Closet Drying

Hey, I am closing in on the end of my second medical grow. I have 18 days left of flowering on 4 plants, 2 bubbleberry and 2 burmese. All are looking very good, some mg/cal deficiency in week 4-5 and some phosphorus. They have been treated with nutrients, but the leaves that took damage were reluctant to recover much and stayed hard and crispy.

Anyways, I am focusing on the chop. I'm in a 2 bedroom apartment. I have a 4x4 grow tent for flowering in my bedroom, and my closet is my veg room. I have a bathroom, but can't use this space to dry as I kind of use it daily. My only option is the closet in the kitchen, which is directly in front of the door to the hallway.

I'm pretty sure I'm stuck drying here, I will move most of the junk out of the space, and I even think I want to completely clean it and sterilize it. I am nervous one dust flake or mold spore could ruin my work. I plan to buy a fan to circulate air, I will open the door for FAE multiple times daily as I'm home often.

I have 2 concerns, one, will just a fan inside the space be enough to dry properly AND keep the humidity controlled at day and night? It is a dry winter here and the area it will be in will be cooler because we don't use the furnace much (1000 watt exhaust keeps my room nice n warm). Second, I know drying buds fucking reek, my only solution as of now is a jar of ONA gel from the hydro store, leave it on the kitchen table right next to the front door. Will this cover the smell?

Lastly, I am very particular when it comes to my plants. I want to dry them correctly as I feel drying/curing is a HUGE factor in taste, smell, harshness, and even potency to an extent. I know drying to fast, or to slow, will cause issues. What are these issues if anyone knows exactly? How do I judge the timing on the dry, better yet, how do i accurately control it?



And just a side question if anyone knows the answer. I just got a humidifier for my veg room as the closet was at a stale 30% all day and night. The humidifier bumps it to 70% and 80% if I leave it running. I need to control it at a perfect 65% area. I thought about a humidistat, seems logical, but how does a humidifier connect to a humidistat? Also, I thought of buying a timer like the one on my flower room. Has a dial with 30 min controllable intervals, so I could set the humidifier to run all day and night, in 30 minute or 1 hour periods of off/on. The RH would fluctuate with this method though and plants prefer stability.

Thanks!

If your 100% done with all your flowering why not dry in the tent for 5-7 days?

Weedler said:

If your 100% done with all your flowering why not dry in the tent for 5-7 days?

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Perpetual harvest. Bummer but at the same time not at all haha.

Just grab yourself a cardboard box and thread some string through the top a few times to hang the buds from. I do this and it works well for me. Cut a few small holes in the bottom of the box and one in the top for airflow.

TheJointProject said:

Just grab yourself a cardboard box and thread some string through the top a few times to hang the buds from. I do this and it works well for me. Cut a few small holes in the bottom of the box and one in the top for airflow.

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Hmm thats a great idea. I could squeeze a box in my room and throw a fan under it. But would the pourous paper cardboard absorb moisture too quick? I feel like the cardboard would suck the moisture off the buds outsides quickly and it would dry unevenly and taste nasty. Also I feel the RH under the box would be a bit low, especially with this cold dry winter.

Being too dry in a room full of plants is an unusual situation. I can only assume that you have forced air heating and there's a heating duct in that room blowing dry air from the furnace in. If so, maybe just plug up that heat duct. Not much point trying to humidify that room if there is constant dry air being blown in. If you don't have air heating then I don't know how the room can be that dry.

In regard to the harvest drying, You could try this simple method. Just take the fresh cleaned buds and chuck them into a paper bag and close the top. Sit the bag on a screen or something so air can get to the bottom too. Now just open the bag each day and mix the buds around. Once a day is sufficient but you could do it more if you want. In about a week they will be completely dry. There won't be any mold at all as long as you stir them around every day. The bag also keeps most of the stink in while letting the water pass through, unlike hanging them on a string. The outer surface of the buds won't get too dry and seal the rest of the water inside. You don't want them to dry quickly on the outside like that but rather the whole thing to dry slowly and evenly. That won't happen hanging on a string with a fan blowing or even just hanging on a string without a fan. The outside will get dry but the moisture inside will be sealed there and it will take longer to dry

You can dry about 100 grams (dry weight) of bud in one bag this way with no problems. If you put a pound in one bag it might not work as well, never tried it. Works real nice for about 100 grams though. I've never had mold grow on it at all, maybe because the mold spores can't get at it inside the bag. I don't know exactly why but it works perfectly and I put the buds in the bag completely fresh, no other predrying at all.

I guess if you're squeamish about stirring your buds around then you won't like this method but it actually helps to get them into a nice rounded shape because they are banging into each other. The only glands that might get damaged would be the outer ones anyway, a small percentage I'm sure. Even if some do get broken open the exposed resin won't degrade for a few months anyway and would probably increase the aroma of the buds. If people want to coddle every bud that's their business. Personally, I don't have the time or the inclination for that kind of harvesting and I'm quite happy with the easy way. I suppose some resin would stick to the inside of the bag so just use the same bag over and over again and when it gets significant resin on it just extract the bag with some alcohol, assuming it's a plain paper bag with no ink on it.

Just thought I'd share the method I use. It's simple but effective. It's also good for leaves. If you put them in a paper bag they will dry out and then you can just squeeze the bag between your hands to break them up into powder for easier disposal or mixing with soil for composting. I also cut all my stalks up into short pieces and put that in the bag too. It's then easily mixed with soil and composted along with the leaves. Be careful not to use it before it's well decomposed though or it will attract fungus gnats like crazy

I have placed 200 grams in a paper bag with strips of paper bag kind of like confetti but longer and thicker. I place all the buds in here and hang the bag in a closet I use the paper bags that have handles so makes it easy to hang. I usually try and hang my harvest for a few days before placing in the bag however you can do it just like Bob described and place them directly in there, you can easily hang them for 1 day in a dry environment and still get a good cure. I would suggest hanging them for a day 18-24 hours then place them in the bag. The bag can be placed in a bathroom if your in an extremely dry environment moisture from the shower / tub / sinks & toilets will be in the air & should keep humidity right for drying.

dan2581 said:

Second, I know drying buds fucking reek, my only solution as of now is a jar of ONA gel from the hydro store, leave it on the kitchen table right next to the front door. Will this cover the smell?

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i find that using weather stripping around the frame of the closet door and such pretty much kills a lot of smell and noise.

All good ideas and responses. Thanks! I'm unsure of bag drying for the majority of the dry as I've never done it. I do use brown paper bags for the final process. I think I will integrate hanging and bagging this time. I will buy an ONA gel jar for the kitchen and hang the buds for 4-5 days in the closet, then transfer to a brown paper bag hanging with paper confetti like strips. Hopefully in the bag the undergrowth buds will be slightly compressed and look better. Most are going to be nugs and colas, but despite the fact I lollipoped these bushy bastards grew a lot under the canopy.

Actually it all depends on the amount in a closet the smell doesn't travel that much past the bedroom if no one goes in there especially till bottle time...