How To Harvest and Cure Your Home Grow

While growing your own cannabis does not require an agriculture degree, it does require a little know-how to produce a good crop and use the right harvesting techniques to ensure you get the best stock after all your efforts.

It is not just the growing process that is important. Harvesting, drying, and curing your weed are big factors that influence the quality of your produce. If these last stages are done incorrectly, you could end up with a ruined stash that ends up in the bin. And nobody wants to waste weed. Ever.

Harvesting

A good way to check your plants are ready to harvest is to use a magnifying glass and analyze the trichomes, which are the tiny, white hairs loaded with all the good stuff. If the trichomes are transparent, it is not ready. They need to be white and looking cloudy indicating the THC is there.

Seeing your bud covered in white, cloudy trichomes is a glorious moment and signifies harvest time! A note for outdoor growers: it is best to harvest in the morning and not during the heat of the day.

While the process is fairly easy, it is labor-intensive. You will need a pair of quality latex or rubber gloves, sharp, clean scissors, a plastic tray to collect your cuttings, and string for hanging the cannabis. Resin from the plants will stick to the gloves and scissors so after harvesting, you can collect those precious particles from the tools used ensuring nothing goes to waste.

You want to be careful to preserve the condition of the buds during the harvest so start by carefully cutting off single branches that hold the big buds.  Collect all the branches in a tray. Before you hang them up to dry, you need to trim off the large fan leaves to increase circulation around the buds. Do the cutting over the tray so you don’t lose any of the small sugar leaves that will have traces of THC and can be used for making oil or for cooking and baking. Remove all protruding leaves and do it as close to the buds as possible.

Drying

This is a crucial phase that will impact the end product. To get the best quality for your cannabis buds, it’s imperative they are dried and matured correctly. The moment you have harvested the plants and trimmed the fan leaves, the drying process begins.

Things to consider when selecting a room, grow tent/box, or cupboard to dry your cannabis:

• An environment that is too damp or cold prolongs the drying process and increases the risk of mold growth.
• Rooms that are too dry or warm will accelerate the process making the buds brittle and crispy.
• You need the right humidity, temperature, ventilation, and darkness to ensure the process is slow but effective. If the odor is an issue, you must install an extractor fan and filter.
• The ideal temperature of the growing area must be between 18 and 24 degrees Celsius (64.4 – 2 Fahrenheit) with the humidity between 45-55%. The darker the room, the better because light will lead degrade the THC quicker.

You can adjust the room conditions using the following appliances. An air conditioner will decrease the temperature and humidity, a heater or dehumidifier will increase the temperature and lower humidity, and a humidifier will increase the temperature and humidity.

Hang the cannabis buds upside down from a taut piece of string or you can have them lying down on a drying rack. The hanging method is recommended because it won’t flatten the buds and retains the good looking shape of the harvest. Either way, keep the branches spaced so they don’t touch each other.

Leave the cannabis to dry for at least 4 days, after which you can do a small crack test on a branch to see if its snaps easily. If not, then you need to wait a few days. Do a daily check from the first day of drying to ensure there is no mold or other issues. The sooner you pick up problems, the quicker you can resolve them.

Curing

Curing properly will maintain the quality, taste, and aroma. This works best in glass jars. Cut off your dried buds and fill the jars no more than 80% and keep them loosely packed. Store the jars in a dark area kept at room temperature. During the first 2 weeks, give the jars a gentle shake and allow the weed to breathe for 15 minutes at a time. After 3-4 weeks, your homegrown cannabis will be ready to enjoy!