I've heard varying reports from different people... Does leaving weed to 'age' or 'mature' make it better/stronger/smoother/improves it in some way? OR does it tend to weaken the strength of it? Lets say it's marijuana stored in an air-tight, moisture-proof container.... what will happen?
Is this actually a thread? Ok, Weed is not whiskey, it dosent get better over time Weed overtime will dry out and basically do the same thing it does now, get u high The only time you need to be worrying about its age is while your growing it, or while your harvesting it and or drying it out.....
wow.. r u guys serious??? storing your bud in an air tight container improves flavor and smoothness... its call "curing"... just put ur buds in a glass container for a week or two but open it once every day for air. ignore the other replies
Curing works best when the weed is fresh i.e. freshly harvested & dried but still slightly moist. It needs to be in a air-tight container and opened everyday for 10 minutes to let the gas that causes curing to escape, to keep the process going. When the buds are perfect smoking moisture (like a fresh cigar or cig, not crispy) the jar can be kept sealed. Curing makes the weed burn smoother, taste & smell better and increases potency by as much as 30%. Recently I found a humidor I had accidentally packed away in a box of quilts & blankets and left in stortage for at least 2 years. When I saw the container I figured it was empty but checked anyway. Inside there was a bit more than a ounce of quality bud. Ever find a $20 in the pocket of a coat that you had forgotten about? Well this was like finding $400 in a pocket of a coat I forgot about. I packed/sparked a bowl and for a few seconds I thought that the weed must've lost a lot of potency because it was so mild on the throat & lungs. But it kicked my ass. Ageing had made it soooo mild & smoth with a wonderful aroma. Curing/ageing improves a lot of things. Tobacco is aged for 5 years or so. Curing beef improves the texture/taste.
i always wondered if a humidor would be a good environment for curing cannabis....i've got two, and only generally use the larger/more expensive one for storing cigars (limited budget only allows me to buy more smokes so often, and usually i dont have enough to build up a very large surplus of stogies...) and have considered giving away the smaller/cheaper one as a gift....but seeing as later in life i will probably want to start cultivating my own marijuana, it might be a good idea to hang on to it. the spanish cedar lining surely is good for deterring pests and regulating humidity. now i've got to ask, how good is the seal on the humidor you used? considering it was forgotten about for some time, i imagine the RH dropped significantly, but probably a while after the bulk of the curing process had taken place, yes? did you rehumidify the contents before partaking? i havent seen him on here in some time, but there was a guy called geckopelli who used to post here a lot, and like ranger, sang the praises of well-cured marijuana. i dont know for sure if its true, but he did say once (i believe it was him...) that acapulco gold was not in and of itself a great variety of cannabis, but that its quality and color could be attributed to an inordinately thorough curing process wherein almost all of the chlorophyll was lost...
First: some people don't know about weed so lay off them! We all start somewhere, you have to be told things by people to learn (you don't just automatically know things) so don't act all high and mighty like this question has no merit. Second: It doesn't do anything to the potency of the MJ if you let it "cure" or just sit around. I personally do not like it's flakiness when it dries out too much so I tend to not like letting it sit around for a while. There is no way more THC can be made on the plant if it is already dead.
i thnk this thread is about premature vs. mature plants and determining what the best time to harvest is, once its in a zip lock bag it's just down hill from there
^^ agreed. i actually had a question regarding curing, and saw this thread, and was like 'oh, maybe i wont have to ask someone now because someones already answered it for me". it's not a stupid question; it's like you guys are telling a five year old theyre retarted because they can't solve 5X5. they aren't stupid, they just havent learned their multiplication tables yet. for those of you who left some advise thank you for being so tolerable
I'm not a complete n00b when it comes to weed, I've been smoking it regularly (as in at least once every couple of days, most of the time more often) for about the last year and a half... I just get my weed and then I smoke it. So I don't know about storing it. However the most recent batch I got is from last season's harvest as we're just coming up to harvest time in New Zealand and so there's a bit of a drought of really good really fresh weed. I was just wondering how much that will have affected the weed and its potency - I'm assuming it was stored decently... I suppose I should have written all of this initially.
True. However, there are many cannibinoids in marijuana that contribute to the high besides THC. Over 20, last time I heard. That's why a weed high is different than a hash high. Hash doesn't have nearly as much of these cannibinoids as weed. It also explains why some weed makes you killer hungry, some gives you terminal cottonmouth, some makes you horny, etc. Curing converts non-psychoactive alkaloids into psychoactive ones. Making the weed more potent. This takes a min. of 2 weeks. The goal is to cure it to just the right moisture content (like a good cigar) and THEN store it. The weed I found had been sealed in a top-quality humidor with a rubber gasket seal. And because the humidor was stored in a large box with blankets above and below it, the weed had lost no moisture. To indicate how long a properly cured/stored smokable plants can last, I read about a restuarant that sells cigars, and their top-of-the-line cigars are ones that were rolled in 1937. That's right, these cigars were 70 years old. Each one costs $1,000, and comes with a complimentary bottle of prohibition-era hooch.
ok, so i'd probably need to keep replenishing the humidifier in the humidor if i wanted to store some mj in there, because the one in question does not have a 100% airtight seal (there seems to be debate as to whether or not an airtight seal is beneficial in the storing of quality cigars. in the case of tubos and airtight humidors, you can keep a cigar fresh for months or even years, as if it had just been rolled. however to allow the cigars to age properly, some degree of airflow is necessary. since the humidor i have is on the smaller side (recommended as a 25-50 capacity) i could keep it in a large airtight box to ensure a lesser degree of airflow if i were using it for grass. damn. most likely cubans? or perhaps from key west, which was the cigar capitol of the US many years ago... seeing as the US has outlawed trade with Cuba these days, we cannot import Cuban cigars or rum. but it would be a mistake to assume that these commodities are strictly illegal. we cannot import POST-embargo cuban products, but anything imported prior to the embargo (what was it...62? 63?) is fair game. one of the nicest cigars i've smoked, but not the best, was made from pre-embargo cuban tobacco...the brand is Pinar....i forget if i had the 2000 or 3000 line, but it cost about 13 bucks per cigar. i wouldnt call myself a cigar coinnesseur, but definitely an enthusiast. i've had some damn good smokes, including illegal cubans, and this cigar made from several-decades-old tobacco was among the best. and still pretty potent with the nicotine punch! rangerdanger is right, curing for longer periods of time and aging, can be beneficial - under the proper conditions. well cared for plant matter can be kept well for years. its true for marijuana as well as tobacco. but just as you can't leave a naked cigar out on a shelf and expect it to get better (in fact this would render it unsmokable in just a couple days) you can't age or cure marijuana by keeping it in a sandwich bag in a closet somewhere. if its stored like this it WILL be all downhill....but if stored properly, it can get better or stay the same.
You can purchase an air-tight container for your buds for a coupla bux. Tupperware's pretty good. More decorative are cannisters designed for coffee. Gevalia has one that electric blue and wicked cool. But no, don't use a humidifier. The buds would rot from too much moisture. The majority of bulk cigars are stored in special rooms that are tempeture and humidity controlled. They will continue to improve for decades. Keeping them sealed in an air-tight container and stored in a cool location replicates this. The U.S. embargo went into effect in 1960. That sure helped get rid of Fidel, huh?
humidors are usually made of spanish cedar, or at least lined with it. they also incorporate a humidifier. both the spanish cedar and the humidifying device are designed to help maintain a constant RH of about 70%. most personal humidors do not contain a mechanical humidifier but rather a type of sponge laced with a mixture of 50/50 distilled water and propylene glycol. this sponge is then protected in a plastic cage and kept in the humidor seperate from the cigars but in the same general space. the propylene glycol does not evaporate at the same rate as the water, and helps to maintain the ideal RH, as does the very accomodating spanish cedar. spanish cedar also helps to deter pests, and adds more depth of flavor to the cigars if they come in direct contact with it for extended periods of time. using a humidifier is absolutely necessary in a humidor, otherwise its just an expensive box. simply using an airtight container would still ruin the cigars, it would not keep them at the right humidity to prevent them from drying out over time. a rubbermaid container with a humidifier as is used in nice humidors makes a very good, very cheap alternative to a fancier design, but being that it's airtight and not lined with spanish cedar it ought to be opened periodically to help prevent excessive humidity. if you did not have a humidifier in your humidor, than the cannabis wasn't stored in a humidor proper, just a fancy box. so i suppose the humidor aspect becomes a moot point. the humidifiers in humidors do not cause any damage to cigars and certainly do not make them wet enough to rot or spoil in any way shape or form. in fact just the opposite is true...its keeps them wet enough to be smokable (dried out cigars are unsmokable) but dry enough to not spoil from moisture. you certainly CAN keep weed in an ACTIVE, humidified humidor....i've kept tins of pot open in my humidor alongside my cigars a number of times, and have even kept joints and unflavored blunts in my humidor, too. it will not rot. i just was curious as to whether it would be too humid in a proper humidor to further cure marijuana, or if it would be a good climate for aging the pot as it is for cigars. i realize cannabis cannot be cured properly when completely dry, but that just the right level of moisture is necessary. i just didn't know if the RH should be up around the same level as you use for storing quality cigars. i've noticed no problems with marijuana stored with my cigars for weeks or months at a time, but i do know that absolutely fresh marijuana WILL go bad. i certainly wouldnt try and do that, and i certainly wouldnt excessively rehydrate cannabis by constantly increasing the humidity so i'm still curious if cannabis can be cured for an extended period of time in a PROPER humidor rather than simply an airtight box, but perhaps it cannot afterall, even if storage in those conditions provides no adverse effects.
If weed (or anything) is kept in an air-tight humidor, a humidor made of a non-absorbant material (glass/plastic/ceramic), the humdity on 01/01/00 is the same humidity on -1/01/01, and so on, assuming it hasn't been opened. Because where else could the humidity go? A container meant to be opened frequently, like a cigar humidor, needs a humidifying device; it can lose moisture every time it's opened. After my weed is dried and cured, I store it in air tight food-grade plastic containers. I broke one open a few days ago (my last one from '05 harvest) and the buds had the same moisture content as when they went in over a year ago. From the plastic container they go into a Gevalia or pipe tobacco humidor, about an ounce at a time. I take about 3 grams/day out of that container. The containers I useare more like jars with a lid, rather than a box, like a cigar humidor. Also, with a wood box, there is some moisture loss than occurs that doesn't take place in glass/plastic/ceramic. When cigars are kept in a walk-in humidor, like at a tobacconists, there is very little moisture gain/loss. The cigars are usually on display in opened boxes. There is air flow of a kind, but it's the same humidity all the time. A walk-in humidor would probably be superior for buds than a tightly sealed container, but I don't think by much. Cedar does lend a small taste/aroma to cigars. And I've stored weed in cedar-lined humidors before. As you said, cedar is used because of it's insect-repelling qualities first. The taste/aroma it imparts is pleasant, but not neccasary.
Curing does help weed, it just has to be the right kind. In my experience I get my stuff pretty fresh and if you keep it in an air tight glass jar usually is what I use, it will get smoother. Be careful with your jars tho cuz my friend broke my bong with one of those.
