So this is my 5th grow, still learning a lot but this time around I felt like I had maybe gotten the hang of it, the grow went great, the buds looked great, and I harvested last week. Only one plant but I had a whole stacked tray of branches and buds, and the buds seemed thick and heavy, I could kinda squeeze them and they felt dense, and when I held out the branches they felt heavy and drooped. I dried them for 5 days upside down, with most of the leaves trimmed off. It's been very humid and rainy here so I went for a longer dry time. But now as I'm going to jar them up the buds feel so airy and light, they almost feel and look like tumbleweeds. They look nothing like the dense nuggets you get from professionals. They're light as air. I'm kinda upset. What did I do wrong here? Is the whole "dry until the stem snaps instead of bends" rule bs? Any thoughts or insights appreciated. I don't have a photo of them after harvest but here they is one jar and one nugget. If it matters, this was critical purple auto flower, and I grow in a vivosun grow tent setup with an LED panel.
So what would you say is a good drying time, generally? And then if the airiness is genetic then the change I saw between harvest and after drying is natural, there's nothing I could have done about it? I have heard that airy buds are genetic, but I have gotten them every time I grow and I've used multiple different strains, so I'm thinking I must have something to do with it? As for light, I'm following the vivosun directions faithfully, in terms of intensity and how far away from the plant the light is. Are there other directions I should be following?
7 days @70 degrees, 62%humidity typically gives me the results I'm looking for, but it is dependent on how big the buds are.
Help, Curing question What Factors a Cause an "Earth" Smell What does curing your bud do? How i finally figured out the dry for my zone.
hotter temps when flower looser buds . Genetics . Is # 1 for looser buds . Drying . Nope not the issue . Lack of light yes and no. If you stressing the plant from lack of light yes you can get loose buds but typical it wont even form solid buds only form bud on collars very small buds. To much light can make loose buds not common unless its very hot. Mostly its the genetics . Pro shops fuck them most of them sell garbage laced with pest sprays . First loose buds can be put into a vacuum. Squeeze it all tight now its solid bud . Let it dry then being in the vacuum. they will run your buds in a tumbler . Pick up the kief toss it on the top of the bud so it looks so frosty. Perfect looking buds . Now they can sell it for bigger money miss label it at 25 % thc. The kief might not be off the same bud. It may be for another . How the dispo always has 20 % and up they cheat . Its bs . Some strands are naturally much lower 10 % will say. Nope that dispo will never have anything that low . Bottom shelf starting at 18 sure ! . My bottom shelf was 4.5 % up to 8.
@bryan oconner @BrassNwood so would you saw that the airy buds are mostly an aesthetic problem? Is the medicine otherwise acceptable? At the end of the day a quality strong end product is all I'm looking for
right, it's 100 watts but an LED, I'm not an expert on light metering or grow lights in general but the output is much higher. Using my light meter I'm getting close to 60k lux which I thought was ideal for growing weed.
Try these. I always go 7,7,7. 7 days,70°,70%RH. Fan oscillating around plant,not on. Slow n steady wins the race
Yeah looks really have nothing to do with it . Some of the strongest i have ever smoked looked like garbage. I said wtf is this ? They said just smoke it . BAMM. gone. You just see to much commercial weed. Always look amazing . What i call moon rocks . Garbage chemical weed. Look at that picture . See how much it was tumbled . Vacuum packed . Pore on keth .What are moon rocks and how do you smoke them?
When you hang to dry. Cut a sample branch that fits inside of a 1 quart mason jar. As your dry progresses to the point that the stem still bends but doesn't snap yet. Toss your sample branch in the mason jar with a small hygrometer,cap the jar and wait an hour. When your reading reaches 58-64% your bud is ready to start curing. Depending on your specific drying conditions it can take 4-10 days to reach that point. Folks in the desert might dry in 3-4 days. Those in a wetter location might take 10 days or longer. HTH.
I am sure you can go up to 75,000 with some sativa strain/plants(high bud/low leaf ratio) with added co2 before you see the light cause damage but this is very different from what the average indica/sativa cross(60/40%) with large fan leaves, often the magic numbers seams to be around 800 umols( 35,000lux is about 660umols and 45,000 lux is about 850 umols), guess the point I am trying to make is one plant in the middle of the flower room covering a 2ft x 2ft with the panel 12" above the canopy will receive more than enough light(between 680 and 1080 umols) 25w ft2 @Akhenenra was growing an auto indica plant, probable get away with 30,000 lux, its more likely that Akhenenra chopped the plant too early, a week or 2 longer and the plant would have fill out. Just been looking online, found the same chart on royalqueenseeds and there pictures of single ended 600w hps and that makes a lot of sense, leds are 20% to 30% more effective when they get the same amount of lux because the lux meter can only see white light and so the reading are lower with a HPS (2000k)
that's interesting, I have had issues telling from the trichomes when to harvest and in the past have waited too long (like molding buds) waiting for the amber trichomes so this time I just followed the timeline (12 weeks) rather than checking with the microscope. Other than the trichomes how else do you judge? Do you always do 14 weeks on your indicas?
My personal experience has been that the buds really develop density the last 2-3 weeks or so. Strain does matter, some are lighter/airier some are naturally denser. As pointed out above a 100w light is not enough for really dense buds. I think the minimum for most LED's would be 120-150 per plant. My 480w led in my 4x4 is fine, but the 150w in my 2x2 does usually produce slightly denser/bigger buds. The 7/7/7 drying method has yet to steer me wrong. I always try for at least 10 day dry time, but circumstances can vary that slightly. 7 days would be my minimum target.
