Take steps to ensure that you get the most out of your harvest.
 
Photos by Dan Skye 
 
When it comes to growing the highest-grade ganja on earth, true experts understand that what happens after harvest plays an outsized role in the smell, flavor and smokeability of your end product, and that drying and curing is a process too many beginners rush through – or overlook entirely.
 
“It’s a lot like the aging of a fine wine,” explains legendary cannabis breeder DJ Short, creator of Blueberry, Old Time Moonshine and other popular strains. “The benefits of properly cured cannabis include even moisture content and a complete breakdown of chlorophyll, which allows the full, clear expression of taste and aroma to emerge.”
 
Unlike tomatoes and carrots, marijuana is not best experienced as fresh produce. It takes weeks after cutting down the buds to properly dry and trim them. Drying too slowly invites molds and other pathogens; too quickly, and even the stickiest nugs turn crisp and smoke harsh.
 
Plan to spend up to 10 days drying your next harvest in a cool (60oF to 70oF), dry, dark place with steady airflow. Don’t turn a fan directly on the buds, put them in direct sunlight or fall prey to other shortcuts. When the stems snap, rather than bend, between your fingers, finish your trimming and prepare to start your cure.
 
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Plan to spend 10 days drying your harvest. 
 
Curing – the process of slowly leaching the last traces of moisture from “dry” buds – protects the THC and other cannabinoids from breaking down too quickly during storage, and it also prevents mold from developing. To start, place your buds in an airtight glass container, carefully piling in as many as possible without damaging them. Over time, trace amounts of moisture inside the buds will evaporate, though this moisture will still be trapped inside the jar. Periodically open the jar and turn the buds over to release this moisture and allow more sweating (leaving the jar open for about an hour each time), and check several times per day until the buds are perfectly and evenly dry (usually about a week). At that point, you can set the jars aside until you’re ready to blaze.
 
According to DJ Short, if the buds are kept in the dark in airtight glass, they can continue to cure for at least four years. “The long cure has kind of become standard operating procedure for me,” he explains. “I do periodically check them up until about six months. At that point, if they’re the same as at five months and four months, then I’ll just let them go until I’m ready to sample. Right now, I’m about to crack open a jar from 2009. Cured that long, the calyxes start to go golden and the herb develops some deep and unique characteristics, based on the strain. I’m actually curious what would happen if, like the spirits industry, we started aging in oak barrels – because anything you put next to cannabis, that flavor will be imparted to the herb.”
 
DJ Short suggests that anyone interested in the long cure might want to investigate the new violet glass jars designed to prevent the degradation of terpenoids that give cannabis its flavor and aroma. And one last tip: If your bud gets too dry during curing, simply place a freshly cut nug into the middle of the jar and then monitor it closely for the next week, as if you were starting the curing process over from the beginning.