welcome aboard DOC, i thought this conversation was gonna be AB only lol. listen to IRISH, jar em til they are soft, if they dont get soft we need to get you adding moisture... in the correct way. this will give you an idea of what moist is.
these buds spent about 8 days in my closet after trim... i have a space heater in there keeping temp at 70F and humidity is around 60% i opened the door once a day to check on em and drop humidity to 50%.
here is a day or 2 later after bagging rolling up the bag tightly, not air tight but a gentle squeeze... just pressing them together they are still wet enough and sticky enough to clump
here they are all broken up.
IRISH please elaborate on my post and correct all my mistakes... any suggestions on temp, vent time, bud spacing, RH?. im new to this but its working for me.
Looking good, Flurple. Be careful packing them tight for very long a time though--could cause an anaerobic atmosphere in the middle, encouraging mold. Also, if your bud flowers are particularly delicate, you can't leave them softly wet for very long--and by very long I mean 10 days or more--they can do a strange dry rot that'll make them moosh to sticky powder once they've reached the proper moisture content and you'll be scratching your head muttering what the.... *L* You can't smell this happening, it's just drawing out a cure too long.
Ideally, 50% RH is what one wants for drying. 60% and you're slowing the process down. Not a bad thing, it can sure make your smoke taste rich, but you have to be wary of taking it too far before the final dry and set.
i am going to ask again with a slight alteration to your question DOC, and multiple questions... cuz you struck a nerve in my head (no nerves in the brain haha) what would cause buds to have a weak smell even when cured correctly.
... can underventing or opening the container too often cause a bad cure even if humidity and moisture are perfect?
Ayup, it sure can. Undervented, and you build up curing vapors (and RH) in the container and can take the cure to the dry rot stage. Overvented, and you get to the point that the cure is interrupted.
... is it important to achieve an anaerobic (oxygenless environment) before venting?
Nope. Not entirely. Just close enough quarters so that the curing vapors permeate every bud in the container. However, when you're going to store long-term, an anaerobic condition is desired, since this puts everything in a sort of suspended animation. Bud will continue to cure in the long term vault, but at a much slower rate.
... the slower the better right??? so as long as i dont have mold i can slowly expose them to more dangerous but perhaps better curing environments? and if so what would these be... higher humidity or higher temp? or both?
OK, this is info I've never heard before.....cool.
So, you roll your buds together in a bag and you want them to stick? I thought that monster photo above was one bud....but it's actually several!
The neat thing about curing in bags is that you can extract as much air as you need to keep them curing, and watch the bag puff back up with vapor, which is your cue to vent the bag, just like Flurple.
Right now, mine are in jars, with lids on, so if they dried too fast, they should rehydrate decently. Again, they were not crispy, but dried pretty fast.
The RH in my room is between 25 and 50. It's been dry as hell up here lately.
You'll need to stabilize that RH if you can. What is the temp?
I'm harvesting my two best plants tomorrow night, so I want to get it right!
You guys and gals are awesome to help out like this.
Keep Fluffin 'em and resealing them like you have been and those puppies are going to be soooo dank!
Right now, check them in the morning when you get up and in the evening when you crash. It may be beneficial if you can dump the temp a bit. 74 is a little warm--you can cope with it but cooler would help slow things down a bit. When you check your bud, touch them to see how soft they are and if they bounce back when squeezed or stay depressed. If they stay depressed, you should be "smelling the sweet" pretty soon. Don't leave the lid off very long--just long enough to smell, touch, and lightly fluff up the bud before sealing again. If they bounce back when squeezed, don't open the jar again for 24 hours, and then do just a quick check, no fluffing. Ideally, the bouquet should bloom and keep blooming like a bell-curve until opening the jar does not produce the thick, heady perfume that it did previously. At that point, your cure has come to its pinnacle and you should be able to seal and store indefinitely.
Me too! You should see my 3rd cutting Strawberry Cough--a solid pillow of black maroon....
Interesting. What is the genetics of the Flo?
If you're asking if the Flo would smell better due to osmosis with other more aromatic buds, I really don't think so. It may smell great while the aromatic buds are in with them, but once you grind the Flo buds up to smoke, it'll taste pretty much the same as it did before.
Wheelchairs?
