Drying huge colas

[firsttimeARE]

I usually trim the plant and hang the whole thing up for 7-10 days.

This plant in question has huge colas. The main is about 10 inches long and 5 inches in diameter. pretty solid cola.

Should i break it down into smaller buds?

 

[FilthyFletch]

Thats a pretty normal sized sativa cola as long as you keep watch on humidity and air movement you should be fine slow drying. This is a picture of some smaller indica buds about 3 weeks from being done. I always hang the entire deleaved plants. I take all the big stuff then give a quck trim up hang then do final manicure before storage.

 

[firsttimeARE]

Alright -- Ive always grown indicas, but was running low on seeds and told myself to use what I got before I got more.

Which was just attitude freebies.

I've never seen a cola that big, but I usually top my plants and this one I didn't.

What RH do you keep your drying room at? I usually do 50%

I currently have the dehumidifier on 35% as I heard this was the thing to do for late flowering plants. Im coming up on week 10 and should be finished.

 

[firsttimeARE]

I love this strain, wish I took a clone. Twas the runt of the litter so I dismissed it. Dinafem Super Silver. Lotta people knock Dinafem, but quality gear from what I ran of theirs.

 

[FilthyFletch]

I use RH of 61% which is considered ideal 60-61 to get a nice slow dry so the chlorophyll has enough time to mostly evap before the outside gets to crispy then into jars. Im a huge fan of Dinafem its Next Generation I'm having issues with at the time. I have ordered grape god fem seeds 3 times now by them through attitude all pop then within 24 hours tap root turns to mush. Attitude wont replace and Next gen won't even reply back.

 

[FilthyFletch]

You have anymore pics of that strain gow. It does look nice would love to see more of the plant. How did you grow hydro soil?

 

[StellerKeller]

I grow only a couple of plants, and that lasts a year or so. Recently I harvested the biggest cola of my career. I had visions of drying it out and slicing off what is needed, like the prime rib guy at a Vegas buffet. But, my previous crop was ruined by mold, which seemed to grow from the inside out. Better to have good smoking weed than have good looking weed.

Besides, do I really WANT good looking weed, so all my friends could come and smoke up all my stash? My decision to break it up before drying seems a no brainer.

 

[panhead]

You dont have to break them up , with the help of Albfuct & Filthyfletch i learned hydroponics about 5 yrs ago & started growing singlecola sea of green using Al's method ,i end up with the entire plant being one massive cola , weights range from 2 ounces as high as just shy of 4 ounces once or twice , most plants end up about 60 grams dry weight .

When drying massive buds you have to take the extra time to sweat the moisture out of the interior of the bud , after mine are dry i put them in big turkey sized zip locks until they feel moist again , then air dry & put back in zip lock repeating the process until completely dried .

I use a moisture meter/probe to check the huge buds to be sure moisture is below 10% , the meters are sold at Grainger contractors supply house & are meant for inspectors to check moisture content in wood , drywall ect & cost from $49 all the way up to several tbousand dollars like mine that i kept when i retired from construction , a $49 moisture probe is perfect for checking buds with .

Grainger also sells some great light meters .

 

[FilthyFletch]

You dont have to break them up , with the help of Albfuct & Filthyfletch i learned hydroponics about 5 yrs ago & started growing singlecola sea of green using Al's method ,i end up with the entire plant being one massive cola , weights range from 2 ounces as high as just shy of 4 ounces once or twice , most plants end up about 60 grams dry weight .

When drying massive buds you have to take the extra time to sweat the moisture out of the interior of the bud , after mine are dry i put them in big turkey sized zip locks until they feel moist again , then air dry & put back in zip lock repeating the process until completely dried .

I use a moisture meter/probe to check the huge buds to be sure moisture is below 10% , the meters are sold at Grainger contractors supply house & are meant for inspectors to check moisture content in wood , drywall ect & cost from $49 all the way up to several tbousand dollars like mine that i kept when i retired from construction , a $49 moisture probe is perfect for checking buds with .

Grainger also sells some great light meters .

Hot damn I actually had something that helped some one out so Im not just a lunitic ass afterall...lol

 

[firsttimeARE]

You have anymore pics of that strain gow. It does look nice would love to see more of the plant. How did you grow hydro soil?

Yeah man. https://www.rollitup.org/t/dwc-to-perpetual.850751/ has it all start to finish if you care to read. Only issue is I large sized the pictures so make a cup of tea while it loads, lol.

This was under a 600W grown DWC bubble bucket.

The picture below was taken the same time as the one above(start of week 9, day 63 from flip). Even the bottom colas are huge. Foxtailing a bit currently, I think its genetics as a few other Super Silver grows I read they had the same issue while plants around it didn't so its not environment. Though it could have been overferting as I noticed some rams horning around week 6. Was on 1.2EC most of flower and then around week 6 it stopped eating as much. Kept cutting it back .1EC until about .8EC. So i've been feeding .8EC from week 7-9. Its on nothing now. Do you guys stop feed as the plant matures? I've heard not to and always didn't. This grow im trying it.



This was day 49. As you can tell it loves calmag. 5ml/gal wasn't enough as evident from the pictures.

 

[firsttimeARE]

You dont have to break them up , with the help of Albfuct & Filthyfletch i learned hydroponics about 5 yrs ago & started growing singlecola sea of green using Al's method ,i end up with the entire plant being one massive cola , weights range from 2 ounces as high as just shy of 4 ounces once or twice , most plants end up about 60 grams dry weight .

When drying massive buds you have to take the extra time to sweat the moisture out of the interior of the bud , after mine are dry i put them in big turkey sized zip locks until they feel moist again , then air dry & put back in zip lock repeating the process until completely dried .

I use a moisture meter/probe to check the huge buds to be sure moisture is below 10% , the meters are sold at Grainger contractors supply house & are meant for inspectors to check moisture content in wood , drywall ect & cost from $49 all the way up to several tbousand dollars like mine that i kept when i retired from construction , a $49 moisture probe is perfect for checking buds with .

Grainger also sells some great light meters .

Yeah I had known he mentored you, must of been nice learning from a pro. I started hydro 3 years ago never having grown at all, wanted to do the single cola style like ABF does so I read completely through his stickies in the hydro section, bought a table, rigged some channel system by cutting pvc pipe in half and laying it across the table to support 5 inch netpots. Made a cover out of poly. Looked nice. Had spots for 36 plants on a 40"x40" table. I think this is how you do it with the suspended netpots growing roots down into the table and forming a bed of roots? Well I struggled and switched to DWC. It wasn't easier.

Thats awesome weights. IIRC Al was only getting 1.5oz per plant. Must be easy come trimming time. This super silver would work good SOG if it wasn't for the fact its a 10-11 week strain.

Good idea on the meters, have you used the cheaper ones?

I do the same burping process. I do like fletch does and I cut off all the large stuff so the colas got air movement thru them and hang whole plant upside down so the sugar leaves fall over the buds to trap in that smell. Then about 7-10 days later the outsides are dry and I do some final trimming then cut, jar and monitor its moisture level. If moist I just take them out and put them on a paper plate till the outsides are dry again and then repeat until outsides aren't wet jarred.

Process I read on some sticky in the curing section. SimonD i think was the author.

 

[Diabolical666]

Im kinda baffled why people still dry the buds on the stem....takes foever to dry.

 

[firsttimeARE]

I grow only a couple of plants, and that lasts a year or so. Recently I harvested the biggest cola of my career. I had visions of drying it out and slicing off what is needed, like the prime rib guy at a Vegas buffet. But, my previous crop was ruined by mold, which seemed to grow from the inside out. Better to have good smoking weed than have good looking weed.

Besides, do I really WANT good looking weed, so all my friends could come and smoke up all my stash? My decision to break it up before drying seems a no brainer.

Sorry to hear about your plants man. Lol on the slicing the buds. I'll take extra precautions in memory of your fallen ladies.

 

[firsttimeARE]

Im kinda baffled why people still dry the buds on the stem....takes foever to dry.

On the premise that it leads to a better smelling, tasting and smoking product.

I'm not a scientist though. I am open minded to a degree and gave it a try and liked it.

Ran out of bud so I had to hack and trim on one of my plants. Its dried, smoking, but the smell isnt there yet.

Slow drying smells better without curing and even after curing IMO.

But this is just my experience and what works for me. I'll go this longer route if I have bud to smoke, but if I dont its chop trim 4 day dry time.

 

[Diabolical666]

I grow only a couple of plants, and that lasts a year or so. Recently I harvested the biggest cola of my career. I had visions of drying it out and slicing off what is needed, like the prime rib guy at a Vegas buffet. But, my previous crop was ruined by mold, which seemed to grow from the inside out. Better to have good smoking weed than have good looking weed.

Besides, do I really WANT good looking weed, so all my friends could come and smoke up all my stash? My decision to break it up before drying seems a no brainer.

what do you mean by " good looking weed"... like huge buds? meh huge buds dont impress me because I know they are just alot of buds packed together:/ I break mine down as far as I can.

 

[Diabolical666]

On the premise that it leads to a better smelling, tasting and smoking product.

I'm not a scientist though. I am open minded to a degree and gave it a try and liked it.

Ran out of bud so I had to hack and trim on one of my plants. Its dried, smoking, but the smell isnt there yet.

Slow drying soon as you final trim its smelling good.

But this is just my experience and what works for me. I'll go this longer route if I have bud to smoke, but if I dont its chop trim 4 day dry time.

most of my strains will start popping aroma in 10 days from chop. I have only one that wants to be in the jar at least 2 wks before she starts breaking down and goes threw many diff aromas. Hay not one of them

 

[panhead]

Hot damn I actually had something that helped some one out so Im not just a lunitic ass afterall...lol

Are you kidding me , you & Al were the 2 best hydro guys back then & the only 1's willing to take the time to teach soil growers how easy hydro really is .

I vividly remember you starting a soil grow & hydro grow at the same time & showing pics of the progress , watching the hydro outgrow the soil so much & with so little effort convinced me to dump soil & put all my efforts into hydroponics , i'd still be slugging it out with soil without you & Al's help .

Dont sell yourself short bro , you helped alot of us original RIU members learn the basics & how to design our own hydro systems , nobody has matched your DIY tutorials since you left for greener pastures .

 

[FilthyFletch]

Yeah man. https://www.rollitup.org/t/dwc-to-perpetual.850751/ has it all start to finish if you care to read. Only issue is I large sized the pictures so make a cup of tea while it loads, lol.

This was under a 600W grown DWC bubble bucket.

The picture below was taken the same time as the one above(start of week 9, day 63 from flip). Even the bottom colas are huge. Foxtailing a bit currently, I think its genetics as a few other Super Silver grows I read they had the same issue while plants around it didn't so its not environment. Though it could have been overferting as I noticed some rams horning around week 6. Was on 1.2EC most of flower and then around week 6 it stopped eating as much. Kept cutting it back .1EC until about .8EC. So i've been feeding .8EC from week 7-9. Its on nothing now. Do you guys stop feed as the plant matures? I've heard not to and always didn't. This grow im trying it.
View attachment 3345686


This was day 49. As you can tell it loves calmag. 5ml/gal wasn't enough as evident from the pictures.
View attachment 3345692

Im running around 1GB (1000Mbps) internet so loading for me is nothing lol Blue ray movies start at click lol

 

[FilthyFletch]

Thanks Pan I appreciate it. Really do man...The old timers here where and are the best...I always just hoped I offered something back since I was able to get taught by some patient detailed guys way back when..Tip of the pipe to you.

 

[panhead]

Yeah I had known he mentored you, must of been nice learning from a pro. I started hydro 3 years ago never having grown at all, wanted to do the single cola style like ABF does so I read completely through his stickies in the hydro section, bought a table, rigged some channel system by cutting pvc pipe in half and laying it across the table to support 5 inch netpots. Made a cover out of poly. Looked nice. Had spots for 36 plants on a 40"x40" table. I think this is how you do it with the suspended netpots growing roots down into the table and forming a bed of roots? Well I struggled and switched to DWC. It wasn't easier.

Thats awesome weights. IIRC Al was only getting 1.5oz per plant. Must be easy come trimming time.

Good idea on the meters, have you used the cheaper ones?

It was nice having Al's help but he wasn't the only one Filhyfletch is an excellent hydro grower as well .

Al was only hitting 1.5 g's because he had serious humidity issues where he lost good chunks of each harvest from blight , if he had dryer conditions he'd of been well over 2 g's .

When you tried my flood & drain/ areoponic style what were your watering times , ive had tons of hydro growers try n convince me watering for 15 minutes once an hour was too much & would cause root rott or over watering .
The main reason i water once an hour is root zone temps , the space between the panda plastic & table gets hot fast being no medium is in the table , when you water every hour with 60 to 65 degree rez water the root zone stays under 72 degrees at all times , above 72 you get slimey roots .

Did you water every hour round the clock ? Or did you use a different schedule ?

One of these days im gonna take the time to write up a start to finish picture tutorial showing my flood/aero hybrid system built from scratch , doing flood & drain with no medium makes turn around time instant from no clean up .