drying in Cardboard Box/Brown Paperbag?

[PineMan]

i plan on harvesting my little windowsill Grow this week. I've seen & read alot about drying in cardboard boxes for a cheap simple drying method. Is it better to use a brown paper? It's a steady 70° in my house (central AC) it's pretty chill in the morning time. How exactly would i set up my box?

 

[Ca++]

A typical drying box would be 30W x 30H x 40L. With 6 string washing lines down the length of it. Placed about 4cm down from the top. The lines should be tight enough not to sag, but not enough to put any stress on the boxes shape. The 6 lines are usually just one bit of garden string, thread back n forth though holes punctured with your scissors. A bit like lacing up a shoe.
The lines will easily take the 20-25cm lengths that it's nice to section a plant up into. While sectioning the plant into these short bits (that are easy to twiddle about as you trim) you think about just how they are going to hang. You need a bud at the bottom of each little bit, to hand it over the line. Each line should be full, with buds touching their neighbours. In 24 hours that gap will be gone, as the buds half in size rapidly. Boxes shouldn't be half full, or quality will take a hit. You are trying to keep the stink around them, and a bud:box ratio influences drying speed.
Normally I would suggest a brown box, as any with a shiny surface seem a bit thin, and somehow don't wick as well. Their humidity changing quickly as they have little water holding capacity. You can't employ tricks like spraying the box, as they just lack that capacity. A capacity that also lets them get better with age. In fairness, the first time a box is used, you are just conditioning it. It's still better for your weed than nothing, but an older box is worth handing down to the next generation. Stuff watches, you want decent cardboard boxes left to you.

If you do just have some little bags worth, then perhaps do use little bags. Like a thin box, you will need to pay more attention to their surroundings though. That moisture holding capacity is zero. Like their was no bag. So you may want to put the little bags, in a big plastic box, containing a bowl or water and an RH meter.

Without an RH meter, you are seriously disadvantaged. Drying is all about the RH. I have seem people do paper bags, waiting for the twigs to harden as their gauge instead. The outer bud was crisp long before the twig showed any signs of getting woody. Ruined...

Wherever your bud is, keep it above 55% and get it below 65% in a few days. All time spent over 65% is a mold risk, and serves no purpose. Dropping below 55% ends the enzymatic action of curing. For good.
This is why we keep the drying area around 58% RH. So the weed drops to that, but no further. While over 65% we are letting the moisture leave freely, perhaps even using fans. Below 65% you wouldn't risk fans drying the edges. In a big box, you have the lid shut, as you try to regulate around 60%. Opening/closing just the right amount. In time you get to know your system, and can guess the next 24 hours accurately. It's tricky the first few times though. Nobody can really help, except for the RH meter.

 

[Ringodoggie]

Ditto on the need for an RH meter of some kind.

I had a great drying tent back in why oh why Ohio but out here in SoCal I just use cardboard boxes as well.

My method is simple. I use a giant WalMart box and just poke holes on the top and stick the branch through it. Sometimes, I just lay them in the box. It makes for smashed ugly buds (LOL) but still works great.

Either way, I drop a handful of those cheapo hygrometers (of which I have many dozens LOL) into the box to monitor the RH

 

[Ca++]

Anywhere between 61 and 73 lol. We must have the same supplier. I started putting them all in a box with my decent meter, then applying stickers to them, to say how far off they were. This is a reasonable fix to the calibration issue, but still they pack up randomly. I'm not sure how they made them so badly to be honest.

Mushroom trays are my current bad habit. You can half fill them, and stack them in a small drying space. I use a few little PC fans for air circulation, and an extractor on an RH stat. You really can stack them in..

Your local takeaway is probably annoyed by the space these take up in their bin. The bottoms are just like the sides, as mushrooms also get moved in a controlled environment, to stop them going moldy.

If your local store offers thick paper carriers, I can imagine a system. You can lay paper under and over them, if they are drying to fast, and you don't have a way to keep up the RH. It just gives another day, before plastic bagging the tray is an option. Having just a little bud to dry, in a big space, can drive you to find ways of slowing moisture loss. Ideally.. a humidifier on a stat. But the need for drying can swing to the need for keeping wet, very quickly. Especially with small amounts.


It's a nice vert system, with interesting access equipment and even hair nets. It's a shame they lost the lot to mushroom. Must be cuttings from @Loc Dog

 

[PineMan]

A typical drying box would be 30W x 30H x 40L. With 6 string washing lines down the length of it. Placed about 4cm down from the top. The lines should be tight enough not to sag, but not enough to put any stress on the boxes shape. The 6 lines are usually just one bit of garden string, thread back n forth though holes punctured with your scissors. A bit like lacing up a shoe.
The lines will easily take the 20-25cm lengths that it's nice to section a plant up into. While sectioning the plant into these short bits (that are easy to twiddle about as you trim) you think about just how they are going to hang. You need a bud at the bottom of each little bit, to hand it over the line. Each line should be full, with buds touching their neighbours. In 24 hours that gap will be gone, as the buds half in size rapidly. Boxes shouldn't be half full, or quality will take a hit. You are trying to keep the stink around them, and a bud:box ratio influences drying speed.
Normally I would suggest a brown box, as any with a shiny surface seem a bit thin, and somehow don't wick as well. Their humidity changing quickly as they have little water holding capacity. You can't employ tricks like spraying the box, as they just lack that capacity. A capacity that also lets them get better with age. In fairness, the first time a box is used, you are just conditioning it. It's still better for your weed than nothing, but an older box is worth handing down to the next generation. Stuff watches, you want decent cardboard boxes left to you.

If you do just have some little bags worth, then perhaps do use little bags. Like a thin box, you will need to pay more attention to their surroundings though. That moisture holding capacity is zero. Like their was no bag. So you may want to put the little bags, in a big plastic box, containing a bowl or water and an RH meter.

Without an RH meter, you are seriously disadvantaged. Drying is all about the RH. I have seem people do paper bags, waiting for the twigs to harden as their gauge instead. The outer bud was crisp long before the twig showed any signs of getting woody. Ruined...

Wherever your bud is, keep it above 55% and get it below 65% in a few days. All time spent over 65% is a mold risk, and serves no purpose. Dropping below 55% ends the enzymatic action of curing. For good.
This is why we keep the drying area around 58% RH. So the weed drops to that, but no further. While over 65% we are letting the moisture leave freely, perhaps even using fans. Below 65% you wouldn't risk fans drying the edges. In a big box, you have the lid shut, as you try to regulate around 60%. Opening/closing just the right amount. In time you get to know your system, and can guess the next 24 hours accurately. It's tricky the first few times though. Nobody can really help, except for the RH meter.

hey man this advice worked perfect, just came back to say thanks! i jarred my buds a little bit too early, my RH was reading 74% so i turned on the AC and had my buds drying until it got to 62%, burped a few times until 58% now im at 59-60%. smokes perfect and taste wonderful. a few more weeks curing it'll even out the smoke I feel

 

[exoticrobotic]

Drying and curing is quite an art.

Personally after all that effort I'm just pleased to get them dry enough so i can jar them up without them going mouldy so i no longer have to worry about the whole street stinking.

Last harvest I bagged up some still wet bud into those cure bag things and was extremely surprised how it allowed the bud to slowly dry without any mould at all. The smoke is a tad harsher than jar cure but to be honest i prefer not worrying about mould.

With jars you have to watch them carefully while they off gas and redistribute their residual moisture even after you think the buds are dry otherwise white cotton wool looking mould will appear.

Even if only one bud is affected by such mould it will ruin the whole jar it was in.

 

[PineMan]

Drying and curing is quite an art.

Personally after all that effort I'm just pleased to get them dry enough so i can jar them up without them going mouldy so i no longer have to worry about the whole street stinking.

Last harvest I bagged up some still wet bud into those cure bag things and was extremely surprised how it allowed the bud to slowly dry without any mould at all. The smoke is a tad harsher than jar cure but to be honest i prefer not worrying about mould.

With jars you have to watch them carefully while they off gas and redistribute their residual moisture even after you think the buds are dry otherwise white cotton wool looking mould will appear.

Even if only one bud is affected by such mould it will ruin the whole jar it was in.

Totally a art!! what's your drying & curing RH, Temps? i followed 60/60 kinda had to dry a bit more. im going to go with 55%60 next time tbh

 

[exoticrobotic]

I had to dry last time in the tent in darkness in the middle of summer.

RH is always mid 50ish, temps were too high at 70, sometimes mid 80s

It all dried way too quickly this time and stunk the whole street up. Luckily i could only smell it a few doors away.

I read something the other day where it said the key to the best cannabis was drying for 30 days at 60degs.

If only....

At some point i may treat myself to one of those fridge curing thingies.

 

[PineMan]

I had to dry last time in the tent in darkness in the middle of summer.

RH is always mid 50ish, temps were too high at 70, sometimes mid 80s

It all dried way too quickly this time and stunk the whole street up. Luckily i could only smell it a few doors away.

I read something the other day where it said the key to the best cannabis was drying for 30 days at 60degs.

If only....

At some point i may treat myself to one of those fridge curing thingies.

smell is noo joke, i went to VA to visit my pal & as soon as i pull into his apartment complex I could smell thr stench through my actual car window. Had to give him a stern "dude it fucking stinks". before then i never realized how foul it can really get. Cold temps really works wonders but ik it's a hassle trying to get cool air during the summer! much applauded to you for giving it what you could man.

 

[exoticrobotic]

It's weird how while flowering the cf and extraction is enough to handle any smell but while drying it often isn't.

The evaporating moisture must be taking some volatile stinky elements with them through the tent fabric.

 

[Hasch]

Last harvest I bagged up some still wet bud into those cure bag things

@exoticrobotic you mean those Grove Bags?

Grove Bags - Packaging and Curing Solutions

Grove Bags equips growers & consumers to efficiently preserve quality from cultivation to consumption with USA-made packaging with TerpLoc®

grovebags.com

 

[Old Piney]

I see your talking about drying completely in box start to finish , but I thought I'd throw this in. After hang drying ( I suppose you can do this in a box ) I find it useful to use a brown paper bag. As I remove the buds from the sticks when they are somewhat dry but not dry enough to jar , I place them in a bag. It's useful I slowing down the drying , especially with heat or air running, this way it's easier to get the perfect moisture content to start your cure. Drying rate can be further adjusted by opening or closing the bag. I also find that this helps even the moisture content

 

[Ca++]

What you describe the brown paper bags doing, the box is doing. Instead of hanging in a room, then moving to bags, you are going straight to bag/box. This skips a process, and also compacts the crop into movable units right away. That can be space saving, as you can stack and shuffle them about, as you get the room cleaned and planted again. Often the lowered lights offer space above them, it depends how you work things.

If you only have a paper bag full, and a space with the right RH, it's good. However, if your space is drier than the ~60% you want, then the thin bag offers little resistance to drying out. If you were to wet a bit of paper, and a bit of card, you can imagine how quickly each dries. The box size and type I gave, is the right ratio of surface area to bud volume, when filled as I described. I have seen tv boxes filled, but the box surface area was too great for the amount of bud. I have seem microwave boxes, not loose moisture fast enough as it's glossy board, and have too much bud in them for the surface area. It's all about drying speed.

The box isn't hang drying in the context you're thinking of. It's a controlled space, like your bags, but can't flash dry, like bags can. Only for the first day, are the boxes open, like drying in a room.

 

[Ca++]

Mushrooms


They stack up pretty well, and let some small PC fans get a draft though. Allowing a quite compact drying area. Which has an exhaust fan set for 60%. It's a nice bit of recycling, that I can also dry my rubbish in, so it doesn't mold up.

Murrshrooms

Well.. I was scrubbing pics, so I thought I may as well

 

[goingrey]

Those stackable plastic trays are single use waste? Wow, what a, well, waste..

 

[johnmitchell]

For drying your windowsill grow, using a custom printed cardboard box can be a great, simple, and cheap method. The box allows good airflow which helps in drying. To set it up, cut small holes on the sides of the box for ventilation. Hang your plants inside by string or use a mesh to keep them off the bottom. Make sure the box is in a cool, dry place with good air circulation. A brown paper bag is also good, but the box gives more space and better air circulation, which helps dry your plants evenly.

 

[amanda88]

nice but, please note that these hydrometers were invented in the states back in the late 1950s, for a AC electric circuit, now they are made in china sold for pennies, using a DC circuit, the difference is to wide to rely on, unless you can reset them, just beware good buddies they are shit