curing question?? my bud feels like its goin to crumble, any help??

Im a first time grower, and ive read alot on drying and curing, but im not sure if my crop is normal or if something is wrong....

I harvested my bud on march 5th, today is the 10th - I had let it flower for just over 3 months, the colas looked and smelt amazing...

after I cut and hung them, they smelt like grassy hay, but from what ive read thats normal....today is the 5th day of drying, ive kept them in a dark room in my basement, where the temp is around 70-75 degrees, but im not sure of the humidty, (I live on the east coast so its not very humid here)

so is it normal that my bud feels like its goin to crumble? it does feel very dry, but the stems still bend, instead of breaking....

I put some of it in an air tight jar today with alittle moist bud from a plant that I just cut yesterday......was that a good idea?

any ideas, suggestions, comments are much appriciated...

thanks

adam0416 said:

Im a first time grower, and ive read alot on drying and curing, but im not sure if my crop is normal or if something is wrong....

I harvested my bud on march 5th, today is the 10th - I had let it flower for just over 3 months, the colas looked and smelt amazing...

after I cut and hung them, they smelt like grassy hay, but from what ive read thats normal....today is the 5th day of drying, ive kept them in a dark room in my basement, where the temp is around 70-75 degrees, but im not sure of the humidty, (I live on the east coast so its not very humid here)

so is it normal that my bud feels like its goin to crumble? it does feel very dry, but the stems still bend, instead of breaking....

I put some of it in an air tight jar today with alittle moist bud from a plant that I just cut yesterday......was that a good idea?

any ideas, suggestions, comments are much appriciated...

thanks

Click to expand...

Humidity is the most crucial factor, If you dry your bud to fast there will be more chlorophyll left in the bud. This makes your bud smell like hay and makes it much harsher to smoke. I recomend you take all your buds and put them in a jars with a moist fan leaf in each jar, this will re-moisten your buds so you can try the drying process again. This time makes sure your realitive humidity is 45-50% no higher.

the outside of the bud dries while leaving the inside wet. it's time to trim the buds and put them in glass jars. the moisture from inside the buds will migrate to the outside as you cure.

Everything sounds like you have it under control. Id bet the outside is dry but not the inside. Keep them in the jars and open them like you are supposed to. They should feel alittle moist when you check them the first couple times. If after a week they still feel dry try this.... I had some shit get left open and it got too dry. All i did was open the jar and brought it in the bathroom when i took a shower...i know it sounds stupid but it works. When you get out of the shower close up the jar and check it tomarrow.

adam0416 said:

so is it normal that my bud feels like its goin to crumble? it does feel very dry, but the stems still bend, instead of breaking....

Click to expand...

Yes, the outside of the bud dries faster than the inside as others have stated. You want some moisture left in the stem and buds when you begin curing so it drys slowly and evenly.

I put some of it in an air tight jar today with alittle moist bud from a plant that I just cut yesterday......was that a good idea?

Click to expand...

That was perfect. You can also use fresh stem or leaf material. You won't need a lot.

After adding your fresh bud you should notice the dry buds have absorbed some that moisture, and no longer feel crumbly. It is probable that they would have re-moistened naturally without the aid of fresh plant material, but for future reference that's what you want to do.

So yeah, you did fine. That good smell should start to return after a week or so of curing.

The bathroom is not a stupid idea, in fact its a great idea...I put boiling water in a small metal bowl, then my bud in their jars open, then put a serving dish i have that fits nicely over the 2, leave it 5 minutes and then put the jar in the fridge closed for 10. Bathroms even easier...Take weed in container into bathroom. Turn on hot shower tap. Wait 10 minutes. Turn off tap. Done lol.

I believe putting the moist jar in the fridge helps to condense the water, (more water in the same space) Without the fridge my buds feel like they are crispy with a bit of moisture on top, after the fridge they feel fairly evenly moist.
***
DO NOT LEAVE IN THE FRIDGE!! Every time you open your fridge door you go through a process of drying out the contents.
You open the door, which sweeps fresh air through the fridge. The air that was in the fridge was cold, and humid. The air you let in outside your fridge was warm, and may have been humid but it doesnt matter because most of the moisture in that air will stick to the walls or back of the fridge as frost (this is what happens in your freezer too btw but much worse!). Water will then be drawn out of everything in the fridge to get the air to the correct humidity. Each time the door is opened you do this again, and again.
***
I only recommend the one time in the fridge now, and then perhaps a short stay in the fridge prior to packaging the finished product just to even things out one last time.
Once you take the jar out of the fridge gently open it (so you dont "wipe" the condensation off the jar with your buds lol.) and wipe the inside with a clean cloth or tissue to get most of the condensation out. Then resume normal curing method. (if you overfill your jars you may need to gently take bud out then wipe the jar.

I cant be fucked citing references if you think I'm full of crap just google "fridge dries food" or whatever and you will see.

Prot

PS. If you are wondering if you could just dry your bud in the fridge using the frost build up the answer is kind of. Most dehumidifiers work like I described run humid air from your room over a chilled heatsink surface where ice forms taking the water out of the air...I think using this method to dry would take water out well, but its the chlorophyll we want out and im not sure it leeches out quite so well in the fridge...Just another note too, if you find your bud drying really fast make sure your not drying it in a room with too much untreated wood in it...remember untreated wood is fantastic at absorbing moisture. To raise humidity a little grab yourself a rubbermaid, put drill holes all over the lid, chuck your nug in it with a bowl of water and stick a SMALL PC CASE FAN over some of the holes. you dont want air moving over the bud but you do want fresh air in the box. Rotate bud/branches a few times a day, refill the water as needed. If its drying too slow drill more holes under the fan to let more air in, if its drying to fast duct tape over some of the holes. I find this really lets you fine tune your dry times.

Sorry to hijack, Drying/curing is so much more complicated than growing, at least for me lol. Plants grow themselves, they dont make mistakes...humans do. oh btw DONT SPILL THE WATER IN THE RUBBERMAID lol. You want humidity not water cured.

prot - stoned as hope this makes sense, it did while i was writing it.

OK, so I finished clipping all the buds from my first plant and put them into 3 qt sized air tight jars..... I didnt have any fan leafs, so I put a little moist buds from my 2nd plant (thats drying now) in with each jar to bring back some moisture...I also put a fresh peice of lettuce in each jar........so all I can do know is wait to see if the freshness and exotic smell comes back by opening the jar daily for the next month or so...
THanks for everyones comments, any more suggestions, comments, ideas, are welcome, Thanks

today is about 4 days into my curing process, I just opened my jars and pulled some bud out to smell, and Im getting a small hint of that citrus skunky smell on some of the buds, but mostly on the stems, so I decided to pack some in my bong, and I defintily got alittle high, is this a sign for good things to come?? i'll just have to keep my fingers crossed, and hope this bud smells as good as it did when it was growing.....

That hay smell is a sign that you chopped to early or didn't flush long enough before you chopped. It has happened to me before.
It will go away, takes about 3 weeks in the jars to get it smelling like good weed again.

ok, so im 1 week into my cure and if i open up my jars they smell pretty potent, but If i take out a peice of bud, it doesnt really have a smell to it, unless I break it up alittle..........it then starts to get that skunky smell........is that normal?
also when I open the jars, I can feel mositure on the sides, If that ok, or do I have to dry it more? ive been opening them daily for about 30-35 min.....

I figure i made a few mistakes on my first grow, but I wanna try and do whatever I can to make this bud the best it can be, so thanks to the people who posted info, any more feedback will be awesome, Thanks

yo bro, im new grower too, just recently got my first true harvest...cant expect to get everything right the first time ha....I thinik its pretty normal tho for the smell to be locked inside the buds...the longer you cure the more the smell will come out, I can only assume. Got some very nice buds off of my 2 girls and they are very stinky, Kinda similar to what you were saying that cant really smell it until you bust it open...but when you do OH MMM GEEE its amazing! grew 2 different strains afghan kush from world of seeds and a beaner seed that actually turned out better then the ordered one, we harvested it, chopped it all down off the stocks, trimmed all the buds up and then put it into these homemade drying totes, work pretty good....theres a screen inside you place bud on and on the bottom there is a 4 inch inline duct fan that sucks air throw the buds getting an even dry...found it on the forum here should maybe check it out!

Adam, I'm in exactly the same boat as you. But I got told to let them dry out for 30 days. Seems to make a huge difference.
Not that posting this is much help, but thought i'd reply on what you post, seeing as its pretty much the same as the problem I had, or though I had haha.
It should be fine and a good smoke...

miketyson said:

Adam, I'm in exactly the same boat as you. But I got told to let them stay in jars for the CURING process for 30 days. Seems to make a huge difference.
Not that posting this is much help, but thought i'd reply on what you post, seeing as its pretty much the same as the problem I had, or though I had haha.
It should be fine and a good smoke...

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Not drying out .. I meant curing lol.

yeaaaa. that is exactly how it was with my 1st grow.. my buds didnt really smell like anything.. at all. lol. i was kind of disapointed.. but w.e. .. it got me high and i wasnt selling it. so i didnt care.

And i also had the same problem as u with the dryness of the buds.. i dried them for 5 days.. adn they were all crumbly. then i put them into the jars to cure.. and after 4-5 days... they were almost TOO moist! when i would try to smoke a bud.. it would take a few tries to get a hit because it was soo moist. lol. Soo im sure you will be fine.

But the idea about puting the moist fan leaf is a good idea. I do something similar to that you might wanna try since u said u have no fan leaves... Get a small piece of paper towel.. maybe like the size of 4 quarters side by side. well 2x2 i mean.. and wet the paper towel completely... and open your jar and stick the wet paper towel to the top of your lid.. it should stick right to it since its wet... adn just make sure to open it daily..

Its really cool too, cuz after about a week or 2.. when you get the piece of paper towel... it will be hard.. and bone dry.. and almost feel like a piece of paper.. lol. PS>. you can use the trick with the paper towel for ANY weed you have.. it sees to make it almost fresher... i had bought some mids.. that my friend had sitting in an envelpoe for god knows how long.. adn the buds were hard as rocks.. adn would crumble if i squeezed them... anywayz... i put the moit paper towel under the lid.. and put it into the jar... and after lioke 4 days.. the buds looked amazing.. they actually got bigger.. since they were so compact. lol. and it broke up so nicely..

Just a neat little trick I thought I should share with you.. hope you enjoy ur smoke.. u said this is ur 1st grow?? well good for you!! your first homegrown weed will always be somethin u remember. keep it up man.. im telin u.. things just get better and better from here. now that u have a grow under ur belt.. your next plant will be better.. adn then ur next 1 after that.. for ur next grow u should order some seeds from Nirvana www.nirvana-shop.com theyre great.. adn VERY cheap man.. i got my WW seeds from there. adn that plat is doing fucking AMAZING!! I've even got "Siamese Twin" Buds.. 2 buds aer growing in a single bud site.. and the stem is twice as thick.. there are double the amount of leaves there should be.. its really cool looking.. u can check out my journal if ya want...

But im tellin ya... a good plant is all in the genetics.. this is only my 3rd grow.. adn my 1st too were form some bagseeds.. from some mids.. adn they grew ok.. but this White Widow plant..... its growing soooo mcuh better than my other plants...

OK..OK... i will stop rambling on.. im sorry.. i tend to do this when im high.. i probly told you a bunch of shit you already know.. haha.. +Rep tho for your 1st harvest!! u should be proud of urself.. growing and harvesting ur plant is harder than everyone thinks. =)

miketyson said:

Adam, I'm in exactly the same boat as you. But I got told to let them dry out for 30 days. Seems to make a huge difference.
Not that posting this is much help, but thought i'd reply on what you post, seeing as its pretty much the same as the problem I had, or though I had haha.
It should be fine and a good smoke...

Click to expand...

dude thanks for the imput, im just gonna wait it out, and hope it gets better, so far it seems to be improving about 9 days into curing....

chb444220 said:

yeaaaa. that is exactly how it was with my 1st grow.. my buds didnt really smell like anything.. at all. lol. i was kind of disapointed.. but w.e. .. it got me high and i wasnt selling it. so i didnt care.

And i also had the same problem as u with the dryness of the buds.. i dried them for 5 days.. adn they were all crumbly. then i put them into the jars to cure.. and after 4-5 days... they were almost TOO moist! when i would try to smoke a bud.. it would take a few tries to get a hit because it was soo moist. lol. Soo im sure you will be fine.

But the idea about puting the moist fan leaf is a good idea. I do something similar to that you might wanna try since u said u have no fan leaves... Get a small piece of paper towel.. maybe like the size of 4 quarters side by side. well 2x2 i mean.. and wet the paper towel completely... and open your jar and stick the wet paper towel to the top of your lid.. it should stick right to it since its wet... adn just make sure to open it daily..

Its really cool too, cuz after about a week or 2.. when you get the piece of paper towel... it will be hard.. and bone dry.. and almost feel like a piece of paper.. lol. PS>. you can use the trick with the paper towel for ANY weed you have.. it sees to make it almost fresher... i had bought some mids.. that my friend had sitting in an envelpoe for god knows how long.. adn the buds were hard as rocks.. adn would crumble if i squeezed them... anywayz... i put the moit paper towel under the lid.. and put it into the jar... and after lioke 4 days.. the buds looked amazing.. they actually got bigger.. since they were so compact. lol. and it broke up so nicely..

Just a neat little trick I thought I should share with you.. hope you enjoy ur smoke.. u said this is ur 1st grow?? well good for you!! your first homegrown weed will always be somethin u remember. keep it up man.. im telin u.. things just get better and better from here. now that u have a grow under ur belt.. your next plant will be better.. adn then ur next 1 after that.. for ur next grow u should order some seeds from Nirvana www.nirvana-shop.com theyre great.. adn VERY cheap man.. i got my WW seeds from there. adn that plat is doing fucking AMAZING!! I've even got "Siamese Twin" Buds.. 2 buds aer growing in a single bud site.. and the stem is twice as thick.. there are double the amount of leaves there should be.. its really cool looking.. u can check out my journal if ya want...

But im tellin ya... a good plant is all in the genetics.. this is only my 3rd grow.. adn my 1st too were form some bagseeds.. from some mids.. adn they grew ok.. but this White Widow plant..... its growing soooo mcuh better than my other plants...

OK..OK... i will stop rambling on.. im sorry.. i tend to do this when im high.. i probly told you a bunch of shit you already know.. haha.. +Rep tho for your 1st harvest!! u should be proud of urself.. growing and harvesting ur plant is harder than everyone thinks. =)

Click to expand...

Hey man, thanks for the info, It def feels good to be able to grow my own shit....I dont sell either, but I smoke so much I cant afford to buy it every week, LOL
I'll def check out nirvana seed shop for the next time I wanna get seeds....i previously bought from everyonedoesit.com - kinda exspensive, i got ones called Ceres Purple, which I grew first, and right now I got some white widows goin that are about 2 weeks old, so hopefully this time I wanna do everything 110% perfect...here are some pics of my first grow about 2 weeks before i chopped

wow.. those are nice lookin man!! u did a hell of a job man. they really do look good! and yeaa. as far as pricing.. Nirvana is the cheapest you will find.. and the genetics are pretty good too. and the shipping is incredible.. about days..

Im growing Nirvana's white widow right now too. You can click on my link in my signature if u want.. that way u can at least see the Nirvana genetics. This plant is fucking great! when u click the link, go to page 48, its the last page. I got a BUNCH of pics on there of it.. it smells fucking amazing!!

Well, keep up the good work man!! if u decide to make a grow journal, deff send me a link to it!

if you have some leaves left I find them the best indicator.
if they crumble - you'r done with the drying and off to the curing.

I don't let them dry to the point the stem breaks. Never.

McFonz said:

if you have some leaves left I find them the best indicator.
if they crumble - you'r done with the drying and off to the curing.

I don't let them dry to the point the stem breaks. Never.

Click to expand...

same here, I like my buds a bit soft but dry enough to blaze a joint without relighting so I dry them until they feel dry on the outside but still feel a bit moist in the middle. Once the cure starts I crack the jars once a day, empty them out and re-arrange the buds, then put them back in and store them in a cool, dark place.

I rather not move my buds too much as it knocks trichomes off.
In any stage I don't like moving \ touching them too much.
When jaring I even put some clear plastic bag beneath and use the trichomes that fall to make hash. I also smoke the leftout trichomes in the jars after the weed is gone.

I jar the buds once, put it in the fridge.
I open the jars daily on the first week, bi-daily on the second week and twice in the third week.
If cured in the fridge for another week I just pop the jar if moisture builds up. Usually 3 weeks in more than enough.
When I open the jars I let the vapor that collects on the jars when moved outside of the fridge disappear (about 10 minutes) and close back the jar.

If its too moist I might re-arrange the buds, but I really don't like it when it happens.

After the curing time I re-jar the weed thats left in jars that fit it and put it in the freezer until consumption.


I like my weed moist enough to squeeze when squeezed and not to crumble, while the calyxes seperate easly from the stem.