# 72 hours of darkness at harvest



## boneheadbob (Jun 5, 2011)

Its probaly been argued here many time so one more wont hurt.
I am a newbie and from what little I have read some people say yes, some say no, kinda like lots of stuff here and in life.


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## Alex Kelly (Jun 5, 2011)

Look up the other threads there are hundreds of pages on this and have been some recently so i doubt people will want to start all over and go way into this subject again. IMO, after much much research on the subject, I would not reccommend a full 72 hours of darkness, but somewhere between 12-48 hrs of darkness before harvest IMO will increase THC and resin concentration. I have seen evidence that points to the "recycling" of THC daily, in turn meaning that each strain will be different, but after 12-24 hrs the THC may begin to recycle itsself and break down, lowering your THC concentration. As i said a lot of info on here tho, get to some research. Good Luck.


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## Alex Kelly (Jun 5, 2011)

Here I did it for you. Read the whole thread gets better as it goes. 

https://www.rollitup.org/advanced-marijuana-cultivation/413967-white-widow-three-days-dark.html


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## cannawizard (Jun 5, 2011)

36hrs FTW.


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## MrDank007 (Jun 5, 2011)

Bricktop pretty much settled this for me.

*"The Stichting Institute of Medical marijuana (SIMM), the first company to sell marijuana through the pharmacies of Holland, has been investigating the medical possibilities of cannabis, together with TNO laboratories and the University of Leiden.

One of their discoveries has been that to keep the ripe plants in the dark before harvesting could increase their potency.SIMM&#8217;s growers separated a crop of mature plants, harvested half of them and kept the other half in absolute darkness for 72 hours before cutting and drying. Analysis of the resulting dried buds showed that some varieties had seen an increase of THC of up to 30%, while CBD and CBN remained the same."

*


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## deprave (Jun 5, 2011)

Its been proven to work quite a bit actually


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## homebrewer (Jun 5, 2011)

MrDank007 said:


> Bricktop pretty much settled this for me.
> 
> *"The Stichting Institute of Medical marijuana (SIMM), the first company to sell marijuana through the pharmacies of Holland, has been investigating the medical possibilities of cannabis, together with TNO laboratories and the University of Leiden.
> 
> ...


This study does not exist. If it does, by all means, post a link....


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## Alex Kelly (Jun 6, 2011)

Yes please do. If it does work, 30% seems way too high, I was thinkig maybe 5%. I have seen the SIMM quoted on here before, is *it *real?


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## homebrewer (Jun 6, 2011)

Alex Kelly said:


> Yes please do. If it does work, 30% seems way too high, I was thinkig maybe 5%. I have seen the SIMM quoted on here before, is *it *real?


 SIMM has a site and I tried to send them an email, expect my email address got bounced so I don't know how to get a hold of them. They do have a phone number listed.....

http://www.medicalmarijuana.org/index.html


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## BitchPLZ420 (Jun 6, 2011)

Yeah that does seem high it would b raw if it worked though, post a link plz


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## HighLowGrow (Jun 6, 2011)

I think if THC increased 30% by 72 hrs of dark, it would be well known by now and be standard practice. At least it wound be MY standard practice.

-HLG


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## wiseguy316 (Jun 6, 2011)

My take on this is that it doesn't cost anything to do it. How can it hurt? If it increases any cool.


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## HighLowGrow (Jun 6, 2011)

wiseguy316 said:


> My take on this is that it doesn't cost anything to do it. How can it hurt? If it increases any cool.


Good point. I think the only problem you may encounter is possible mold. 

-HLG


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## MrEDuck (Jun 6, 2011)

I think they meant the concentration was 30% higher so 19.5% compared to 15%. Still seems like an amazing increase. Wish I had access to the standards I'd need to check this.


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## Jack Larson (Jun 6, 2011)

Why would anyone argue about something that takes little time and no $ to find out for yourself if it works or not? Try it if it works great! if not ohwell. If you can't tell the diference than why do it ? If you can tell the diference than why not do it? You don't need a study ! All you need is a little effort,your senses and EYES. Its really not that hard (out of 8 strains I had 1 that showed + effects, The Purps B.C )BTW the SIMM study is unavailable do to an unrelated law suit.Nothing else .Yes it works ,but it seems to be strain spacific and diferent lengths of darkness for diferent strians. Do not believe all that you read .Experiment and find out for yourself. good luck .


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## homebrewer (Jun 6, 2011)

Jack Larson said:


> BTW the SIMM study is unavailable do to an unrelated law suit.


That makes zero sense and do you have a link supporting your statement?


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## MasterS (Jun 6, 2011)

Is this SIMM shit still being posted? It's like the urban legend of cannabis scholarly articles haha


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## Jack Larson (Jun 6, 2011)

homebrewer said:


> That makes zero sense and do you have a link supporting your statement?


This is the person that responded to my original request for the study. J
[email protected] as in James Burton Pres/ower SIMM his responce to me read "
"Hallo,
Due to a law suit...it's off the web."

this just made me curious so I started looking for more info on the law suit .I found many regurgitated quotes from this statement 
 http://www.medicalmarijuana.org/html/legal_action.html Sorry you'll have to type it in, for some reason my comp. wont let me cut\paste the link ......J.L.


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## homebrewer (Jun 7, 2011)

Jack Larson said:


> This is the person that responded to my original request for the study. J
> [email protected] as in James Burton Pres/ower SIMM his responce to me read "
> "Hallo,
> Due to a law suit...it's off the web."
> ...


 It's off the web? Is it really _that_ easy to completely erase something from the web? I'm calling shenanigans. 

I've been hearing about this '72 hours of dark' for over 10 years now and regardless of some contractual disagreement between SIMM and their distributor, this info about their _dark period test_ should be on the net somewhere and it's not. In fact, their current status as a medical supplier has literally nothing to do with the availability of this information from sites other than their own.


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## Jack Larson (Jun 7, 2011)

homebrewer said:


> It's off the web? Is it really _that_ easy to completely erase something from the web? I'm calling shenanigans.
> 
> I've been hearing about this '72 hours of dark' for over 10 years now and regardless of some contractual disagreement between SIMM and their distributor, this info about their _dark period test_ should be on the net somewhere and it's not. In fact, their current status as a medical supplier has literally nothing to do with the availability of this information from sites other than their own.


I agree.I can't believe no one has this study on disc or even paper. This subject kinda got under my skin, I have spent way more time on this than I'm willing to admit, and my results add up to NOTTA. Does that mean the method doesn't work? NO, it just means the results of this study are not available. I can't believe that with all the studies on marijuana no one else has done a simular study with published results. I would love nothing more than to find the results of a scientific study and break down of when, where, how, and why it does or doesn't work, strains, conditions, etc. I know you have tried it on like ten strains with no decernable change. I have tried it on eight strains with only one showing an increase of gland size IMO. I just got a new digital camera so in about six weeks. I'll post some side by sides pics. Like I said, people should experiment. It is my opinion that it does work on some strains and figuring out what strains and legth of dark period produce the best results is fun and it doesn't cost anything, so why not try it? PLEASE post any Scientific findings you come across.......J.L.


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## Jack Larson (Jun 7, 2011)

You could always E-mail James Burton maybe he could shed some tight on the subject. I kinda got the feeling he was tired of answering this question, but you never know.


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## homebrewer (Jun 7, 2011)

Jack Larson said:


> ... I know you have tried it on like ten strains with no decernable change. I have tried it on eight strains with only one showing an increase of gland size IMO. I just got a new digital camera so in about six weeks. I'll post some side by sides pics. Like I said, people should experiment. It is my opinion that it does work on some strains and figuring out what strains and legth of dark period produce the best results is fun and it doesn't cost anything, so why not try it? PLEASE post any Scientific findings you come across.......J.L.


 Yeah, I'm not saying people shouldn't try it themselves but after seeing this SIMM tidbit posted all around the web on different forums, I just found it odd that no one had a copy of the actual 'study' (or even minor details about the 'study' like the number of strains tested or which strains or which hybrids it tends to 'work' on; sativa or indica). Makes me think this 'technique' is just another rumor that's passed down from one generation of new growers to the next. It doesn't help that certain 'respected' members like Bricktop on various forums keep posting this with nothing to back it up. 

You're correct, I have tried it on about a dozen strains and could try it on the 8 that I have now. But over the years, I've found that dialing in the basics yields a far bigger difference than these cutesy techniques whose results are suspect at best. Cheers and +rep for being critical of skeptical information.


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## maphisto (Jun 7, 2011)

ive heard that right before you harvest, keep your plants in the dark for 36 hrs and add ice cubes to your res.this shouls increase resin production i myself have not tried this. hey hb maybe you can do the test for us at the end of this run, i mean if ya want to? oh yeah i also heard that 36 hrs dark before 12/12.ok one more guys/gals i also heard to harvest your garden @ 12:00am on outside crops..Damn i hear alot of things..


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## Jack Larson (Jun 7, 2011)

maphisto said:


> ive heard that right before you harvest, keep your plants in the dark for 36 hrs and add ice cubes to your res.this shouls increase resin production i myself have not tried this. hey hb maybe you can do the test for us at the end of this run, i mean if ya want to? oh yeah i also heard that 36 hrs dark before 12/12.ok one more guys/gals i also heard to harvest your garden @ 12:00am on outside crops..Damn i hear alot of things..


Unfortunatly myths out number facts by about 10 to 1 when it comes to marijuana culivation nobody wants to say I have no fucking clue, so they just make shit up . I really feel for the noob that listens to bad info. It is my opinion that one should master the basics, then experiment.....and Good Luck...J.L.


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## Alex Kelly (Jun 8, 2011)

It is good to harvest before the lights come on, or ''at 12:00 am," when more of the salts/nutrients are located in the mediuma and around the root zone. I hope one day we will see some real scientific tests done on this subject, but until then neither arguement of for, or against the increased thc content can be seen as correct.


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## Jack Larson (Jun 8, 2011)

Do you have any thoughts on how long a plant should be in the dark before harvest? I always cut about a 1\2 hour before my lights come on, for me thats 7:30 a.m.to 7:30p.m. so I guess my ? is, could I harvest at say midnight or is it better to waite till morning? ( I stay up late and 7:30 comes a little too early for me..) how long do you think it takes for the salts, nutes, etc. to drain "if you will "out of the plant and into the medium ? I always figured the longer the better, but it wouldn't be the first time I was wrong.Thanks...J.L.


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## boneheadbob (Jun 10, 2011)

I am growing endless sky. I emailed doc greenthumb and he said he thought it was just a myth.


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## Alex Kelly (Jun 10, 2011)

Jack Larson said:


> Do you have any thoughts on how long a plant should be in the dark before harvest? I always cut about a 1\2 hour before my lights come on, for me thats 7:30 a.m.to 7:30p.m. so I guess my ? is, could I harvest at say midnight or is it better to waite till morning? ( I stay up late and 7:30 comes a little too early for me..) how long do you think it takes for the salts, nutes, etc. to drain "if you will "out of the plant and into the medium ? I always figured the longer the better, but it wouldn't be the first time I was wrong.Thanks...J.L.


I don't have any research saved on this but i do it 2-3 hours before lights come on. In my head I'm thinking that maybe the plants start suckig everything up a little before the lights come on so they are ready to go right away. They must know the lights are about to come i dunno though good question. You could probably find out by testing the Ph and ppm's/EC every 30 minutes to an hour or so during the end of the night cycle.


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## Jack Larson (Jun 10, 2011)

Alex Kelly said:


> I don't have any research saved on this but i do it 2-3 hours before lights come on. In my head I'm thinking that maybe the plants start suckig everything up a little before the lights come on so they are ready to go right away. They must know the lights are about to come i dunno though good question. You could probably find out by testing the Ph and ppm's/EC every 30 minutes to an hour or so during the end of the night cycle.


Thanks I hadn't thought about that, but it makes sense + rep. ...J.L.


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