48hrs of darkness before harvest?

Zoog

New Member
Here is what I know - your plant produces THCa as a sunblock to UV light, mostly to UV-B around 380 nm, if I recall correctly. UV-A light reaches the ground but typical of black lights, doesn't really sunburn us nor will it create much of a reaction in the plants. But UV-B only reaches mountains before it is absorbed via oxidation. This is why mountain sativas produce the most THCa, since they are already genetically prepared to anticipate UV-B, even if you are growing them indoors. So you can add UV-B light to boost your THC levels hint hint. The plants will continue to produce THCa at night, saving it up as sunblock for the light cycle. And light destroys THCa, turning it into THC and then degrading it down to CBN which puts you to sleep. So this is why ancient people harvested during Full Moons: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/harvest_moon

The science behind it isn't limited to creating more and preserving THC with a dark period, because the plant creates a lot of smelly Turpenes at night too, and these are fragile, not even needing heat to degrade. So your night harvest was smellier, juicier, tastier and plumper, FOR MOST PLANTS. Obviously you want to harvest some, like Grapes, in full sunlight so the plant pumps all the sugars into the fruit. When I can afford to, I turn my grow room off for 7 days with no water. The buds start to dry on the stalk, pulling the last bit of sugars, carbs, starches and nutes out of the entire system including the soil which is presumably the science behind vine-ripened tomatoes. The microbes in the soil understand the last sugars are going away so they deliver only the best nutes to the roots as a final boost during the carotene/ethylene cycle when the bud begins ripening.

It's really no prob to trim this stuff once you get used to it. By taking away the light for the final week, I "added" a final layer of very potent frost, I call this "Sugaring". There is no way you add "1%" THC to an entire flower sample that is being tested at a lab LOL! But you add a lot of unconverted terps that will now be converted in a curing jar, where they are all captured. The reason I call it Sugaring is that you can see a final layer of those tiny "Bulbous Trichomes" - new, clear, but slightly amber trichromes which are full of brand new precursor cannabinoids which are terpenes + phenols combined into a web but not *activated by light into any but the prime three, mostly THCa, hence the honey colors.
 
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billymad

Member
What does the humidity need to stay around when drying? Do I keep my fans on when drying? Temp? This is techniqly my first grow,since my real first one turned hermie half way through flower, btw white widow by ilgm...WP_20160312_19_29_24_Pro.jpg WP_20160312_19_29_24_Pro.jpg
 

bottletoke

Well-Known Member
My 72 hour technique starts with decreasing the overhead canopy lights to 6 hours and killing the vertical lights completely, next i drop the temp to 73deg c and i run like this for the first 24(temp stays for 48 ) . The next 48 hours i go with total darkness and on the last 24 i decrease the temp again to 70. I truly believe that I see a difference.
I run 7 (most of the time 8 ) 1000w hps lamps in air cooled fixtures and 8 vertically hung 600w hps lamps (2 in cool tubes, 6 open air) in a 10x18 area(15x20 including walkways).
 
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