Maybe TMI but I hadn’t showered since yesterday and couldn’t help but notice myself smelling my armpits and likening them to the complex surface structures of cannabis when being stored in warm humid environments.
I’d imagine the populations of bacteria are different, but my thought was how it doesn’t really take much time for bacterial populations under the “right” circumstances to start producing noticable amounts of what I’m assuming to be volatile organic sulphur compounds being produced via microbial action.
@Dirt_Wizard I was listening to a podcast or something like that on YouTube and the host was speaking of terpene analysis and quantification across harvesting drying and curing. As volatiles are dissipated, it was difficult to think they were still able to be produced after a plant has been harvested. The host mentioned their findings for their unique experiment showing an increase in humulene, and that it was an interesting finding.
Keeping on the moistness idea, perhaps if the flowers are dried too much they lose the moist humid rich environment these bacteria need to survive/thrive, and thus is driving off additional VOC’s by way of microbial action during drying and curing. Perhaps partly why sticky dank buds usually smoke better than overly dried old flowers too? Because they’re still hosting this bacteria that’s actively producing new mVOC’s? This is all so fascinating. Much love
Lol damnit " no 3 in a row" anyways diffusion limited enzymes are awesome and all this is cutting edge stuff so the white papers are few and far in between but they are out there
Also noticed that they say the humans with the most diverse microbiome on the planet are the hunter gatherer tribes from the humid tropics of the Africa and South America. Pretty rad!
Literature suggests that hydrogen sulfide, a thiol with reported smells of rotten eggs, is often produced during the primary fermentation of wine. They don’t like it in the wine as it is suggested that it’s presence even in small quantities overpowers the fruity floral nose of the wine. I’m curious of the relevance and how all of these data points from other fields of study correspond with cannabis. Appreciate the bread crumbs. Much love
One time after a cob making fail, I opened up the bag to a moldy cob that smelled exactly like brie cheese! It had a hint of that dusty grey mold in the smell so I didn’t touch the thing but it really made me wonder about the possibilities!
In a table I found online from a paper it lists some of the Volatile Sulphur Compounds found in cheese. Grouped into the following categories: thiols, sulfides, thioethers, and aldehydes. Camembert, another soft cows milk cheese, that’s kind of like Brie is listed as corresponding to having many of those VOS’s on the list. Interesting to notice, these are both soft wetter moister cheese.
Your shared experience is helpful in gaining a helpful understanding to how these things apply to cannabis as they apply to other things we’re able to observe with our senses like smell, taste, and touch. Much love
Very similar to what me mentor taught me with sweating, when ALMOST at that point you would normally jar/bag etc. Toss them in garbage bags (I try and do whole plant ) let them sweat and you can open it and let the air escape as you please. But I also swear it adds SOMETHING, I’m sure of it as when done with buds straight jarred they will outdank them every single time. (I should really use Rubbermaids though )
Very interesting. Since you have shorten the harvest window, have you been checking the trichomes before and after the burping process? Has this alter the effects/legs of those particular cultivars?
Oh no, I take my plants to full term, even long by some standards, everything runs ten weeks or more with rare exceptions. But my drying process is shortened by a few days, yes. I dry for a week or two instead of the normal three, and then put the whole branches into sealed bins with hygrometers taped inside so I can read them then tarp them in a cool corner of the basement and check daily.
I’ve packed overly wet flowers in the past and the results were more fragrant and denser than the typical dryness packs (multiple month cure). Out of the same batch, the difference was notable.
Largest concern was mold. The jar humidity was way high. I ended up burping that bottle much more often. It turned out great and was the go to jar for that batch.
Ok, that makes sense. Shortening the drying period. When I began making Malawi cobs, that was the first time I purposely shortened the drying process. I noticed the local climate also affects the length of the drying period. Dry, high altitude areas such as Colorado need only a short drying stage. Keeping buds moist at high altitudes is a true art. Once those terps evaporate, that’s it.
Yes mold is my greatest fear, I treat my plants with foliar IPM right up until harvest then wash each plant in its own bucket of fresh cool water before hanging up. I think the full dip helps kill any mold spores residing in the buds, then it’s just on me to dry in a clean space
On a smaller scale, I accomplished the “burp till its right” approach, with the Grove Bags… patience rules and it worked.
I’ll be following the @Dirt_Wizard’s ~ 2 week timeline and as soon as the bud thinks 64%, its getting Cobb’d
I’m sure there will be a fair amount of trophy Buds left to Hang / Cure… essential stuff lol
Second-time around I know that I’m looking forward to seeing the moist Cobbs come out of the Sous-Vid pot, with a green cast throughout the vacuum bag. Then you know it has Sweated ! I saw that on two cobbs!
Bottom-left you can see where a bare, unwrapped Nugget (canary) had the sweats. In the same vac-bag as the Cobb. A Fungi / Bacteria alarm. This was all good considering how little moisture was left for Cobbing ~ jarred for 3 weeks then cobbed at 60% damn. Next time maybe the whole bag will be green
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It was the discussion of the NotSoDog technique that got me thinking about it, I had already used paper bags to good effect on my first few grows when I didn’t have a drying setup that was reliable, I would pull them early and use the paper bags. But then I saw people talking about just a straight garbage bag/sealed tote tek and realized that’s the way for me, it’s fast and easy, bins are simple to bleach out beforehand so I don’t worry about mold, it’s pretty perfect for my needs. I’ve also seen a lot of big outdoor growers drying into totes with the lids ajar for the last week or two to clear up hanging space and that sort of tracked with what everyone has said about traditional prohibition techniques to keep the weed moving while keeping it dank.
Wanted to post a little update on the cannabis rice wine batch I’m brewing. Consumed 50ml of filtered still-fermenting rice wine I made with the last of the flower from 2022’s MZPV plants (5g flower/400g rice/30g rice yeast ball/1g kveik yeast/850ml water). Letting the culture sit for longer (16 vs. 10 days when I lasted tried it) seems to have increased the strength / transformed the effect. Less THCV and stimulation heavy than the 10 day mark with more of a happy feeling. I think I will let it go to 30 days just to see what will happens in an attempt to imitate the best I can the longer fermentation process that occurs in cob. Next batch will be much more cannabis heavy, likely 10g flower/400g rice/30g rice yeast ball/1g kveik yeast/800ml water.
This makes sense re: rinsing off spores. Simply plain tap-water?
I have tried the citric acid / baking soda / water wash in the past. The drying characteristics changes. Clear stripping of the oils and waxes … by extension, not great for tricomes.
bread crumbs
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