We were jarring 3 plants after 15 days drying at what I thought were near ideal conditions, with an average of 60%r.h. with a short high of 65% and low of 55%, when I found bud mold or fungus. This was of the cobweb like appearance and it smelled off. I looked over the entire plant and what was jarred of that plant and found nothing on the outside or inside of buds. Not feeling safe I packed everything in bags and put them in the freezer. Maybe the remainder of the buds are safe and maybe not it is a hell of a blow. I closely tend my plants daily and hand grow as opposed to home grow.
I have been fighting low humidity the whole grow and added a Cloudforge to manage the VPD at 1.40 through flower. This is my first use of the humidifier and the R.H. has been unusually low for my area this winter. Actually I never had to pay much attention to R.H. previously in 4 grows and never expected mold or rot in my 4x4 or 4x8.
My current unassisted VPD in the 4x8 with 9 plants is 1.36 in the second week of flower.
So, should I find fault with my use of the humidifier? I don’t plan on using it again this grow, and use a dehumidifier in my lung room.
@Frankb First thing I would do is get that out of the freezer and into a paper bag for a few hours. Then monitor the moisture when its a bit dryer go back into jars and go thru cycles of drying and drawing out moisture. You can do this with burping the jars but if there is too much moisture like 65% it’s best to remove and place in paper bag and monitor moisture every few hours. When it’s safe 62 or below go back to jars and daily burping. Remember moisture can climb quite high the first time something is Jared it draws out a lot of internal moisture you need to deal with by burping for longer intervals and progressively into shorter intervals. This can take weeks to get the right stable RH and buds are all different with how much moisture they hold. Most likely the jar was your problem but keep your eye on RH in flower a lot of people like to drop it pretty low late in flower 35 to 40 RH . Sounds like you are at around 50 RH so not bad some go lower late in flower. But I sure the jars were your issue since you did not see it trimming. Cheers !!!
Normally when my plants go into jars they are at the right humidity already but when they aren’t I dump the jars out on to newspaper and let them dry for, say, an hour, or whatever feels right.
I guess I was unclear. It was when I took the plant out of the drying tent that the spider web like fungus or mold was seen. I am sure that it is not visible on most of the plant as it wasn’t seen until the fifth jar. I quarantined what looks unaffected but may only use it for keif.
I think the problem was that I had large nugs against each other and fed a fungus in the drying tent.
I burp twice a day for 2 weeks and then daily for 4 more weeks before I consider smoking.
I’ve had this happen, always inside larger colas next to the stems where its the most moist. Now I make sure to break down larger flowers when I’m timing and look for it before it goes into jars.
Not sure what you’re really asking, your drying process sounds solid. Some people like to start at lower RH like 50-55 for the first 24-48hours to remove a large amount of water before raising the RH back to your desired dry conditions. Might be worth trying if this is a risk.
For the humidifier it sounds like your situation warrants it, just make sure to clean it regularly.
Sounds like you have your daytime vpd in a good range , but whats the night time look like?
Do you have a photo? I’m not sure if it’s mold or spider mites.
Sorry for the delay in replying.
I guess I was confusing folks. I am certain it happened in the drying tent and not present when I chopped them. It happened on one plant out of 3 in that tent. These plants were handgrown, meaning they got daily care and training. My real concerns are whether the rest of that plant is safe to smoke or make kief with.The worst part is I had done what I thought was my best drying job ever. I hung whole plants for 16 days with humidity rarely breaking 62% and my lung room humidity was from high 30 to low 40s.
This will be highly debatable and is 100% up to your discretion. The mold I’ve found in buds is usually pretty localized and I will trash whole colas along w/ adjacent buds but keep the rest, make sure to check it carefully.
You could try shortening up the drying time by moving more air if you are sure it happened during drying. 16 days is a long dry depending on temperature.
were you using the humidifier in the drying area?
Me too. Acceptable losses.
Got any photos?