New Grower My first grow

[Hog_M@Gundy]

Looking great! I don't know about defoliation at this point. I will say, when I lollipopped my plants I was super nervous, but after a few snips I found that it became intuitive where to cut pretty quickly. And it was the most fun Ive had with the grow. Just my two cents, looks like you'll have plenty of healthy nugs either way!

 

[PeaceLove&Buds]

Looking great! I don't know about defoliation at this point. I will say, when I lollipopped my plants I was super nervous, but after a few snips I found that it became intuitive where to cut pretty quickly. And it was the most fun Ive had with the grow. Just my two cents, looks like you'll have plenty of healthy nugs either way!

That’s what I have to keep telling myself haha. It’s just that the lollipops that are left have some nice growth on em and at 2 months old I’d rather let the plant do it’s thing so I’m going to try to focus just on some key leaves and leaf tips with the inevitable lollipop or 2. Thanks Hog

 

[PeaceLove&Buds]

Journal Day 56
56 and 63 days old

Did some defol and rotated the pots for I think the final time because it took a lot of manicuring to have them fit nicely side by side and get light to bud sites. All in all I’d say everything is going well. Sure smells that way anyways. Raised a couple of plants to maximize the light, they were getting shut out in the rain forest. Happy growing! Peace

 

[DCLXVI]

Wow! You have done it!

 

[PeaceLove&Buds]

Wow! You have done it!

 

[PeaceLove&Buds]

I’m trying to put together my plan for drying. I have to do it in the grow shed and therein lies a problem. The shed is about 250 sq ft. My outside humidity averages 80-90% so I bought a 50 pint dehumidifier. It’s awesome and can get my room humidity to down to 45 and I need to run the window AC to keep tent down to mid-high 70s while light is on from 2pm-6am. It would need to run 24hours to keep shed at its coolest which is about 62-65 degrees during the day.

The problem is I can’t have the dehumidifier, AC, and tent light on at the same time as it draws too much power. So I’m gonna put hygrometers around the shed and experiment with different combinations at different times and I’m wondering what is the most “extreme” environment I can get away with for drying? Such as the highest room temp and highest humidity I can allow in the shed? I think higher temps lose the taste/smell? Thats not really a concern to be honest, I’m only worried about losing potency and getting it too dry for long term storage. Thank you so much for any advice, starting to stress about destroying my beautiful plants! Peace

 

[Dankerson]

I’m trying to put together my plan for drying. I have to do it in the grow shed and therein lies a problem. The shed is about 250 sq ft. My outside humidity averages 80-90% so I bought a 50 pint dehumidifier. It’s awesome and can get my room humidity to down to 45 and I need to run the window AC to keep tent down to mid-high 70s while light is on from 2pm-6am. It would need to run 24hours to keep shed at its coolest which is about 62-65 degrees during the day.

The problem is I can’t have the dehumidifier, AC, and tent light on at the same time as it draws too much power. So I’m gonna put hygrometers around the shed and experiment with different combinations at different times and I’m wondering what is the most “extreme” environment I can get away with for drying? Such as the highest room temp and highest humidity I can allow in the shed? I think higher temps lose the taste/smell? Thats not really a concern to be honest, I’m only worried about losing potency and getting it too dry for long term storage. Thank you so much for any advice, starting to stress about destroying my beautiful plants! Peace

Hey there! Congrats on getting so close, it's definitely an exciting part of the grow when you start drying but you want to make sure you do it right or if will mess up all your hard work. For reference I cut the whole plant, snip all the fan leaves and hang it upsidedown to dry. After about 3-4 days or when the sugar leaves get crispy to the touch I cut them into branches about the length of my forearm and place them into brown paper bags and put them back into the tent to sweat the buds and finish drying for another day or two.
General ranges to dry in are 60-70 degrees, I've gotten away with a bit higher but you will loose some terpenes above 68 degrees. RH is important as you really need that as stable as possible. I keep mine between 58-64% with 60-62 being my target. You go too high and it will dry slower and risk mold. Too low and it will dry too fast and you'll get hay smell/taste in your flower and it's a more harsh smoke. Did this with a few plants drying them too fast and ruined a half pound of bud which is why I brown bag it now.
Sounds like you're doing it in a tent so you have the complete darkness part down as light will degrade terpenes as well. Just make sure you pay close attention to your tent drying environment and within about a week you should be ready to trim and cure! Good luck and feel free to reach out if you have any questions!

 

[PeaceLove&Buds]

Thanks Dank! I was going to to hang them from the ceiling of the shed and keep the lights off with the only light exposure being when I opened the tent to water. Perhaps I should invest in another tent? I‘d prefer not to only because I’m running out of space but I guess I can cramp in here for a few weeks, with 2 plants 7 days older I have no idea how long it will take from chopping the first to chopping the last.
Do you have to rotate the buds in the bags to avoid them getting flat on one side? I have a bunch of cool hangers that I was going to hang branches from after I hung the whole plant for a few days, does this result in a “too fast” dry that you mentioned? How long on average are they in the bags? Do you test them by putting a handful in a jar til 62 rh? Appreciate your feedback man, I’ve been searching and reading posts here on curing and grove bags and burping jars lol growing these babies is a piece of cake compared to drying them correctly!

 

[Dankerson]

Thanks Dank! I was going to to hang them from the ceiling of the shed and keep the lights off with the only light exposure being when I opened the tent to water. Perhaps I should invest in another tent? I‘d prefer not to only because I’m running out of space but I guess I can cramp in here for a few weeks, with 2 plants 7 days older I have no idea how long it will take from chopping the first to chopping the last.
Do you have to rotate the buds in the bags to avoid them getting flat on one side? I have a bunch of cool hangers that I was going to hang branches from after I hung the whole plant for a few days, does this result in a “too fast” dry that you mentioned? How long on average are they in the bags? Do you test them by putting a handful in a jar til 62 rh? Appreciate your feedback man, I’ve been searching and reading posts here on curing and grove bags and burping jars lol growing these babies is a piece of cake compared to drying them correctly!

If you can control the airflow in the shed as well as the temp/rh you should be good. I use a tent because I dry in my lung room which tends to be a bit colder/dryer in the summer and warmer/wetter in the winter so it doesn't play nice with drying in general. The tent lets me control the dry more and when I'm not using it my 3x2 grows smaller strains/pots well so it doesn't go unused. I do plan on upgrading and making this a permanent dry tent eventually. It's an easy setup cause I just vent it into my larger tent and the exhaust pulls a good amount of air across the buds slowly which is perfect for drying. Plus double filtered exhaust so it helps more with smell. I still use a small fan in there as well for light airflow and then add my small humidifier/dehumidifier as needed.

As far as my exact dry process I'll explain it a bit more for you. So after I clip the fan leaves and hang up upside down to dry I let it hang there for 3-4 days. You can rotate it but it's really not necessary unless it's in a corner or something.
After 3-4 days the sugar leaves will claw in on the buds and get crispy. I the cut them into sections and place them into a large brown bag and then place another brown bag over that and put them back into the tent. Elevate the bag so it's not sitting on the floor directly. I usually just use my pot risers for my trays or use the propagation shelf in my tent. I will rotate/move the bags every 4-8 hours and flip the bags once or twice a day. After a day I'll check the buds, you can use a wood moisture meter to try to get a 11-12% moisture reading on a buds stem. I have one but never really got the hang of it so I usually snip a few smaller sections and place them into a jar with a hygrometer for an hour or two and check for 62%. If it's too high it goes back in for another half day or so. If it's too low then I put a boveda 62 in with it. With this method I found as long as your paying attention it should make it easier to get it right where you want it. Make sure to still rotate the bags. And then check it again. Once it shows the correct rh it gets a final dry trim and into the grove bags for curing!

And yeah I know what you mean, once you start reading all the things that can go wrong it can be a bit worrying. You're doing great on your grow so far though! If you take the same mindset over to drying as it seems you already have you'll be totally fine! There are many ways to do it so just find the method that works best for you and do that.

 

[PeaceLove&Buds]

Man thank you so much for the patience and time to go in depth. I’ve decided I’m going to do some some major rearranging in here to make room for a tent but it’s gonna take a month doing it after work to do properly. So for this run I think what I may try is hanging the whole plant from the ceiling and tack up a dark sheet to help block light. I feel confident I can keep the shed inside the parameters you mentioned. Then I can just set the bags on my shelves in here and on to the grove bags in the wine cooler.