Drying Humidity and Temp

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Westsidehawaii

Member
Need help with drying options. Difficulty controlling humidity. Location is Hawaii, hot and dry side of island. First time growing 1 plant. I will be drying in spare bedroom. Normal temps in spare room are around 84F / RH58-62%. With a/c running RH plummets down to 30-40%. Any simple suggestions on what to do? Would a room humidifier work? I have several weeks to figure this out before harvest.
Mahalo
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Delps8

Well-Known Member
No clear - the plant is outdoors or indoors?

If you're in veg, you'll want a combination of temp + RH that work out to a VPD of 1.0. If you can't get that much moisture into the air, make sure to monitor the plant for nute burn because, if your VPD is 1.6, you're taking up 50% more water than you would be at 1.0 so your plant is getting a lot more nutrients.

Better too dry than too wet, though.
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Bullmark

Well-Known Member
I would opt for the coolest temps possible down to 60f and use humidifiers to bring the rh up.
If u must dry in a large room, U may need several humidifiers to do the job.
Also, measuring the humidity will drive u nuts as it will vary a good amount from the floor to the ceiling. If u can dry everything in a smaller space, like a large closet, it’ll be easier to raise and maintain the rh.
Make sure you have some decent airflow and ventilation in the space. And never have a fan blowing directly on the plant.
60f and 60% rh is ideal……but I’ve had some great results when the rh bounced between 50-55%.
Remember, u want the dry to take as long as possible. Really large dense buds can hang at 60f/60% for up to 2 weeks or longer ideally.
It’s tough to over dry in those conditions.
The outside of the buds will be very dry but the inside will still contain enough moisture to cause mold. Which is why the buds need to be “sweated” after the initial dry.
I will seal them up in an airtight container for up to 48hrs. Then open and you should feel the moisture redistributed to the outside.
Then lay them out evenly for an hour or so, then reseal. Depending on how much moisture is there, u may need to repeat this process 2-3 times. For me, once they reach 60% and have been sweated, they go into jars and no burping is required.
Good luck.
 
Hook Daddy

Hook Daddy

Well-Known Member
As @Bullmark said the smaller the space the easier it is to control. Several members that have similar issues to yours, an environment that is just hard to get perfect without a lot of expensive ac and humidity control, have converted coolers to provide the correct environment in a very small space. Most have started with a Koolatron wine cooler and added a humidity controller and small dehumidifier, there’s a link to all the info in my signature. If you decide to give it a try and have questions feel free to ask or post questions in the thread. Whichever way you go good luck!
 
HandyGringo

HandyGringo

Well-Known Member
You need to strike a balance. Ideally, you'd try to get the room temperature down below 21c/70f - Because that's when you start losing some of your terpenes to evaporation.

But then your humidity becomes way too low. Right?

If I was in your situation I'd run the AC to get down to 70f and then get a humidifier to get to around 60-65% humidity.

Alternatively, if you have a wine fridge or extra fridge, you could try lotus drying. Drying at low temps and low humidity works as well.
 
W

Westsidehawaii

Member
Bullmark said:
I would opt for the coolest temps possible down to 60f and use humidifiers to bring the rh up.
If u must dry in a large room, U may need several humidifiers to do the job.
Also, measuring the humidity will drive u nuts as it will vary a good amount from the floor to the ceiling. If u can dry everything in a smaller space, like a large closet, it’ll be easier to raise and maintain the rh.
Make sure you have some decent airflow and ventilation in the space. And never have a fan blowing directly on the plant.
60f and 60% rh is ideal……but I’ve had some great results when the rh bounced between 50-55%.
Remember, u want the dry to take as long as possible. Really large dense buds can hang at 60f/60% for up to 2 weeks or longer ideally.
It’s tough to over dry in those conditions.
The outside of the buds will be very dry but the inside will still contain enough moisture to cause mold. Which is why the buds need to be “sweated” after the initial dry.
I will seal them up in an airtight container for up to 48hrs. Then open and you should feel the moisture redistributed to the outside.
Then lay them out evenly for an hour or so, then reseal. Depending on how much moisture is there, u may need to repeat this process 2-3 times. For me, once they reach 60% and have been sweated, they go into jars and no burping is required.
Good luck.
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awesome, thanks for the tips. I do have a closet that would provide more control. Appreciate all the info.
 
W

Westsidehawaii

Member
Hook Daddy said:
As @Bullmark said the smaller the space the easier it is to control. Several members that have similar issues to yours, an environment that is just hard to get perfect without a lot of expensive ac and humidity control, have converted coolers to provide the correct environment in a very small space. Most have started with a Koolatron wine cooler and added a humidity controller and small dehumidifier, there’s a link to all the info in my signature. If you decide to give it a try and have questions feel free to ask or post questions in the thread. Whichever way you go good luck!
Click to expand...
Thanks for advice. I also realized that I have a harvest right freeze dryer (bought for food storage). I recently read some posts on using that for drying. Might be a better option. I’ll have to do some more research.
 
W

Westsidehawaii

Member
HandyGringo said:
You need to strike a balance. Ideally, you'd try to get the room temperature down below 21c/70f - Because that's when you start losing some of your terpenes to evaporation.

But then your humidity becomes way too low. Right?

If I was in your situation I'd run the AC to get down to 70f and then get a humidifier to get to around 60-65% humidity.

Alternatively, if you have a wine fridge or extra fridge, you could try lotus drying. Drying at low temps and low humidity works as well.
Click to expand...
yes, with a/c at 70f the rh drops down to 30%. The room I am using for drying is really small so I’ll get a humidifier and see how that works. Thanks for the tips.
 
W

Westsidehawaii

Member
curious2garden said:
@shnkrmn is the man here. He has that massive garden he uses it for so he can easily compare to his regular drying method.

All I could add is it's very good coming out of the freeze dryer and I won't be drying any other way. But I love storing mine in my Koolatron!
Click to expand...
Awesome!! Couple questions
1) do you fully trim prior to going in FD?
2) what specific settings are you using?
3) is mT below 100 a concern?
 
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