Friday, January 30, 2009

And so it begins

So I am currently awaiting shipment on a lighted magnifier from the folks at Radio Shack:


This will allow me to properly inspect the trichomes on the buds to gauge their level of maturity -- I can see that the all appear cloudy on the top of the plant, with the stigmas all turned a beautiful shade of red, but plant #2 the tric's still look clear and the stigmas are mostly light in color. The recommended magnification is 30x, this unit cost me 12 bucks plus 6 bucks shipping (natch). You can use a jeweler's loupe as well, I recommend looking online rather than checking in shops, it's still a hard to find item.

Here's a good idea of where to look to determine the harvestibility of your stuff:


and this is something that turned up after a quick search on hot girl weed, the classic smoking through an apple move, which in my mind is the pinnacle of ingenuity -- well as far as pot smoking tech goes.


Don't forget to eat it!

Thursday, January 29, 2009

What's the deal with curing?

As mentioned, I've begun the process of trimming smaller "popcorn" buds from my first grow and had a somewhat unpleasent experience last week with some material that I trimmed, hung upside down for several days, then kept in a sealed container for a few more days and then rolled up -- it felt dry and smelled great, but the smoke was harsh and didn't really "work". I returned again to the sages at rollitup to see what was crackin' on the messageboards and I came up with the following:

Curing can seemingly affect potency because often the first time the buds feel "dry", they really aren't. Once they start to cure and sweat, you will see how much moisture is left.

Curing is mostly for aroma and taste, but the first week after "drying" will still have some effect on the potency as the bud fully dries.

If the above is not reason enough, here is a more scientific explanation:

Drying bud converts crude acidic THC from its nonactive form into a neutral pH psychoactive substance. Each THC molecule has to lose it's moisture content in order to become fully psychoactive.

[Editor's note: Starkes suggests up to 95% of the cannabinoids will remain carboxylized in dried and cured plant matter]

When the water exits the bud, the THC becomes slightly different in molecular structure. As Fatima mentioned (See this thread from overgrow.com), heating can make THC readily active by immediately vaporizing the bud's moisture content away. However, as Fatima also mentioned, aging is important too.

First the bud is "dried", but can still contain some moisture within. By using the "cure", the THC slowly becomes psychoactive. Curing builds a more uniformly dried bud with a better burn and taste. Almost all the THC converts to the usable psychoactive cannabinoid over the alotted time, without the degradation from drying the bud rapidly with heat.

Sunday, January 25, 2009

Look out boys, Ganja Girl!

Howdy pardners, did a small test last night, results were mixed -- I am confused by the curing process and will post info on how it works tomorrow.

I am also going to let you know about the possibility of trimming the buds that are mature and letting the smaller immature buds grow a bit longer.

Last bu definitely not least, I'd like to introduce you all to Ganja Girl:



Courtesy of Willamete Week Online