Interesting topic/discussion…..sans the derogatory posts…
Not much experience from me….I grow just for myself in a small tent and under a small Area51 LED. I only have two strains at the moment….an Indica dominant hybrid and a Sativa dominate hybrid…but so far, I am much happier with the results than what I was buying at the dispensaries.
On my latest grow, I dried the plants in the soil for the last 10 days before harvest. During that time period, I was constantly pulling off and trimming all the leaves that weren't producing trichomes. After that, I cut them and hung the whole plants for 9 days. Next, I did a fine-trim and jarred the best buds and kept them attached to a long stem in order to allow them to dry even more slowly. Then into the Mason jar.
It's humid weather at the moment and so even burping the jars everyday hasn't really been bringing the humidity down to under 65%. I took one of the larfy lower buds and smoked it -just to check. It tasted great!
Then I compared it to some buds that were jarred last June -same strain…same conditions…etc.
I found that both were very tasty! They were different in terms of flavor -not better or worse…just had a different taste….maybe like the difference between a fresh strawberry and strawberry fruit leather!
In other words, the long cured bud had a darker, more concentrated flavor, while the lesser-cured buds were "brighter" and slightly more volatile tasting. Effect-wise, there wasn't much difference that I could tell.
It's not comparing apples and oranges. It's more like comparing fresh apples to apple pie.