First harvest…advice/suggestions?

Northern lights auto.

- 58 days from seed

- Info on website about strain says finished in 65-80 days

Pre harvesting indicators:

- I'd say at least 50% of the pistils have changed color/matured
- Buds haven't grown any serious mass or fattened in a few days
- The smell seems like its at its peak

Questions:

1. Will she be ready for harvest at 65 days, or longer closer to 80?
2. Most people say they dry their buds until the stem snaps, does anyone know about how long this takes? (a couple days, or closer to a week)
3. How often do people burp their jars for the first week? Also how much to burp after the first week?

- I Bought a microscope to inspect to trichomes, looking to see if they're clear, cloudy or amber. As it turns out the microscope I bought is a piece of junk and doesn't work. Is it a necessity for me to buy a new microscope to determine the harvest window, or would I be alright without one this harvest, and be able to figure out the best time to harvest?

Willing to hear anyone out if they any suggestions for any of these questions! If you got some good info please post it!

I threw in some pics so hopefully you guys can try and get an idea… Also took a popcorn nug off the bottom of plant. That's the pic of it. So what do you guys think?

Depends on the high you like, I'd go 3-5% amber on the trichs...so 80 days

CashCrops said:

Depends on the high you like, I'd go 3-5% amber on the trichs...so 80 days

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alright thanks, any advice for drying and or burping?

You will regularly read forum posts from novice marijuana plant growers referring to harvesting a crop when the hairs are at 50% of a color change to either brown or red, but that is not always an accurate read. If you notice a color change in Calyx hairs it can mean a readiness of the plant, but it does not have to mean that. Now if you notice those same Calyx hairs withering, that typically means the plant is very close to complete readiness. The hair color shows that the ripening process is happening, but is not always a good indicator on just how ripe the marijuana plant really is. You can harvest Sativa strains when 90% of the hairs have changed colors and Indica strains when only 60% of the hairs have changed and still have them both fully ripe. The withering is a much more tell-tale sign of ripeness. You must rely on the color of the trichome to indicate ripeness above anything else.

Looking great. Clear tri's = shit, Milky tri's = very good and Amber tri's = shit.
Get a magnifying glass or scope. If not have then just take a pic as close as you can get then zoom in with an editor and you will see the tri's. Too much work? then just look at the plant when it is ready the hair's will wither and recede into the calyx swelling them(fattening them up). Good luck bro.

Popcorn900 said:

Looking great. Clear tri's = shit, Milky tri's = very good and Amber tri's = shit.
Get a magnifying glass or scope. If not have then just take a pic as close as you can get then zoom in with an editor and you will see the tri's. Too much work? then just look at the plant when it is ready the hair's will wither and recede into the calyx swelling them(fattening them up). Good luck bro.

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il try to get a new scope. I would say tho that the pistils are receding back into the plant, which would indicate she's close to ready right?

Sick Of Scrapin Rez... said:

il try to get a new scope. I would say tho that the pistils are receding back into the plant, which would indicate she's close to ready right?

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she's getting close and looking good imo, but i'd say she's still got about 2 weeks or so'ish left on it.. i like to wait for the hairs to fully recede, plus the color of the trics, i like as lil clear as possible, with only very few ambers, and the calyx will swell up nicely, and maybe some light fox tailing going on..
you'll know when they're ready as they simply look much different ime.. i always like the saying... when you think they're ready, give them another week.. it's never done me wrong.. nothing worse then spending months of your life on them only to cut them down early and miss out on potency.. i made that mistake once, once, lol..

racerboy71 said:

she's getting close and looking good imo, but i'd say she's still got about 2 weeks or so'ish left on it.. i like to wait for the hairs to fully recede, plus the color of the trics, i like as lil clear as possible, with only very few ambers, and the calyx will swell up nicely, and maybe some light fox tailing going on..
you'll know when they're ready as they simply look much different ime.. i always like the saying... when you think they're ready, give them another week.. it's never done me wrong.. nothing worse then spending months of your life on them only to cut them down early and miss out on potency.. i made that mistake once, once, lol..

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Sounds good. thanks for the input racer you the man! You have any suggestions for drying and or curing? willing to hear any suggestions as i could use the advice for my first harvest!

Also I used a little fox farm soil nutes on her so i gave her some bush doctor sledge hammer today to flush her out. You have any advice on how much i should water her to flush her out completely?

Sick Of Scrapin Rez... said:

Sounds good. thanks for the input racer you the man! You have any suggestions for drying and or curing? willing to hear any suggestions as i could use the advice for my first harvest!

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my first harvest, i read and followed a thread by our fdd2blk, i'll look and see if i can find it for you..
the drying and curing is one of the biggest parts of getting good smoke imo.. mess it up, and you can easily ruin a crop with mold or bud that tastes like hay..
just let them dry as slow as they can.. i personally take all of the leaves off of them, and put them on a rack with a fan blowing across the tops.. you don't want too much air movement as they'll dry too quickly.. gotta find a balance.. everyone says let them dry till the stems snap, but when i tried this, i felt the bud was too dry, so let them dry till the outside of the buds feel nice and dry to the touch, but the stems still bend and not snap yet.. then into glass jars for the cure.. for the first week or so in jars, make sure you open them every few hours, this is called burping the jars.. when you burp, just feel the buds and make sure they're not getting too wet again.. what happens is the moisture from inside the buds will eventually get the buds moist again.. if too wet when going into the jars, on my first burp and i see they're wet, i'll just take them out of the jars for a few hours and let them dry out some more, then back into the jars again..
if they're not too dry, sometimes i'll just dump them out anyways, and rearrange them back in the jars again. keep burping them every few hours for the first week, ten days or so in the jars, then you can leave them alone after that, maybe open them once a day to check on them... umm, i have found right about 18 days or so to about 3 weeks is the minimum amount of time in jars for the flavor to really pop.. anything less and the flavors just not quite set imo.. of course the longer they stay, the more the flavor will set and the smoother they'll smoke, up to about 6 months or so i'd say, then they won't get any better imo.

just make sure you dry them nice and slow.. you wanna aim for about a week or so for the dry.. sometimes you can't make it that long if they rh is too low, not much you can do about that if it happens, but they'll be ok..

Sick Of Scrapin Rez... said:

Also I used a little fox farm soil nutes on her so i gave her some bush doctor sledge hammer today to flush her out. You have any advice on how much i should water her to flush her out completely?

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i don't really believe in flushing the plants to improve flavor or w/e they say flushing does rez.. of course everyone has their own opinions on the subject, but for me, the sciencejust isn't there for me to flush, and i've tried it personally and didn't notice any difference..
i just ease off on the nutes towards the end of the grow.. imo, when people say they're bud doesn't burn good or tastes like poo poo and they blame it on the flush, i think they eff'ed up the dry and cure, and not because they didn't flush their plants.

racerboy71 said:

i don't really believe in flushing the plants to improve flavor or w/e they say flushing does rez.. of course everyone has their own opinions on the subject, but for me, the sciencejust isn't there for me to flush, and i've tried it personally and didn't notice any difference..
i just ease off on the nutes towards the end of the grow.. imo, when people say they're bud doesn't burn good or tastes like poo poo and they blame it on the flush, i think they eff'ed up the dry and cure, and not because they didn't flush their plants.

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cool great advice racer i appreciate it! So i guess i didn't need to hit it with the sledgehammer but it shouldn't hurt il just water it a few more times before harvest.

racer i just had one more question. you said the first week burp it every few hours, did you mean a few hours every day or literally every few hours. (If you meant literally every few hours, how often should i burp them like every 6-8 hours or so?)

Sick Of Scrapin Rez... said:

cool great advice racer i appreciate it! So i guess i didn't need to hit it with the sledgehammer but it shouldn't hurt il just water it a few more times before harvest.

racer i just had one more question. you said the first week burp it every few hours, did you mean a few hours every day or literally every few hours. (If you meant literally every few hours, how often should i burp them like every 6-8 hours or so?)

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yeah, literally every few hours rez.. just leave them open for about 15 minutes or so each time you burp.. as to how often to burp them per day, that's really up to you and how much time you have on your hands.. i'd say a good 4 times or so per day though for the first week.. you just wanna make sure they don't get too wet in that time, and to get rid of that moist air that's built up in the jars.. you could even carefully dump them out on to say a piece of paper when you burp them, it's not really needed, but it allows them to breathe a bit..

racerboy71 said:

yeah, literally every few hours rez.. just leave them open for about 15 minutes or so each time you burp.. as to how often to burp them per day, that's really up to you and how much time you have on your hands.. i'd say a good 4 times or so per day though for the first week.. you just wanna make sure they don't get too wet in that time, and to get rid of that moist air that's built up in the jars.. you could even carefully dump them out on to say a piece of paper when you burp them, it's not really needed, but it allows them to breathe a bit..

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great bro great thank you! 1 more question and thats it sorry to keep bugging you lol. but you know how in some bathrooms theres a fan in a ceiling, and when you shower or w.e you flip a switch and it goes on and basically clears the air, sucks all the nasty air out. I have one of those in a room i was going to dry in and also a mini dehumidifier that would dry the air out real quick.

Do you think it would be a good idea to use either of these 2 things to help dry out the bud/air, or it would dry the bud to fast so its just better to let the air do its thing?

Also would leaving a window open in the room or putting a fan in the drying room be a good or bad idea?

Sick Of Scrapin Rez... said:

Sounds good. thanks for the input racer you the man! You have any suggestions for drying and or curing? willing to hear any suggestions as i could use the advice for my first harvest!

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BOVEDA BOVEDA BOVEDA can't afford not to at about a $1 a jar. It's been a blessing since I found these things.

REZ, IMO I would think that would be too much air flow. I usually hang dry mine after removing any leaf with a visible stem I can see and cut. Hang 5-6 days and then I remove from the stem and do a final little trim before laying them on my drying rack for 1-2 days then into the jars with my boveda and pretty much forget it other then the air exchange here and there when I snag a Nugget.

urban1026835 said:

REZ, IMO I would think that would be too much air flow. I usually hang dry mine after removing any leaf with a visible stem I can see and cut. Hang 5-6 days and then I remove from the stem and do a final little trim before laying them on my drying rack for 1-2 days then into the jars with my boveda and pretty much forget it other then the air exchange here and there when I snag a Nugget.

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alright cool, hang for about 5 days, drying rack about 2, then into jars sounds good!

urban1026835 said:

REZ, IMO I would think that would be too much air flow. I usually hang dry mine after removing any leaf with a visible stem I can see and cut. Hang 5-6 days and then I remove from the stem and do a final little trim before laying them on my drying rack for 1-2 days then into the jars with my boveda and pretty much forget it other then the air exchange here and there when I snag a Nugget.

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just noticed your sig urban, good stuffs, lol..

Yeah im guessing more like 70ish.

They look really nice.

As far as how long it takes to dry it differs from place to place.

I jar mine early them mess with it as needed so I wont complicate this with my input.

I would rather jar too soon than too late.

Nice work man

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