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Water Cure To Reduce Weight Of Final Product


rockinsteady

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I “water cure” all my buds, changing the water daily for 5 or 6 days, since it's all for my own personal use and I don't mind the resulting darker buds with less “bag appeal”. I like not having to do a final flush towards the end of flower, and the smoke is milder, although noticeably less “tasty”.

 

Additionally, the buds weigh less than air cured buds by perhaps 7 to 10%. In other words, my ounce bag may now weigh 25 g instead of a full 28 grams, yet have the same number of trichomes present. I figure that's 7-10% more bang for my allowed 2.5 ounces were the cops to weigh it.

 

The water cure removes the water-soluble crap deep within the buds (salts, ferts, flavor or whatever) which account for the weight difference. It makes sense that the removed soluble crap that went down the drain with the water, would weigh something.

 

Your results may vary, and I have not weighed everything super accurately, although my rough weighings have of course always been noticeably lighter (that is, weighing less than air dried buds).

 

One reason for my inaccuracy is that I water cure “on the branch” and remove those big stems after water curing and drying. So I haven't run a good experiment. You can, of course, water cure an already dried and manicured 28 gram bag (whether you bought it or grew it yourself) and verify that it is lighter afterwards.

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There are lots of sources on the net describing "water curing", briefly what I do is:

dunk dry or undried cannabis under water (I dunk harvested branches under water in a 5-gallon pale)

hold it under the water to sink and keep it submerged  (I make sure a pyrex plate on top stays in place)

change the water at least every day for 5 or 6 days

hang it up to dry, fast or slow, I'm not sure if it matters much (I dry it slowly in the basement, but I don't know if that is essential)

then use it like you would if it had been cured in the air: smoke, vape, decarboxilate it by heating then eat it, whatever

 

You can speed the process by continuously trickling water through and out of the pail (I have let the water "change" by just wasting 10 or 20 gallons of water each day just letting it trickle through and into my bath tub drain). The smell is bad (but not disgusting) if you don't change the water daily. So the smell will remind you to change the water daily.

Edited by rockinsteady
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Some of the advantages of "water curing":

- slight weight reduction no mater how well you did a final flush

- eliminating ferts due to not flushing, which can be so concentrated that a rolled joint might extinguish itself

- stealth advantage from having less smell:

 - - during air drying your harvest than you'd have without water curing first

 - - during storage, transportation, and while working or cooking with it

 - - in the smoke producing during burning or perhaps even less smelly vape

 

I've noticed that water cured pot produces a fine, white ash rather than dark, crumbly ash.

Edited by rockinsteady
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a) why not just flush regular like?

b) why not just use organics and stop feeding so late into flower?

 

i'm not knocking your methods or your grow style. but some organic farmers do not have these problems to begin with.

 

the bud smells different after the water bath? is it more of a hay smell?

that could be very useful to many apartment growers.

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I've never had problems with flushing. I produce meds that I would want to get from another caregiver should I ever find myself needing to be in such a situation again. Though I suspect that my flushing has to do with being an organic gardener (mostly, my DWC does NOT play nice with Organics just yet..but I will get there!), after about a week or two of sugar water at the end the ash here burns white as well.

 

It seems similar to something one would do with fresh produce, that's for sure. I wont knock the process, I may even take a branch or two off of my next harvest to test the method just to see how it works.

 

Edit: I just re-read the length of time that you leave your buds submerged..I redact my stating I'd be attempting this method, I think I'll keep to my current method.

Edited by AbominableDro-Man
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the bad smell of the water / bud is because of bacteria growth. so you may run into higher volumes of bacteria on your bud.

 

i'm not sure what kind of bacteria, good or bad? but people with compromised immune systems may want to have that checked or avoid this method.

I suppose I could dunk a small amount of pot in water in the refrigerator and see if it smells the next day (I'm sure it will) and that would indicate that bacteria (or what the bacteria produce) probably didn't contribute much to the smell.

 

Or, I could design a better experiment:

Prepare two mason jars with pot and water in them. In one, kill any bacteria by raising the water temp to say 130 def F, then cool in without opening the lid. Then refrigerate both jars (one with bacteria and the other without) The next day, when I open the two jars, will the pot smell the same?

 

Or you could have two similarly treated jars (one heated to 130 def F, and the other jar unheated) and leave the two jars at room temp instead of refrigerating. The next day, open them and smell for any difference.

 

Anyone with pot, water, two jars and a fridge could try this. I'll try it today and let you know this weekend.

Edited by rockinsteady
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.

.

....

 

Edit: I just re-read the length of time that you leave your buds submerged..I redact my stating I'd be attempting this method, I think I'll keep to my current method.

You can soak them for one day, or two, but the longer the better, up to a point: 5 or 6 days I suppose. The plant tissue may have to break down a bit over the days, who knows? But, the smell is bad from the first to last day of changing the water, without getting much better even at the end. So the smell is released pretty consistently through the days.

 

There aren't that many folks water curing if net search results are any indication of it's popularity. I don't know if the method is just too odd, scary or what for folks to try.

 

I still get an odd feeling when I first dunk the pot I tended for months into a bucket of water!

Edited by rockinsteady
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a) why not just flush regular like?

b) why not just use organics and stop feeding so late into flower?

 

i'm not knocking your methods or your grow style. but some organic farmers do not have these problems to begin with.

 

the bud smells different after the water bath? is it more of a hay smell?

that could be very useful to many apartment growers.

a) I've only been water curing for the last two years and grow for my own use (small grows of only a few strains over the years). I always harvest after 2 months hoping for an increase the percentage of amber trichomes. Once I let it go way too long and got a small amount of "clone" seeds! The leaves were about to fall off on their own and still only a small amount of amber trichomes. So, I just feed my plants to the very end, harvest with green leaves and ... dunk them into water lately. I used to flush properly and my pot "works" either way for me.

b) as for organics, I used them up until my last grow. I switched to inorganic to save some money on ferts. I'll post about that later on, as well as my "few amber trichomes" unless everyone responds here. I don't want to high-jack my own post.

 

During water cure the bucket smells even after the daily water changes, tho not as strong as right before the water change. After drying it has very little smell in the bag (no hay smell, no nothing). When smoked, it is noticeably lacking fragrance (and produces very white ash).

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it would be stupid for mold to grow under water

 

Anyone who owns tropical fish might say, "Stupid algae would start growing on the pot under water."

 

Oh, and I didn't make up nor invent "water curing", but got it off the net. It works for me since I like the results for my own consumption. Also, I'm going to eat the pot and don't want to eat nutes or whatever is water solluable.

 

I've never seen mold or squishy, gunky black buds, if that's what mold looks like. Iv'e never seen any mold using water curing or not using it.

 

The stuff dried out perhaps faster, but I can't say for sure. It is just pot that was wet for a long time, then dried properly. It wasn't "water dried" or something stupid.

Edited by rockinsteady
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Mainly in an effort to reduce weight significantly from over production (eek!), I've made bubble hash, but don't seem to get all the trichomes out of the pot. I'm thinking that next time, I'll try to make canna butter from the post-bubbled pot mash to see if I'm missing some active ingredients. If it gets me high, I'll know.

 

Since I'm eating my pot (after decarboxylating with heat) I don't want to goof with it more than I have to. I'd like it if I could safely (legally) grow half a pound and make ... what, two ounces of hash from it? That would still be under the 2.5 oz limit.

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