Harvest & Curing Drying Poll

[Magic]

Hello Afn i have heard many different things from people and surfing the web about drying your plant to get the best results.
Do you: 1 Chop the whole plant
2: chop the branches or 3: Chop down to nugs (leaving little stem as possible)

Im trying to find the best way to dry my buds when i harvest my last grow i used the paper bag method and chopped them down to nugs leaving little stem, well i feel they dried a little to fast around 3-4 days no where near the 7-10 days i see some people suggest, so i thought i would start a poll and collect some data and also get some comments from you guys about your process! Thank U

 

[Hazy]

I break it all down into nugs and place them in cardboard boxes lined with brown paper then put a layer of brown paper on top, leave for 5 days, then transfer into air tight containers and air two or three times a day for a week then just leave it to cure. I usd to hang the whole branches but i felt i was loosing something, tast wise.

 

[Bromeo]

Ya know I think its kind of regional. Where I am the local climate is very humid. Hanging a whole plant with big buds is just begging for mold for me. I cut em down to small nugs and line the bottom of paper bags with them. In 5 to 6 days i have dried ready to toke or cure weed. I wish i could just hang a whole plant but after lots of fails the bags seem to be my best bet.

 

[mwsmoker]

I agree with romeo and also seasonal. When winter came to where I live the air dried out and now I'm wrapping a paper bag with the bottom lined with buds. wrapped not too tight but to keep them from driying to a crisp in three days. When it was summer here it gets so humid I paper bag them like above but with bags just folded over shut for 3 days shaking around every now and again then wrap the buds up a lil tighter in the bag for couple to 4 more days then I jar. I've looked at so many threads on drying/curing and most methods work just as good as eachother, its just a matter of preference and what works best in ur climate

 

[Guerrilla]

I chop branches at main stem and hang from there. My humidity in the mtns is less than 20% so it's dry as fuck up here. 3 days and mines dry. 4 days and it's crispysounding when you touch the buds. But then after a few days in a glass jar... Burping twice a day and there perfect!! My candy kush is so perfect right now. It sticky as hell but not to wet. And that shit is fire!!!! :smoke:

 

[oldster]

I tried drying in paper bags this last time and was happy with the results but did not like the sticky mess of working with fresh material. I will be going back to hanging the entire plant. My humidity is usually between 50-70% so the things dry slow without any mold issues. Drying the whole plant allows me to do the final breakdown slowly instead of having a marathon.

 

[pop22]

Ya know I think its kind of regional. Where I am the local climate is very humid. Hanging a whole plant with big buds is just begging for mold for me. I cut em down to small nugs and line the bottom of paper bags with them. In 5 to 6 days i have dried ready to toke or cure weed. I wish i could just hang a whole plant but after lots of fails the bags seem to be my best bet.

Ok where does every one get paper bags?? I haven't seen a paper bag in years!

 

[Magic]

all my grocery stores still carry them you just have to ask for them. i thought the same thing but once i started looking for them i see them everywhere now! fast food places use them alot and also you can buy them online in bulk for cheap, i was told to get the thick bags not the thin ones.

 

[wwwillie]

Food market, ask for paper. The packy always tries to put my sixer in a paper bag. I tell them that it already has this handy little cardboard carrier!

 

[Groff]

Ok where does every one get paper bags?? I haven't seen a paper bag in years!

Me neither !! But then I kind of found myself in an Ikea shop with my gf... kind of day dreaming a seeing all kinds of mods to transfmorm EVERYTHING there into some sort of growing aid apparatus (anyone get that?!) ... anyways... They have huge brown paper bags at the check-out. They are insanely good sideways. You can do 1 big plant in 2 bags if you cut down to nugs. They'll charge you a few cents for it, but quite worth it.

But I find myself preferring to hang up my elastic scrog net and cutting down to branches. Totally agree with romeo, but I've since developed my own method. What I do is have the branches in the tent with the dehuey set to 60%. One or two days, then switch off the dehuey (and exhaust) to test and wait about 6-8 hours with a small fan down below to circ air...

If RH rises, I turn it back on another day. If its stable at 60%, set it to 50%. Then 40%. Then jar.
If its very humid, the dehuey will save my buds from rot. If its too dry, it wont even turn on, but I live in a quite humid place except mid summer.

People fear the word dehumidifier + drying... but I'm certainly not bone drying. I got this idea when I did a little plant in a 10L airpot, and had nothing to smoke, so I got a nug and wrapped some string and hung it above an old dehuey that was set to dry... in 24h in was almost bone dry. But, strangely enough, some of the best and tastiest smoke. Dont recommend it though, I think I just got lucky.

anyway, with my dehumidifeier method, I cut down 1 maybe 2 days, but above all I feel its a more constant speed of drying than enhances flavor, and jarring at the right time, rather than if it takes 2 or 20 days