Hey Blades, So, to give you a little background, I live in a very dry climate...and it totally sucks to try and dry/cure properly. Our low low humidity levels cause my plants to dry out too quickly, resulting in a hay smell more than anything else. I wanted to have my stash be as top shelf as possible, ensuring a nice slow dry, and cure. FickySiskers threw an idea my way to introducing a slow dry by using Boveda Humidipaks. They are great packs from what I read for tobacco, ensuring a two way process to allow a very small margin of change in RH over time. I will be curing in this manner (subject to change depending on the experiment): Chop the plant and allow to dry 1-3 days until a little crisp. Dry trim and manicure Jar with my Caliber IV hygrometer and wait 24 hrs to see what moisture pulls back out Introduce my first Boveda pack, 72% RH. I will need to closely monitor and probably burp for a few days to ensure I dont pickup some bud rot or something. Over a few days is monitoring goes well, I will step down to the 69% RH, and monitor. And so the process goes for a week or so until I step down to 65 and 62% RH Boveda. I like the idea of the 62% RH pak as it is specifically made for cure and storage of Cannabis according to Boveda's website. Once I step down to this 62, I will allow to sit without burping for a week or three, and test them! Please feel free to follow and help me out thru this process. It will be a completely experimental process for me, so any suggestions along the way I will appreciate greatly! Pics soon, I currently have an Auto Fem Pineapple Express to chop within the next couple days, and she smells LOVELY. Great musky pineapple aroma and coated with resin that I hope to preserve thru this process.
Heres a small update if you guys would like to enjoy . The PE that I harvested before is now in the jar with a 65% RH boveda pack, since this morning. I had them inside a 69% RH jar after trim and dry, for 3 days. I have been burping the jars (stored on their side with 60g pack underneath, and bud on top), for about 20-40 seconds, once a day. The buds are sort of stuck in big "globs" to each other so I have to rotate carefully otherwise the pack will move onto them. I think tomorrow will be the trim of the rest before they go into a 69% pack. Heres a pic of the PE thats in the jar.
Just went in to burp the jar at 65% RH and it still has a big hay smell to it which makes me have a funny face expression, but I got a subtle aroma from the terpenes this time. The fruity smell in small dose, which is a good sign! I think theyve been in the jar total for what....5 days I think? I still have the rest of the Pineapple express hanging up, but two smaller branches were good enough to trim and throw into the jar at 69%, a small total of 2.2 grams to experiment. Probably tomorrow I will have the rest of the PE ready to jar. I am thinking I can leave it at 65% for a few more days to even out better, and then throw in at 62% for the rest of the time.
Hey gilly, I've been thinking about buying those as well. Anxious to see how they do for you. See ya...
i have used these before and they work quite well tho they can keep the weed a little to moist at times
Yeah it seems like they have been allowing a nice slow dry for me and cure, which is exactly what I was looking to do, any bud here is usually super dry no matter what and crumbles if you squish it at all. Even drying my buds theyre crispy after only a couple days of cutting down. In a couple more days I plan to set them down to the 62% packs and let sit for a couple weeks to see how they respond. Thanks for following along fellas!
Hey Gilly, I'm interested to see the results. Subbed for sure, hope you get the top shelf youre looking for!
Thanks bud! I cant wait to see results and how it helps. The buds so far are beginning to slowly lose the hay aroma, I havent stepped down to 62% yet, but plan on doing it to my first batch maybe tomorrow morning. I still have the rest at 69% but this afternoon I think ill step it down to 65%. It seems like it definitely helps sweat out that plant smell pretty fast.
So a small update for everyone following, I just finished burping the two jars of Pineapple Express for the day. I also moved the first batch of PE (been at higher humidity packs since 5/22) to its final place of cure at 62% RH. I immediately noticed today there was almost no hay / chlorophyll smell, but a weirder sweetish aroma that came out. Definitely not like it was while growing yet, but a small step there! Here is the 62% bud: I almost moved the 69% pack and stepped down to the 65%, ill leave it there maybe an extra day from before to see how it affects anything in comparison. Here is the 69 to 65 pack: During this 62% pack ill leave there for another week if I can, before smoking. I just smoked a small..maybe .2 g bud and 3 hits later, im damned stoned! My wife also shared this bud with me. It has a sweet taste that hits my tongue immediately upon inhale. Its already smooth where it doesnt hurt one bit.
nice it sounds like these are working out nicely for you im about to buy some more as harvest is coming up
Id definitely recommend these Boveda packs...especially where I live. Humidity is a big issue here, and even if I left in a jar here from burping theyd dry out quite a bit. These ensure that nice RH consistently. I have the larger 60g packs and 32oz mason jars. I think I may move the rest of my Pineapple Express over to join the rest at 62%. I cant wait to do this again with my Blueberry Gum that just started to flower. Ill need to reorder a few extra packs, im hoping to have 3-5 of those jars full once im all done.
Have you been doing it in this method or similar? Opinions are definitely welcome here . I thought about stepping straight to 62% I just wasnt quite sure how well thatd work
I trim, dry and then straight to jars with 62% humidipaks. Still open the jars every once in a while, but the humidipaks really cut down on the amount of times needed. $$.
Thanks for the tips, I may try going straight to 62 after a dry trim or just start at 65 and then work to 62, im still not sure completely yet how its gonna work but I know ill need some more Bovedas either way within the next month. Just to update you guys, all my Pineapple express has been curing in the 62 jar, and today is the first real day I can say burping the jar had a great aroma to it. Curing for longer time will definitely make it even better, but I have noticed the aroma of a musk and pineapple today. Itd an almost questionable smell, I sniffed it wondering if I actually HAD weed in there, its sort of misleading lol. Either way it sure works well, and will stay curing until its all gone.