Why do I always lose all my terps? I need help!

[420Forever]

Check your attitude at the door, and keep your comments to yourself. Moderators don't tolerate that kind of attitude here

disclaimer: they're emojiz....relax ppp

 

[BII]

My plants have no or hardly any odor while growing and only a small amount at best after drying/curing. In colder months I even grow indoors with no exhausting or filtering of tent air, with no odor accumulating in the house. I've never been able to figure out the cause. Luckily every other aspect of quality - potency, yield, looks. - is rather good, so I don't worry about it, don't consider not having loud smells as a problem. I presume even with what growers complain about as low terps there is still enough variety and amounts of whatever terpenes is/are needed for the concierge effect.

For those looking to directly boost (some might say adulterate?) terpene content and odor, a number of companies sell pure terpenes and mixtures emulating the odor/taste of popular strains. Although made mostly as additives for concentrates, I presume there are suitable ways of applying these oils to buds.

 

[Son of Hobbes]

Playing devil's advocate here about adding in smells; terpenes are not just everywhere, but in many of the products we eat, drink, smoke, inhale, etc.

The real issue here is the source of the terpenes and how they are being added in. Concentrated terpenes can make you very sick, which is why it's nearly always suggested to be added in lesser amounts to help negate potential side effects (not greater amounts. Less is MORE here.)

Not all terpenes are created the same either; there are natural sources and synthetic versions.

But yes, you can 100% add terpenes to cannabis flower.

I don't think I would go to the kitchen cupboard to try to enhance my weed though. Look at vanilla extract for example; smells great right? Not a terpene. It's an aldehyde, which are organic compounds that can damage cells and DNA when smoked (lots of aldehydes in cigarettes for an example.) And that's such a easy thing to mistake based on the innocence of just not knowing, right?

So you -can- play science here, but don't play guessing games with what can potentially make you (or others) sick!

 

[Mossy]

I don't think I would go to the kitchen cupboard to try to enhance my weed though.

Not a good time to say I really enjoy a bit of fresh dried Mint in a joint every now and then...like a menthol ciggie that we can't have in Europe any more....or a wee sprinkle of Lavender.......?...

Most herbs have Terpene profiles that match our favourite cannabis terps.....so why not....?..


Don't all Shout at once..........

 

[Mozzy]

know that Sulfur will increase terps/smell/flavor in almost any plant. You could try adding a little plain Epsom salt. It is just Magnesium and Sulfur, 1-2g per gallon should make a difference. Worth a try and it won't mess up your NPK and the Mg ain't bad to use in coco

That's interesting...in organic soil would you put ~2g of epsom/gallon for every watering or is that something that builds up and messes up PH or other stuff?

 

[Entombed]

That's interesting...in organic soil would you put ~2g of epsom/gallon for every watering or is that something that builds up and messes up PH or other stuff?

I am not an organic or even a soil grower so I can't answer that with any sort of knowledge. I run coco and use it every watering. It's also the third item I add so I am not sure what effect it has on pH. Sorry man, but I bet @Waira knows. That dude is like an encyclopedia.

Let's see if the tag summons the wizard.


That said, I think adding a couple grams towards the end of flowering every other watering would do it. You do need to consider that epsom salt is just Sulfur and Mag, so you wouldn't want to over add on the Mg but I don't think it would be that much especially in good organic soil.

 

[Waira]

Here is where things already go a bit sideways - I lose terps after mid flower. My plants stop smelling as nicely. I'm not talking about nose-blindness. Others notice it too. It's as if my terps are disappearing. My tent smells like berries, gas, fruity chewing gums, everything. And suddenly, these smells just disappear. As if something just grabbed all the terps.

This happened to around 16 plants now, stretched over a few grows, 4 of them being photoperiods from Square One, called Frozen Bag. I thought I'll switch it up for once, as all my autos lost their terps & I just thought it's an auto thing, but the same happened to my photos. Seriously, my plants sometimes look like cup winning images, but once you smell them, you'll be like "what the hell, there's nothing".

My drying conditions are rather stabilized, and I tried two methods this time - Low temps (10°C / 50F) with around 55-60% humidity, and the usual 60/60 drying method. One run also had a higher temp drying at around 70-75F / 20-24°C and 55% humidity for 2 days, and then 60% afterwards to let them dry out slowly a bit more. My drying times range from 7 to 14 days depending on bud size and density. I sometimes hang up single full stems with side branches, sometimes I just quarter the main stem up and hang the large pieces. Always dry trim, never wet trim. Low airflow, one big 12" fan blowing against the opposite wall on low setting, causing some air movement, but not enough to move the plants around, just enough to feel air moving on my skin if I stand there. I dry in an extra room I have no use for.

I trim them as usual as soon as they're dry, bag them up in grove bags, and they stabilize at around 61% humidity most of the time, and go to around 58-60% over the next few weeks. Everything works out just fine here. but the terps?

I end up with wood terps. All my plants end up smelling the exact same. Each and every genetic, strain - Wood, chocolate-ish wood. It has some resemblance to weed, but it's 99% cardboard and wood, as if everything died.

Hey Kaz! ...I know this WTF mystery all to well myself, and honestly, I can't finger any one thing for cause --> effect.... Auto's and photo's, inside and out...

Big picture, terp' production is dynamic, it may cycle up and down during flowering... There are several rabbit holes to go down on this, a whole damn lecture series really, so I'll throw some broad strokes out there...

-- your grow MO seems fine to me, ditto for dry and cure... Not the cause that I can tell, and doing that right doesn't wave a magic wand to bring back what ain't there to begin with.

-- big thing missed here by some is the fade out while live, sometimes early on....

-- for a fact, some pheno's will just be inferior for aroma production, it's the inherent gamble of all seeds; solid breeding, quality lines play big roles but nuthin' is "locked in" 100%...
An example from last season: two Lemon Drizzles, usually a solid cultivar, but I got one (the better looking and more resinous) that was nose blank as a piece of paper! The other had decent aroma, but not what it should have been...

-- nutrition and particularly, the right emphasis of which ones at the right time is another strong influencing factor. Certain micronutes are very important to terpene production; you can have all the PK right, but the terp' machine needs other parts than this! Micro's are critical catalysts/co-factors in secondary metabolite production, and it's possible to have that bottleneck things even if there are no overt deficiency symptoms...
Sulfur plays some role too, but isn't literally part of terpene components, but it is part of other aromatic compounds that give that classic skunk odor, "garlic/onion"....
Keep in mind there is so much synergistic action going on with all this, cultivar to cultivar, pheno to pheno, even plant to plant, it's really quite complicated LOL

-- I have had plants very near harvest with fantastic aroma going on (at the time), and 36hrs later, morning of chop time, it goes quiet for no fucking apparent reason ....I've even delayed it because of this, but not always to good effect, and at the risk of going past prime ripeness...
What's most aggravating about this (for me) is that other plants are just fine for aroma! I grow is a sort of super soil with light amendments added in to butt-cover the things I mentioned (micro's, S, PK at the right time and amounts)...Si, kelp, humic-fulvics, inoculants...
*edit*-- spaced the follow-up -- which is here you have plants getting pretty much all the same everything, so inputs are not bloody likely to be the core of the issue for such disparities...

Environmental factors are in play too, but nothing I see in your grow, or even mine, that could be the cause of shit aroma production,... heat, cold, wind,... But some of these (and pests too) can actually stress the plant and help magnify terpenes, so again, barring extremes, it's not the culprit to finger!
Daily wear and tear (outside mainly) does deplete terpenes which is why many I know harvest in the morning...

...gotta run, but mull over this and chat some more later....

 

[Delps8]

One thing that stands out to me (not a detailed read through) is that you're slathering on the P and K. My understanding is that cannabis doesn't need much of either of those chemicals but it's common for growers to add even more when plants go into flower.

Bugbee and his PhD student Mitch Westmoreland are strong advocates of less is better in that respect.

Perhaps it's worth reducing the amount of P and K?


Re temps. Westmoreland did research on temps for minimizing loss of cannabanoids in 2020 and the magic number there is <=78° for the colas. I have not heard/read anything from that camp about reducing ambient temperature, though. The admonition is to keep the colas cool.

Re Cannatrol - I considered getting one but found an acceptable alternative.

Over on another cannabis site, there's a long thread on converting a Koolatron fridge by using the Peltier unit from a small dehu and controlling it with either an Inkbird or, my preference, and AC Infinity controller. The fridge holds the temp, the controller runs the Peltier.

It took a bit more than an hour to remove the Peltier unit from the Pohl Schmitt dehu, drill a hole in the back of the Koolatron, run the wires, and get things tidied up. It will hold a little over a pound but it holds temperature very, very well and it's about ⅓ the price of the Cannatrol.

 

[Waira]

That is an excellent hack!