Curing, a myth perpetuated by bad growers

Homebrew makes a good point. The majority of "curing" that goes on actually happens during the drying period anyway. I know exactly what he's trying to say.

If your weed doesn't take amazing after the drying period, it probably never will.

That being said, I do think aging up to a certain point improves the burn quality, but only slightly. Cutting and quick drying is another story all together. That would produce crap no matter what.

Weed very rarely tastes better after 2 weeks without proper temp and humidity. All my flowers after they hang dry to about 50-60% rh they are.
Her is something to think about folks, if curing produces a better "flavor," then why is it that ll the oil folks want the freshest or fastest frozen material available? Why wouldn't someone who does nothing but oil extraction want your "cured" flowers?
What happens during a "cure" is nothing more than oxidation. WHinch for some compounds I am sure that is not a bad thing.

With the example used comparing to wine, I feel is off base. You can age the wine all you want, it is the proper grapes at the peek brix content that makes it desirable, the input is what is far more important. there is also a whole lot more chemistry going on in wine than dried cannabis.

I would love to make this some kind of challenge.

It's mostly strain dependant on how long you need to dry and cure. Like it was mentioned above, the calyx to leaf ratio matters in regards to how many chlorophylls are left in the plant, the vegetable matter being what houses the most. So yes, with certain strains it's not completely necessary if you've grown and dried the plant damn near perfectly.

What curing does (those who are cigar connoisseurs will understand this) is provide an air right environment that allows for bacteria to consume all of the different chlorophylls and converting cannabinoids like thca into thc, which doesn't happen when you smoke it! Also, burping your jars once the rh reaches between 62 and 55 percent is counterintuitive to the whole process as opening the jar exposes the bacteria to fresh air, temporarily halting the entire process. I imagine a lot of anti curing growers probably fucked up by either allowing the moisture content of the cannabis drop below 55% (below this the bacteria cease the breakdown of chlorophylls and won't ever resume) or by keeping the rh in the curing containers (Hopefully jars if they're smart) too high.

Never have I met a successful commercial grower pull down their A1 harvest then say, "Ok, now let's sit on this for 6 months while we give it the connoisseur dry and cure". Most pro grown commercial is spoken for and sits for very little time on the mtn/shelf.

Truth is that most meds are grown poorly whether it be environmental or nutrient issues. This shows in the finished product regardless of how slowly you dry at optimal humidity or how finely you hand trim.

Ask the pro's or learn first hand bad bud can't be "cured". This is why we have hash/oil masters working their magic on this industry trash.

Now lets not forget that there is a difference between properly drying to prep for long term storage, vs drying to "cure" for extended amt of time. The best grown bud can be dried and ready within wks of take down, smooth hitting and burning to clean whte powder. If you're drying for LTS then no matter how many months after harvest you should be able to properly rehydrate so that it appears and tastes/smokes like that fresh harvest without decarbing in the bag. CO2 greatly helps with long term storage.

I always look forward to the fresh harvest (not green but not 6mths+) as it packs so much more than aged flowers. Of course this will depend on outdoor vs indoor potency variables but that's another topic entirely.

Thanks homebrew420 for working to spread the knowledge! but don't give away all our hard earned trade secrets! I still tell my friends in rec their 48hr dry is great, great for me and my patients ha.

If someone can debunk the fact that the chlorophyll, starches, and sugars are consumed by bacteria during jar curing, which is an airtight environment, then I'll change my mind. But until then, I'll continue to propagate jar curing after a proper dry.

homebrew420 said:

This is not a theory. THis idea that a cure can make your flowers better to the point waiting to smoke is pure poppycock. Fresh is better. I would love to have the proponents and their "cured" herb to have them tested for terpene levels before and after to show you all the degradation of cannabiniods and terpenoids will be of noticeable levels.
Bottom line is when you have done a mediocre job of growing and flowering these plants you simply get mediocre finished products. THe real key to producing good-great flowers is to make sure you have fed the plants a balanced nutrient. In a ration of 3-2-4 fed throughout flower. Metabolizing the salts is why so many people flush. to make sure all the added phosphorous is utilized.

I know i an going to hear Hhow everyone swears their weed gets better. Doubt it.

peace

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So what you are actually saying is that CURING doesn't make ANYTHING taste better... that CURING is pure poppycock? ..That if pot or anything else was grown properly then curing won't improve the flavor.... that all it does is degrade the product.

So then we need to apply this non-theory to all items we eat, smoke or enjoy, right? If this doesn't apply to all cured items then why does it apply to pot? Why wouldn't it apply to all cured products?

During the dry/cure, starches and sugars are being consumed by the living tissue of the plant. As long as the cells are wet and have access to water, oxygen, and carbs (sugars and starches), the weed will continue to cure.

As it runs out of carbs, the process will slow down. Most of the carbs are burned off by the plant while hanging and offgassed as CO2.

This reduction of carbs is what makes your plant burn better after drying. Starchy weed is shit. This isn't a process of fermentation or a bacterial process, but the plant itself continuing respiration while drying.

homebrew420 said:

This is not a theory. THis idea that a cure can make your flowers better to the point waiting to smoke is pure poppycock. Fresh is better. I would love to have the proponents and their "cured" herb to have them tested for terpene levels before and after to show you all the degradation of cannabiniods and terpenoids will be of noticeable levels.
Bottom line is when you have done a mediocre job of growing and flowering these plants you simply get mediocre finished products. THe real key to producing good-great flowers is to make sure you have fed the plants a balanced nutrient. In a ration of 3-2-4 fed throughout flower. Metabolizing the salts is why so many people flush. to make sure all the added phosphorous is utilized.

I know i an going to hear Hhow everyone swears their weed gets better. Doubt it.

peace

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My weed gets a little stronger after it cures for a couple of weeks and it tastes better too. It gets a little stronger because the total mass of the plant matter has reduced giving a higher percentage of trichs. It tastes better because there is not as much chlorophyll present.

MuckyDucky said:

My weed gets a little stronger after it cures for a couple of weeks and it tastes better too. It gets a little stronger because the total mass of the plant matter has reduced giving a higher percentage of trichs. It tastes better because there is not as much chlorophyll present.

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Nope.

homebrew420 said:

Nope.

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yep.

So how long do you folks believe there to be "living tissue" breaking the plant matter down. It is a simple chemical oxidation, on top of the fact you, @MuckyDucky, are posting false info. Thc-a does indeed convert to thc via ignition/vaporization. I would also like to point out comparing apples and oranges doesn't get one too far. Your herb will not get more potent after a 1 month cure. Also you state bacteria is doing the breaking down? where is this info coming from? are you scoping your flowers and watching the microbial action take place? Compounds breakdown over time especially volatile essential oils, I mean just look into the temps and conditions some of the terpenes breakdown and or vaporize.
Maybe I will run an experiment testing our product fresh, within 10 days from chop, and jar some of the same product for a month, another 2 months and see what the labs have to say. I am sure the industry as a whole would be interested.
THe thing is we have eliminated nearly all fluctuations from our gardens. Minor temp and rh differences but nutrients and light are static.
I actually find keeping flowers in an area, such as a humidor is a great way to STORE for later use with little to no loss in quality. However I have NEVER EVER smoked flowers over a month old and thought this is better than it was fresh. The word fresh to some means something completely different than it does to other, obviously. What it means to me is within the first week of a complete drying occurs. Paper bags help to homogenize the moisture content.

I know some of you could argue this point until blue in the face but I will stick with what I consistently see coming from growers all over the state and from elsewhere.
I see no real value in curing...cannabis. Cured meats and cheeses are good by me. wink wink

Interesting, then why is tobacco cured?..

homebrew420 said:

This is not a theory. THis idea that a cure can make your flowers better to the point waiting to smoke is pure poppycock. Fresh is better. I would love to have the proponents and their "cured" herb to have them tested for terpene levels before and after to show you all the degradation of cannabiniods and terpenoids will be of noticeable levels.
Bottom line is when you have done a mediocre job of growing and flowering these plants you simply get mediocre finished products. THe real key to producing good-great flowers is to make sure you have fed the plants a balanced nutrient. In a ration of 3-2-4 fed throughout flower. Metabolizing the salts is why so many people flush. to make sure all the added phosphorous is utilized.
peace

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Curing makes sense to me, like tobacco its done for flavor.

So what if theres some loss in active chemicals, I think of it like moonshine, I intentionally reduce the proof to make it more palatable.

Meh.. if I can cure it I will, but I hardly have a chance to let it sit. I'm sure the outdoor cali guys have that much volume to let it cure.. I'm lucky to keep it on hand for more than a few weeks.

As pot ages, some of the terpenoids go through polycyclic aromatization in the process of decomposition. This agglomeration of terpenoids will change the flavor; hence the ability of cured pot to show flavors that didnít seem present in the original fresh material. Much of the very volatile terpenoids will also evaporate and or decompose, especially with prolonged curing or storage. This action will remove some matter from the pot increasing the cannabinoid concentration and therefore potency.

It must be noted that excessively long curing or storage, higher temperatures, or extremely low moisture content will cause such through evaporation of the terpenoids that the cannabis will generally loose almost all of itís natural flavors.

Naturally, as the metabolic processes continue during curing, the conversion of cannabergerol to tetrahydrocannabinol will continue and the potency of the pot will increase. This is because cannabergerol (CBG) is the non-psychoactive precursor for tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). Of course, the exact change in THC content will necessarily be dependant upon the concentration of CBG in the fresh material at harvest. Of course any remaining precursors necessary to form additional cannabidiol (CBD) and other cannabinoids will also be consumed and converted.

Also as these metabolic process take place, the plant needs energy which leads it to consume the sugars, starches, nitrates, and minerals. Many of these compounds are metabolized and released as water and carbon dioxide, therefore removing what is essentially inert material from the pot increasing the concentration of cannabinoids therefore making it more potent.

Much of these positive metabolic processes can be most effectively begun with thourough flushing and stripping of the plant before harvest. This will help reduce the amount of time necessary for a good cure.

Curing will not only improve potency, but the color and look of most cannabis buds because as the chlorophyll is broken down purple, gold, and white coloration can emerge and the trichomes will appear more pronounced.


Some decarboxylization will take place during curing as well. This happens when the carboxyl group (COOH) located at C-2, C-4, or the end of the hydrocarbon chain at C-3 is destroyed leaving a hydrogen attached and liberating CO2.

Decarboxylization is necessary to convert cannabinoids to usable psychoactive forms; the plants (and your body) carboxylize cannabinoids to make them more soluble in water (for metabolic reactions and excretion).

Research indicates that this effect is fairly minimal during the curing process though. Decarboxylization will take place naturally very rapidly at temperatures of over 100C. So smoking and most any cooking will decarboxylize the cannabinoids. As decarboxylization occurs, the loss of CO2 will liberate a small amount of inert material making the pot more potent via concentration of the cannabinoids.

greasemonkeymann said:

.. dried is different than cured.
Totally true on the outdoor guys drying too fast, I think it is also because the outdoor guys have soooo much at one time that they can't cure correctly being all together. My opinion anyways.

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True what you said.
Also cured or uncured I get the same results from the same like buds
as in ice smooth and awesome taste, smell, high etc...
If grown correctly, I think killer genetics has a way to give you killer
smoke whether cured or not and may not make a whole lot difference
imo and experience

I can't tell you how many times friends have told me "very nice cure you did"
on cured and uncured buds. I say thanks either way.

Milovan said:

True what you said.
Also cured or uncured I get the same results from the same like buds
as in ice smooth and awesome taste, smell, high etc...
If grown correctly, I think killer genetics has a way to give you killer
smoke whether cured or not and may not make a whole lot difference
imo and experience

I can't tell you how many times friends have told me "very nice cure you did"
on cured and uncured buds. I say thanks either way.

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i think the important point is, a cure won't FIX anything, you must have a good product to begin with.
also a completely dried nug will always be more harsh than a cured one with the perfect amount of moisture left in it. We don't want completely dried herb.
forgot to add, not only does a dry nug taste more harsh but you destroy much more of it due to pyrolictic destruction.. ie. you BURN more than you get to smoke

Drying is curing.. period. I sometimes start using my weed after 3 days of drying and usually it taste pretty good if it was cut at the right time and it wasn't over fertilized and covered with brown dead leaves like some I've seen. When I have fresh weed like this I stop using whatever old 6 mo old cured stuff I had stored because the fresh weed IMHO does taste better and I feel like I get a better quality buzz. I harvest when the trichs are mostly clear.. When I check the old weed with a scope I find that a high percent have turned amber and many of the heads appear to be missing. When I check the trichs on 1 week old bottled stuff the trichs are more predominate because of shrinkage (you know.. guy in a cold shower kinda thing) and I see a lot more cloudy and a few more amber trichs.

Personally, I believe mine reaches it's peak after being bottled around a month, then it noticeably starts going down hill after 4 months.

So exactly what do you suggest we do? How do you dry your weed? Do you throw it in the oven at 200 deg until it's dried and then have a coughing party?


These are shots of a cola that I had to prematurely harvest. The first picture was taken as soon as it was trimmed. The second picture was taken after it was bottled and cured for only a few days.

Still green.


It was much better after a weeks cure... a lot more cloudy trichs and also more (yuck!) amber.

MuchyDucky your silly. Anyone who believes a cure to be the same as drying properly is possibly misinformed. "How should we dry?", I suggest you continue to do what you have done my friend. You dry your herb in the same fashion as most from what you have said. Though I am curious how you can get your flowers to dry in 3-4 days. Mine are generally still wet unless i got the fan blowing on them, obviously less than ideal. But I wait about 7-10 days and sample. Is it finished can I chop this up and hook up the patients? People, don't use ovens at 200 deg to dry your herb.
Just to be clear, a cure is allowing it to sit, on purpose, for more than 2 weeks in a sealed vessel of some form. @MuckyDucky it sounds as though you dont really cure on purpose at all. Honestly not trying to be any kind of dick. You simple said you dry and smoke it. Your not waiting for it to cure to smoke it. The pics dont really tell us much in the way of quality smoke though you got good gland production on those flowers. Isee what you are pointing out though.

Peace

I'm from Alabama and i've been growing for the past 7 years.



Ppl from legal states gets so caught up on curing,, " Hey,,, I cure for 3 months, Hey I cure for 6 months,, etc etc.., which is really pointless after about a month tops..




My first 2 grows my weed smelled like hay, only because I dried too fast and pulled too early.

If your plant does not smell "Loud" before and after drying, its not going to be "Loud" regardless of how long you play peek a boo with your mason jars. You can fool yourself into thinking the faint smell that you smell after your so called cure is the smell coming back but its not.. If I had to sit around with pounds and open and close jars all fucking day for months,just to get the noticeable smell and a good taste,,,, I would not be growing weed.

So just say if you wanted 15% water content in your buds at the end of your cure, it doesnt matter how you dry it,,, as long as its slow, because when it comes to weed, curing in jars, ins a sense, is slowing down the drying process, but in actuality your only re-moistening the weed and drying it all over again with your jars.
Just dry it slow,, ppl compare curing weed with fine wine,, but wine is sealed and the cure starts, but most ppl think playing with their jars for weeks is curing when all they had to do is leave the plant hanging with a slow dry... Say or think what you want, only because you've never tried it..

Just like in the past Fox Farm and Advanced Nutrients had a lot of y'all hypnotized, like you were really gonna feed your plants and the plants could distinguish between Fox Farm and Miracle Gro...



I grow mainly outdoors. but also work with others indoors, and when I harvest my plants I hang as much of the plants as wholes as possible, in an empty cleaned and sanitized single wide trailer. with a fan for circulation, no temp control, but temps stay between 70 & 80F wheneva I dry.

After about 6 or 7 days its ready for sale. But whateva is not sold it goes into double paper bags which are folded and kept in a cool closet, as long as you dry your pine correctly and long enough the paper bags will cure your weed just as good as jars, no burping needed, When the buds are how I want them in bags, then I put them in jars, only to conceal the smell.

So all the ppl who thinks curing is the only thing that makes weed STANK, you are wrong.



Down here in the south, if you can't smell the weed in somebodys pocket before they even pull it out, nobody down here wants it. This doesn't apply to medical patients here in bama, because we dont have any ,,legally,, ,yet! But 90%,, notice I did say 90%,, of time if the weed has a very strong aroma it will have some good medicinal qualities..



But curing is for most ppl that are legal anyways, & ppl that have too much time on their hands, & ppl that can just have weed just laying around, like "Fuck The Police",,,because when it comes down to it, if the legal growers were in an illegal state, i'd put my life on it that their answers to making your weed smell "Loud" or dank as y'all say, would be a long shot from curing for weeks & months..

Maybe the way y'all cure might make my sannies sugar punch that taste like a pack of starbusrt, taste like some thing else or maybe even make my killing fields that taste like grapes and a gas tank taste like something else.




This summer I said fuck Panama City Beach, we went to Denver,, all the growers on the net from Colorado always saying that theirweed is this and that, """""""""""'BULLSHIT""""""""""""'',,, most of y'all weed smells like a fucking barn, and I grabbed sacks from quite a few places up there and 90% of that shit smelled bad, but looked real good tho.... CALIFORNIA has the best weed hands down that i've tried..

We used to get 3lbs a month shipped, from cali Gdaddy Purp & Purple Kush, OMFG!!! Cali growers are the FUCKING BOMB!! If somebody has Purp Kush & Gdaddy Purp that taste better than theirs,, I don't want none... and that was from 3 different growers.. If it wasn't for my relations ship with them, I would probably still be a part of the mason jar gang.



Just thank about it,,, Schwag will have a pungent odor if concealed,, so if your growing quality strains and a ounce or two in jars, your bound to have a faint smell after your playtime with the mason jars,, but IT WILL NOT BE LOUD!!!!! As far as taste,,,,,I can't speak on, because mine always taste good, and if it aint broke don't break it....


Roll Tide///

homebrew420 said:

This is not a theory. THis idea that a cure can make your flowers better to the point waiting to smoke is pure poppycock. Fresh is better. I would love to have the proponents and their "cured" herb to have them tested for terpene levels before and after to show you all the degradation of cannabiniods and terpenoids will be of noticeable levels.
Bottom line is when you have done a mediocre job of growing and flowering these plants you simply get mediocre finished products. THe real key to producing good-great flowers is to make sure you have fed the plants a balanced nutrient. In a ration of 3-2-4 fed throughout flower. Metabolizing the salts is why so many people flush. to make sure all the added phosphorous is utilized.

I know i an going to hear Hhow everyone swears their weed gets better. Doubt it.

peace

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you feed your plants, I'll feed my soil...and a solid cure improves the smell, taste, and experience...but it would appear you have had a different experience...maybe location???



mojo

I don't flush, I don't wipe and I don't use a bunch of expensive additives. My plants are healthy and my ass is brown. On my last grow after drying enough to bottle the taste was good and after a few days the smell was great when I opened the bottles. On the previous grow the buds had a green grass taste and smell until it was bottled for a month. I grow hydo and both grows were done exactly the same way with the same nutes. The only difference was the variety.

So, once again it is my opinion that the title of this thread, "Curing, a myth perpetuated by bad growers", is bullshit!

This is some bud that was properly stored in a bottle for 8 months.

YUMMMM!! (spits)


Ain't that nasty looking?