DrZiggy's Low And Slow Drying: Maximizing Your Harvest

[Furcifer]

Thanks Tricam! This is great info...your post validates that this is a time tested way of drying/ curing. Sue has reported that the taste and effect are the best she has experienced, using the low and slow, or "lotus" technique. Great thread...I'm onboard when I harvest next.

Tricam, you mentioned that you wash your bud also, may I inquire what your method is, as many of us wash also. I am always seeking enlightenment in what is the best way to do something, and why. Please, if you need to be scientific, lay it on us.

###thanks DLT.
OF COURSE I will address all ?.
The comment about omitting scientific or reasons why I have stuck and refined this process. Was just during the explanation of steps (procedure).

reps for the time tested explanation of the Lotus Cure

Thanks for putting this out there.

###thanks Radogast

First. This all came about in 93. I was a few days from harvest. And my team was alerted for a "go now mission". What to do with my plants??????
Grandparents used to do this with a lot of herbs and stuff. She called it her "Lotus" preservation. I was amazed at how fresh everything looked. Weeks in a crisper. Tried it in the 80's with a couple of oz. To eager and unwilling to wait. Total failure.

Cut all buds off placed in open mason jars. Put in crisper.
3 weeks later....what a beautiful sight....the experimentation begins.

This is how I do it. Works very well.

Washing buds. I use 5% H2O2. 1CUP to 5GAL water. Rinse in plain water
2 tubs....no more than 3 to 5 seconds of vigorous shaking in each tub. Shake, spin, shake, spin, hang.

Keeping it real...........tasty.

 

[SweetSue]

###thanks DLT.
OF COURSE I will address all ?.
The comment about omitting scientific or reasons why I have stuck and refined this process. Was just during the explanation of steps (procedure).

###thanks Radogast

First. This all came about in 93. I was a few days from harvest. And my team was alerted for a "go now mission". What to do with my plants??????
Grandparents used to do this with a lot of herbs and stuff. She called it her "Lotus" preservation. I was amazed at how fresh everything looked. Weeks in a crisper. Tried it in the 80's with a couple of oz. To eager and unwilling to wait. Total failure.

Cut all buds off placed in open mason jars. Put in crisper.
3 weeks later....what a beautiful sight....the experimentation begins.

This is how I do it. Works very well.

Washing buds. I use 5% H2O2. 1CUP to 5GAL water. Rinse in plain water
2 tubs....no more than 3 to 5 seconds of vigorous shaking in each tub. Shake, spin, shake, spin, hang.

Keeping it real...........tasty.

See, I turn around and want to give you more reps. Thank you, to whatever cosmic force brought you to us.

What a delicious information dump. Ahhhh...... This confirms our suspicions that we were on to something extraordinary. Don't you love how life drops these gems into your lap just when you need it?

The information on getting to the cure is invaluable. You saved us much time and effort. That deserves another hug. We'd appreciate hearing about the other processes as well. Our intent, as is yours, is to produce the best quality buds with the highest retention rate of all components. I'm interested in making the most medicinally valuable buds possible in a home grow without rediculous investments in equipment, and this process is a major step towards that goal.

I don't see the purchase of a small refrigerator as an extreme equipment purchase.

 

[Skullman420]

So. What kind of fridge do I need to perform this experiment? I have a complete normal fridge here - Will that work?

 

[Skullman420]

Thanks! This is extremely useful! This guy just did all the work for us! Nice!

I just came across this journal.
And, I love the intensity everyone is putting into it.
I also have been (since 1976) understanding and perfecting (to my liking) drying and curing Cannabis for smoking.

Three methods....all slow dry to cure.

Traditional- wash, hang, jar, burp (2 months)
Low and Slow- wash, open jar in frost free refrigerator, closed jar, burp (3 months)
Water cure- wash, dry, infusion/rehydrate, burp (1 month) used for unflushed, PM, or a narcotic party favor.

 

[Furcifer]

So. What kind of fridge do I need to perform this experiment? I have a complete normal fridge here - Will that work?

A frost free is a must. You do not want condensation at all.
I found out that in a regular fridge. The jars do not retain constant slow drop in moisture content. IE: if I was to place fresh cut in same space as partially dried. Moisture content of drier BUD will stabilize and raise untill everything in the crisper matches. Not so in a frost free. Buds already drying. Will continue so at the same rate.

 

[Furcifer]

Tricam, you mentioned that you wash your bud also, may I inquire what your method is, as many of us wash also. I am always seeking enlightenment in what is the best way to do something, and why. Please, if you need to be scientific, lay it on us.

DopyLemontree,
You also ask "Why".
Why doe you put Hydrogen Peroxide on a cut or in your ear. Why does it wash away with absolute O% residue.
It's a disinfectant.
I person who taught me to grow used this method.
Short story.......I ran counter drug insurgency ops in South America in the 80s. The Pot Fields I would find. Where F#@Ken Nasty. Full of powdery mildew, caterpillars, spiders, webs. This is the same shit processed and shipped across our borders.
The few buds that I would appropriate for personal use. Damn sure was washed in H2O2. LOL
Also while vacationing in Thailand. I visited a grow ops that produced Thaistick. Same shit. Due to high humidity and abundant amount of rain. All of there plants were covered in PM. Cleaned in H2O2 / water mix in large vats. Hung on lines and hosed off. Dried and processed.
Since then.
If I smell just a hint of ammonia in weed.
I would not smoke it.
Mold gives off an ammonia smell.

So better to grow thy own....
Wash to disinfect without leaving residue or causing any harm and degradation.

"Chances Favor the Prepared Mind"

 

[SweetSue]

DopyLemontree,
You also ask "Why".
Why doe you put Hydrogen Peroxide on a cut or in your ear. Why does it wash away with absolute O% residue.
It's a disinfectant.
I person who taught me to grow used this method.
Short story.......I ran counter drug insurgency ops in South America in the 80s. The Pot Fields I would find. Where F#@Ken Nasty. Full of powdery mildew, caterpillars, spiders, webs. This is the same shit processed and shipped across our borders.
The few buds that I would appropriate for personal use. Damn sure was washed in H2O2. LOL
Also while vacationing in Thailand. I visited a grow ops that produced Thaistick. Same shit. Due to high humidity and abundant amount of rain. All of there plants were covered in PM. Cleaned in H2O2 / water mix in large vats. Hung on lines and hosed off. Dried and processed.
Since then.
If I smell just a hint of ammonia in weed.
I would not smoke it.
Mold gives off an ammonia smell.

So better to grow thy own....
Wash to disinfect without leaving residue or causing any harm and degradation.

"Chances Favor the Prepared Mind"

There you go again..... I read that, said F***in A!" and reached to the rep button....... Whoops.... Made me shudder to consider how lucky I was to be such a small time consumer. If we'd had more money available I'd have smoked a lot more of it.

We've been having a discussion about budwashing. The method of choice around here has been Doc Bud's recommendation of lemon juice and baking soda in a first wash, followed by two clear washes. I recently came across a reasonable argument for using a dilution of H2O2 instead and then rinse that off. Your comments appear to back up that poster's contentions.

Thank you for sharing ratios. That'll come in real handy when I harvest on Sunday.

 

[SweetSue]

I'm sitting here, bouncing up and down with glee that we now have a proven plan for checking the humidity levels of the buds. Already figured out!

tricam......

 

[Furcifer]

See, I turn around and want to give you more reps. Thank you, to whatever cosmic force brought you to us.

### karma, or the love of MM.
Happy to here.

Don't you love how life drops these gems into your lap just when you need it?

### Yes, life has been a rollercoaster for awhile. MM research and the 420 crowd has brought us together.

The information on getting to the cure is invaluable. You saved us much time and effort. That deserves another hug. We'd appreciate hearing about the other processes as well.

###Thank you, I will enjoy sharing. And answer questions.

Our intent, as is yours, is to produce the best quality buds with the highest retention rate of all components. I'm interested in making the most medicinally valuable buds possible in a home grow without rediculous investments in equipment, and this process is a major step towards that goal.

###I'M ALL IN. Exactly my goal

I don't see the purchase of a small refrigerator as an extreme equipment purchase.

Some things are a necessity to achieve the optimal outcome.
$40 for the Tappan fridge. Had to replace the freezer door gasket.

Thank you

 

[Skullman420]

Girl's nylon stockings will probably work well as filter on the jars as well. We often used those in the recording studio as pop-filters during vocal recording. Use two layers, one cm between them and you have a pop-filter good as any expensive professional one. We did this because pop filters are expensive and nylon stockings are cheap

 

[Radogast]

There you go again..... I read that, said F***in A!" and reached to the rep button....... Whoops.... Made me shudder to consider how lucky I was to be such a small time consumer. If we'd had more money available I'd have smoked a lot more of it.

We've been having a discussion about budwashing. The method of choice around here has been Doc Bud's recommendation of lemon juice and baking soda in a first wash, followed by two clear washes. I recently came across a reasonable argument for using a dilution of H2O2 instead and then rinse that off. Your comments appear to back up that poster's contentions.

Thank you for sharing ratios. That'll come in real handy when I harvest on Sunday.

To be fair to Doc Bud, he suggests H202 wash as a prewash if PM is anywhere around, then continue with Lemon Juice/Baking Soda wash followed by 2 rinses.

 

[Furcifer]

To be fair to Doc Bud, he suggests H202 wash as a prewash if PM is anywhere around, then continue with Lemon Juice/Baking Soda wash followed by 2 rinses.

I do understand the concept to the lemon juice and baking soda wash. Used it and have no problem with it. I still use it on my veggies.
The goal is to clean all the fly s#!t, dust mites, skin particles, etc. Without drenching the buds unnecessarily.

 

[Canyon]

FWIW, one of the differences I noticed with the peroxide V lemon soda quasi valid test I did (force dried) comparing the two was that the lemon baking soda appeared to soak into the bud more. They appeared slightly soggy compared to the H2O2 and took longer to dry. I should add that I used a 10:1 dilution. I had no idea how much to use.

After a lot of looking the buds over dry I decided the H2O2 had a slightly better bag appeal. I decided to go with H2O2 for the two plants I cut and jarred nine days ago. They are in paper bags and I am happy with the way they are drying.

Frost, no frost.
I bought a 6+ cf signal door frig/freezer that has an open style freezer chamber that collects the moisture rather well. I am finding that the small frig is drying buds nearly twice as fast as the frost free.

I never know

 

[SweetSue]

To be fair to Doc Bud, he suggests H202 wash as a prewash if PM is anywhere around, then continue with Lemon Juice/Baking Soda wash followed by 2 rinses.

Thank you Rad. You know, when I posted that a little voice in my head said to include that fact, and I ignored it. Obviously, it was important.

I do understand the concept to the lemon juice and baking soda wash. Used it and have no problem with it. I still use it on my veggies.
The goal is to clean all the fly s#!t, dust mites, skin particles, etc. Without drenching the buds unnecessarily.

Thank you. That works for me.

FWIW, one of the differences I noticed with the peroxide V lemon soda quasi valid test I did (force dried) comparing the two was that the lemon baking soda appeared to soak into the bud more. They appeared slightly soggy compared to the H2O2 and took longer to dry. I should add that I used a 10:1 dilution. I had no idea how much to use.

After a lot of looking the buds over dry I decided the H2O2 had a slightly better bag appeal. I decided to go with H2O2 for the two plants I cut and jarred nine days ago. They are in paper bags and I am happy with the way they are drying.

Frost, no frost.
I bought a 6+ cf signal door frig/freezer that has an open style freezer chamber that collects the moisture rather well. I am finding that the small frig is drying buds nearly twice as fast as the frost free.

I never know

And the mystery continues. I'll take your word for it and dilute to the ratio tricam suggested. It'll be good to take this one down on Sunday.

Oooo.... I just realized my social event for tomorrow got cancelled. I can harvest in the morning. Rats! Not enough H2O2 on hand!

You may have stumbled onto an invaluable piece to the puzzle Canyon. So in your experience the dorm fridge is the better choice? Are you coming away with the belief that the bags dry better than jars? Hmmmm..... I'll have to rethink my drying approach. I like the schedule tricam's worked out. I'm ok with leaving some in for a much longer time. I have enough in stock to get us all through. If I have to keep us all on FHO capsules while things dry properly that's the way it'll have to be.

I don't know about you guys, but I'm having great fun exploring this.

 

[Canyon]

....You may have stumbled onto an invaluable piece to the puzzle Canyon. So in your experience the dorm fridge is the better choice? Are you coming away with the belief that the bags dry better than jars? Hmmmm..... I'll have to rethink my drying approach. I like the schedule tricam's worked out. I'm ok with leaving some in for a much longer time. I have enough in stock to get us all through. If I have to keep us all on FHO capsules while things dry properly that's the way it'll have to be.

I don't know about you guys, but I'm having great fun exploring this.

The fridge will need to have a freezer. The frost is the water that is drawn out of the buds as vapor, and then frozen onto the freezer chamber. That is what brings the humidity down. Then you can defrost it as needed.

My latest thinking about the drying is to loose pack buds with the stems on in bags until the stems are rather dry. Then, bring them up to room temperature and stabilize the RH around 62% when in sealed jars, then back to cold curing in sealed jars.

I was getting condensation in screened jars for more than a week. With bags the drying is more even and faster.

 

[Randoobula]

I started my first grow with several plants given to me by a friend. I knew nothing about WPM but after I found it in the plants I looked at his crop and there it was. So I started off on the wrong foot.

I've been diligent throughout the grow and stayed on top of it. I get small spots and deal with them immediately.

As summer has rolled in my RH has gone from 40-50 to 50-60, the exact opposite of what it should have been. I'm in the last few weeks of flower and need to make a decision.

In veg I used a Mildew Cure drenching mist every two weeks and that worked great. In flower I used H202 mist to spot treat. I tried many concentrations and found that the 10:1 wasn't very effective, especially if the mildew happened to be on some of the sticky lower sugar leaves. I went to 4:1 and that seemed to do the job with no visible adverse effects. With about two weeks to go I drench misted the plants with milk solution and haven't seen any mildew since.

Earlier someone suggested 1 cup H202 per 5 gallons water, which is 80:1. Logic tells me all that would do is wash off some of the mildew and may not be enough to kill it.

Can't remember who it was, but someone posted that the effectiveness of the lemon juice and baking soda wash recommended by Jorge Cervantes for WPM is not scientifically sound.

As if the decision on wash isn't enough, now I'm also considering water cure. I've been doing Everclear extraction using heat and believe a high percentage of terpenes are lost, so why not water cure. I assume all terps would be lost but so would contaminates. I also like the idea of continuing to promote bud swelling and trich production through to the end and water cure to pull residuals out, as even tho using "organic" nutes, I don't believe they are truly organic and want as much purity as possible.

What I will Cure for smoke will be low and slow in the fridge. Thanks so much for everyone's input in that method!

Any thoughts? Suggestions? I'm truly at a loss. Info overload!

 

[SweetSue]

I started my first grow with several plants given to me by a friend. I knew nothing about WPM but after I found it in the plants I looked at his crop and there it was. So I started off on the wrong foot.

I've been diligent throughout the grow and stayed on top of it. I get small spots and deal with them immediately.

As summer has rolled in my RH has gone from 40-50 to 50-60, the exact opposite of what it should have been. I'm in the last few weeks of flower and need to make a decision.

In veg I used a Mildew Cure drenching mist every two weeks and that worked great. In flower I used H202 mist to spot treat. I tried many concentrations and found that the 10:1 wasn't very effective, especially if the mildew happened to be on some of the sticky lower sugar leaves. I went to 4:1 and that seemed to do the job with no visible adverse effects. With about two weeks to go I drench misted the plants with milk solution and haven't seen any mildew since.

Earlier someone suggested 1 cup H202 per 5 gallons water, which is 80:1. Logic tells me all that would do is wash off some of the mildew and may not be enough to kill it.

Can't remember who it was, but someone posted that the effectiveness of the lemon juice and baking soda wash recommended by Jorge Cervantes for WPM is not scientifically sound.

As if the decision on wash isn't enough, now I'm also considering water cure. I've been doing Everclear extraction using heat and believe a high percentage of terpenes are lost, so why not water cure. I assume all terps would be lost but so would contaminates. I also like the idea of continuing to promote bud swelling and trich production through to the end and water cure to pull residuals out, as even tho using "organic" nutes, I don't believe they are truly organic and want as much purity as possible.

What I will Cure for smoke will be low and slow in the fridge. Thanks so much for everyone's input in that method!

Any thoughts? Suggestions? I'm truly at a loss. Info overload!

Ouch! So that was what the milk shower was all about. Didn't make that connection. Lol!

I don't have any answers, but I was wondering how long you have 'till harvest?

 

[Dave Groomer]

Sorry I haven't updated in a bit. Here is my update. I pulled the bud when it was at 44% in the fridge. Bud felt dry to the touch. Jarred it up and RH went to about 72%. I should have put it back in the frdge, but I didn't. I let it dry the rest of the way over the next 24 hours with the tops off. Flavor is a bit better then what I had already jarred, but IMHO, it still needs some cure time to increase to potency. I think it is about the same, so after a 3-4 week cure, it should be stronger.

I also just chopped a small Bubba's Gift. 225g wet. She is layered with shredded news paper in a brown paper bag on the bottom of the fridge. Starting RX 37%. I sure by tomorrow morning it will be 70 or more. We shall see.

 

[TorturedSoul]

Interesting. I have always been under the impression that curing cannot take place at that temperature range. Are you still able to observe conversion of (much of) the chlorophyll into sugars? Or, alternatively, does it at least not taste like "fresh dried still-green bud" that the dealers sell because they CBA to produce a good cure?

 

[SweetSue]

Interesting. I have always been under the impression that curing cannot take place at that temperature range. Are you still able to observe conversion of (much of) the chlorophyll into sugars? Or, alternatively, does it at least not taste like "fresh dried still-green bud" that the dealers sell because they CBA to produce a good cure?

We're not curing in these temps TS, at least not all of us. A few may be playing with it, but this is about drying.

I find that if I give it a day in the jar after removing from the fridge I get clean taste, with much more flavor. It has to be dry though, and that can take a while to achieve.