the point is being missed.

THC measured and expressed as a % - say 10% - is a ratio. 10% THC means 9:1. As the buds cure, the oils stay relatively unchanged. The plant material portion of the show continues to break down. It loses weight, and the bud overall loses some weight. Let's say (for the sake of math) it loses 20% of it's weight in 30 days. Now our ratio is 7:1. Expressed as a %, that's 12.5.

A. - Bam, your THC content just jumped from 10 to 12.5%. In some eyes - let's say that you buy buds by weight - that's more potent. It doesn't have to magically create more THC to increase potency.

Check out race cars - HP/Weight ratio is paramount. They don't just add more horsepower to get it - they use carbon-fiber and fiberglass bodies, aluminum engine blocks and chasis components... a ratio can be attacked from both ends.
-s

A - The THC content didn't change. You simply reduced the content of the other chemicals. Which in turn would make the THC that IS there, more prominant. But that won't increase the intensity of the affect that that amount of THC will have on your body because well, it's the same amount you had before!

Rebo said it himself, "it depends on what the definition if is, is..." lol.

So I gues it DOES depend on what you percieve potency as...But I'm arguing FACTS here man, not psychological misconceptions.

Chemically inert or not curing only affects the natural chemical breakdown of the plant matter. It slows it down. This allows you time to taste test. If you like the taste then you store it in a freezer or refrigerator to PRESERVE that taste.

The only way you can change the amount of THC and other chemicals required for THC to work properly is by genetics and proper growing conditions. After that it's a downward spiral of degradation and decomposition. This is why we cure and store the cannabis buds. TO PRESERVE THEM!

This is the last time I'm arguing this FACT.

Removing the other volitile chemicals from the composition of the cannabis plant so the amount of THC is more PROMINANT then the other plant matter DOES NOT INCREASE POTENCY. The THC is what goes into your bloodstream and makes you high.(There are other factors involved like CBD levels and CBG levels but those are all genetic variables.) If the THC level doesn't change you cannot achieve a more intense affect...

It makes it more PURE. It makes it taste better. Hell it can even make it look better but it WILL NOT HAVE A DIFFERENT AFFECT ON YOUR BODY. Only psychologically can you have that become even a remote possibility...

Based on your logic, from what I read, I could make this assumption...

If I have a container with 7 apples (THC) and 7 oranges (Other non-psychoactive chemicals, like chloraphyll.) and I remove 4 of the oranges, somehow the 7 apples are BETTER apples...AND there are MORE of them.

Again, sorry for the arrogance but damn...Heh, it's not rocket science here...

 

[Strainbrain]

No... but if you then homogenize the fruit in a blender and pour yourself an 8-oz glass, you will get significantly more apple than you would with your original mixture. If the Oranges are inert and the Apples are what you're after to achieve some effect... well, that glass is more "potent," isn't it?

If you buy 7 grams of cured buds that are 70% plant and then compare that to 7 grams of uncured buds that are 90% plant... you have more THC in the first bag. Even if they're both the same thing. It's not the potency of the THC itself that is increasing, it's the potency of the total package.

I never said it made the apples (THC) better, nor increased their (it's) level. It's simply a ratio.

-s

 

[L-Thirt33n]

No... but if you then homogenize the fruit in a blender and pour yourself an 8-oz glass, you will get significantly more apple than you would with your original mixture. If the Oranges are inert and the Apples are what you're after to achieve some effect... well, that glass is more "potent," isn't it?

If you buy 7 grams of cured buds that are 70% plant and then compare that to 7 grams of uncured buds that are 90% plant... you have more THC in the first bag. Even if they're both the same thing. It's not the potency of the THC itself that is increasing, it's the potency of the total package.

I never said it made the apples (THC) better, nor increased their (it's) level. It's simply a ratio.

-s

Depending on how you percieve potency then you could be correct man. I'm not arguing the fact that it changes the ratio to other plant matter...That's obvious.

Potency by definition:

po⋅ten⋅cy   /ˈpoʊt

n

si/ Show Spelled Pronunciation [poht-n-see] Show IPA
–noun, plural -cies for 4–6.
1.the state or quality of being potent.
2.power; authority.
3.efficacy; effectiveness; strength.
4.capacity to be, become, or develop; potentiality.
5.a person or thing exerting power or influence.


Based off defintion alone my explanation of this is 100% correct. Isolating the THC does not increase it's "efficacy; effectiveness; strength, does not increase its "power; authority"...It doesn't increase potency...

End of story...

Percieve it how you will but curing is nothing more than a preservative process to enhance the taste/smell of the buds...Nothing more.

 

[rebo]

Would we all agree that certain chemical reactions occur during and up to the moment of cellular death? It seems imperative to know when cellular death occurs. Look at a human being and how rigor mortise changes the body at a cellular level (for better or worse).. I propose that things are also occuring at the cellular level of a plant after harvest. I also believe it is possible that some of those changes can exceed, in a positive way, the effects of degradation for a period of time, thus increasing the actual psychoctive potency of the harvested flower. We must also consider how the human mind interacts with those psychoactive compounds, for instance, my receptors may fire differently than someone elses, so my perception of the potency may be different, which brings up the question of how does one measure potency in that aspect to begin with? Are we talking specific amounts of each compound? Or perhaps a combination of the many compounds in specific ratios? Or THC/gm?

There are many who would say that they perceive a potency and flavour increase after curing, I am among that group.

 

[L-Thirt33n]

Would we all agree that certain chemical reactions occur during and up to the moment of cellular death? It seems imperative to know when cellular death occurs. Look at a human being and how rigor mortise changes the body at a cellular level (for better or worse).. I propose that things are also occuring at the cellular level of a plant after harvest. I also believe it is possible that some of those changes can exceed, in a positive way, the effects of degradation for a period of time, thus increasing the actual psychoctive potency of the harvested flower.
There are many who would say that they perceive a potency and flavour increase after curing, I am among that group.

Yes, definitly. I agree. But we're not talking about RIGHT after the plant has been harvested. Curing USUALLY takes place AFTER the drying process. Once the plant has been dried out, it's dead. You can't argue that...Any cellular level chemical reactions that occur are considered decomposition... The cells will no longer sustain enough nutrients to produce CHLORAPHYLL, let alone THC...

The plant does not produce THC any more...Put it to you this way. When was the last time you seen a dead woman, even one that has been dead for 1 day, produce fertile eggs?

Once the plant has been dried out, it's dead. The cells will no longer sustain enough nutrients to produce CHLORAPHYLL, let alone THC...

 

[rebo]

Yes, definitly. I agree. But the plant does not produce THC any more...Put it to you this way. When was the last time you seen a dead woman, even one that has been dead for 1 day, produce fertile eggs?

Once the plant has been dried out, it's dead. The cells will no longer sustain enough nutrients to produce CHLORAPHYLL, let alone THC...

True.. but once the plant is totally dired out.. the cure is over.

 

[Strainbrain]

Potency by definition:

... is precisely not what my point is, though. That's why I used such language as "in some eyes" and put "potent" in quotations in the juice example.

You can define potency with Webster, sure, but simply put... 1 bowl of cured buds will contain more THC and less 'else' than 1 bowl of uncured bud. If you then smoke those bowls, the one with cured nugs will get you more high. It's a matter of semantics at this point, really... but if you ask your buddy whether the first one was more potent, I bet he'd say yes.

I mean, people say hash is more potent and nobody argues the terminology... but isn't it just the process of all resin-no plant taken to an extreme? It's not like dry-sifting or butane magically makes THC appear out of thin air any more than glass jars do.

That's all I'm trying to say. In the end, it's not even my theory so I can't properly defend it. I'm just trying to rephrase something that seemed a little unclear.


-s

 

[L-Thirt33n]

Do this. Go carefully cut a branch off one of your prized female plants. As if you were going to clone it. Set it down and let it dry out like you normally would dry your buds out. Then try to get the branch to reroot. If it cannot reroot, it cannot produce THC.

But what ever...Don't believe me. By DEFINITION there is no way to INCREASE POTENCY after the plant has been harvested without adding ingredients to the mix manually.

Percieve it how you will...

 

[DrunkenMessiah]

Hah! I remember when this was first written! For those interested, this article is actually an old overgrow.com article titled: "Does Curing Effect Potency 2". It was actually a response to PREMIER's original "Does Curing Effect Potency?" article which featured contributions from fergetit. That document reads as follows:


Does curing affect potency?
Contributed by: PREMIER
Thanks to: fergetit

Curing can seemingly affect potency because often the first time the buds feel "dry", they really aren't. Once they start to cure and sweat, you will see how much moisture is left.

Curing is mostly for aroma and taste, but the first week after "drying" will still have some effect on the potency as the bud fully dries.

If the above is not reason enough, here is a more scientific explanation:

Drying bud converts crude acidic THC from its nonactive form into a neutral pH psychoactive substance. Each THC molecule has to lose it's moisture content in order to become fully psychoactive.

[Editor's note: Starkes suggests up to 95% of the cannabinoids will remain carboxylized in dried and cured plant matter]

When the water exits the bud, the THC becomes slightly different in molecular structure. As Fatima mentioned , heating can make THC readily active by immedietly vaporizing the bud's moisture content away. However, as Fatima also mentioned, aging is important too.

First the bud is "dried", but can still contain some moisture within. By using the "cure", the THC slowly becomes psychoactive. Curing builds a more uniformily dried bud with a better burn and taste. Almost all the THC converts to the usable psychoactive cannabinoid over the alotted time, without the degradation from drying the bud rapidly with heat.

(from fergetit)
It's true we all know bud can appear dry, but still have moisture locked in the stems, it doesn't really affect carboxylization.

According to Starkes and Clarke, cured buds undergo a:


Reduction in Chlorophyll content,

Reduction in plant starch content,

Reduction in nitrate levels,

Loss of moisture,

Loss of volitile terpenoids,

and the polycyclic aromatization of other terpenoids.

All of these phenomena reperesent a loss in weight, and gain in net potency (except for the polycyclic aromatization of terpenoids which affects flavor). Note: over time THC will start converting to useless cannabinol (CBN), which it can do in its carboxylized form no problem.
(/snip)

The bud that has an homogeneous moisture content throughout will give the bud a nice firey glow when burned. Cured buds pack in bowls easier and break down into blunts and joints without difficulty.

Hash that has been cured forms a beautiful rhine around the outside with a rich creamy inside. Cured bud and hash is great and worth the trouble. The taste is awesome as all the excess chlorophyll has been broken down. A smoother smoke is created. In my mind, curing bud is like tenderizing meats... it makes it more palatable and more enjoyable to use.
(*END*)

fergetit would go on to expound on this article by writing the more complete one that OP showed us with the help of Skunk Works.

Its a bummer that this information had to spend so long in obscurity before popping back up again in this thread, crazy how the internet works. It just goes to show how much was lost when Overgrow went down, we're just now getting back to that level of knowledge years later.

*hugs his copy of of the Overgrow archive*

Overgrow will NEVER be forgotten!

 

[DrunkenMessiah]

Do this. Go carefully cut a branch off one of your prized female plants. As if you were going to clone it. Set it down and let it dry out like you normally would dry your buds out. Then try to get the branch to reroot. If it cannot reroot, it cannot produce THC.

But what ever...Don't believe me. By DEFINITION there is no way to INCREASE POTENCY after the plant has been harvested without adding ingredients to the mix manually.

Percieve it how you will...

This is all true and a fine example, but it insists that the plant has to be alive for what is actually chemical OSMOSIS to occur. The original article and indeed the entire practice is based on the research of Starkes and Clarke who where figuring out the outer limits of what cannabis does when we where all in short trousers. They found that the following things happen when bud is cured:

• Reduction in Chlorophyll content,
• Reduction in plant starch content,
• Reduction in nitrate levels,
• Loss of moisture,
• Loss of volitile terpenoids,
• The polycyclic aromatization of other terpenoids.

These are the results of tireless scientific analysis. What happens to all of the lost substances? Where do they go? How can these chemical processes take place when the plant is 'dead'? The answer is osmosis! Plants (and indeed all life to be honest) are just one big complicated chemical reaction. Just because the plant dies doesn't mean that some aspects of the reaction can't continue to take place. Indeed, decomposition is a vivid example of this process. All of the starches and nitrates dissapear because they are converted into cannaboids (cannabergerol specifically) and THC. This effectively gives the cured bud a larger ratio of THC as compared to its overall weight. This entire process is driven by simple chemical osmosis! The metabolic processes that went on when the plant was alive continue to carry an inertia long after death. The proof is in when you over-cure. Osmosis is a two-way street and when all of the raw ingredients to generate cannabergerol are used up the process will reverse!!! The THC will begin to break down into non-psychoactive cannabinol (CBN) effectively DECREASING your potency. Most experienced curing enthusiasts consider this to happen around the 6 month mark. After 6 months, you should either evacuate all of the air out of your jars (this is the best thing to do) or get the bud into a freezer. You can actually do both (I do )

I'v been to a few cannabis cups. I'v asked professionals that do scientific research on this what thier opinions are on curing (amongst many other things of course) who, by the way, have equipment to scientifically check these things.

The "equipment to scientifically check these things" you are referring to is known as a Gas Chromatography-Mass Spectrometry Machine. Known in short a gas spectrometer. Gas spectrometers are used to identify different substances in a sample. It is very accurate and is considered the only way to truly forensically identify a substance because it performs a specific test. Most substance identification and measurement involves a non-specific test which merely indicates that a substance falls into a category of substances. As good as gas spectrometry is, it has a weakness. Because the sample to be analyzed is vaporized and destroyed in order to determine the content of a particular substance in the sample it is unable to discern between the relative mass of a single substance in the sample compared to the mass of every other substance and the relative mass of a single substance in the sample compared to the overall mass of the sample. These two sound interchangeable, but in specific circumstances they are not. Comparing the THC content of cured and uncured bud taken from the same plant is one such circumstance. The cured bud is of nearly the same mass as the original bud because the lost starches, nitrates, terpines and chlorophyl have all been converted into cannabergerol. (some gas is released from the bud during the cure, reducing its overall mass somewhat, but not significantly) When using gas spectrometry to compare the two buds in terms of THC, the cannabergerol doesn't get counted and the cured bud appears to have the same potency as the uncured bud. Truly, the only evidence that the cured bud is more potent is purely anecdotal in nature, it is excruciatingly difficult to show the change via numbers from a lab reading. This sadly prolongs the consideration that curing to effect potency is voo-doo at best. I have long since been convinced that it does and the fact that it is a scientific grey area will see to it that there will always be growers who will disagree with me on this. Oh well, if they want to miss out that's fine by me. Good luck to you all and happy gardening!

-DM

 

[dub 6]

if you want that commercial appeal and taste, put it in lil baggies... ive found that after a ~5 day hang drying, and a ~5 day cure i still had a lil grassy taste and smell, but then i bagged'm up in dub sacks and i must say...

 

[otherwhitemeat]

Remember, we determine if cannabis is ripe or not when the plant is still alive. This is done by checking the trichomes.

Once the plant is harvested the only thing that can be changed is the taste. Unless you physically ADD an ingrediant to the end result.

Curing does not cause cannabis to "peak" in any way other than YOUR PREFERRED taste...

Meant 30-60 days after jarring. Agreed, harvest time is defined by the plant, I was making no qualifications on harvest time. Harvest at the right harvest window, my original post could have been clearer.

Just wanted to clarify--I agree with what your saying in principle. But, jarred pot definitely changes in character. Degradation occurs, compounds change. Pot that's been cured 30 days, tastes different than pot cured 50 days, then pot cured 100 days. After 60 days most of my pot takes on the lemon-skunk flavor or picks up hints of ammonia as bacteria have at it.

If pot that's been in a jar for 120 days makes everyone sleepy and get the munchies, who's to say it's not stronger---just stronger in those cannabinoids, if you're looking for narco-pot. Fact is: pot changes over time, not sure if I am ready to argue that it gets stronger but it sure tastes better.

 

[Mt Toaker]

I like that the article I posted to inform people about the process turned into an debate on whether or not it is worth it. Nearing the end of my stash from harvest I am going to tell you in taste alone it is worth it.

Was it significantly more potent from when it was first dried to the end of the jar? I have no idea, I'm pretty resilient to my four strains since they are the only thing I have been smoking, but with that said I still do get way blazed off this goodness. The past couple weeks make me wish I didn't smoke so much at first simply because of the depth of flavor and spice that the herb has developed.

I cannot wait to move so I can get growing again soon. I'm going perpetual this time so I will be able to stash off Oz's here and there to let them get nice and old. I assure you though my drying and curing process is not changing, though I have been looking at boxes to dry with, but I had a fine time hanging them in cardboard boxes. Took my plants about 7-10 days to dry to a good clean snap on the larger stalks. The buds would crumble perfectly into pillowey piles of dankness, I wouldn't dream of ever using a grinder on my stash, rolling a joint has never been so easy and they have never burned so evenly down to the roach with my elements. The consistency of the smoke was great and I attribute that to organics keeping the plant matter clean and a good cure. Its sad to see my stash go, but it makes me look forward to my next one that much more.

 

[riskofwater]

BUMP