How to Dry and Cure Weed – The Complete Beginner’s Guide

Maybe you grew your own weed, or maybe your dealer stiffed you by giving you a bag of freshly harvested buds. Either way, you have some wet, uncured weed that you can’t smoke. But don’t throw it out! Thanks to this guide, you can learn how to dry and cure weed at home using tools you already have.

Let’s dive into how to dry and cure weed, starting with how to dry your weed at home.

How to Dry Weed

Weed drying involves helping your harvested weed lose its moisture content. As I’ve pointed out, reducing weed’s moisture content is essential for improving its shelf life and smoke quality.

However, how you go about drying your weed is important. If you do it the wrong way, you could over-dry your weed and get desiccated bud husks with minimal cannabinoids and terpenes. For example, don’t attempt speed-drying your fresh weed with a microwave or high-heat oven as these can ruin its cannabinoid and terpene profile.

One of the most effective ways to dry your weed at home is the Air Drying Method. You can do it with the tools and space you already have, and there’s less risk of damaging your weed’s cannabinoid profile. However, air-drying weed requires some patience because it can take one to two weeks.

How to Dry Weed with the Air Drying Method

Air-drying weed requires hanging it or spreading it on a rack to lose moisture. Setting up your fresh weed like this allows air to circulate around it and aid the drying process. You want to reduce the weed’s moisture by 60 to 70%.

The equipment/facilities you need to air dry weed are:

• Drying room
• String or twine
• Hanging tools or drying rack/tray
• Pruning shears or scissors
• Dehumidifier
• Fan
• Thermometer and hygrometer (if you want to be thorough)

Now that you have everything you need, let’s hop into how to dry your weed. Follow these steps.

1.      Prepare Your Drying Room

Your drying room should be dark, clean, disinfected, and well-ventilated. Cleanliness is crucial because it reduces the risk of contamination, while ventilation prevents uneven drying and mold growth. On the other hand, keeping sunlight out of the room prevents UV rays from degrading cannabinoids and terpenes.

Next, keep the room’s temperature between 60 and 70°F (15 and 21°C). The room’s humidity should also be about 45% to 55%. A room that’s too cool or humid will facilitate mold growth and delay drying. A too-hot or dry room, on the other hand, can cause cannabinoid degradation.

2.      Harvest and Prune Your Weed

Harvest your weed plant by cutting it at the base (close to the ground) with your pruning shears. Be gentle to avoid damaging the buds and trichomes (kief). Next, trim off the large fan leaves (not the sugar leaves). This stops the large leaves from blocking airflow around the buds and disrupting drying.

Most people discard the large fan leaves because they contain fewer cannabinoids than weed buds. But you can save these leaves to make teas, tinctures, edibles, and topical products. Just be gentle during pruning to avoid damaging the cannabinoid-rich buds and kief.

3.      Hang the Weed Plant

Use string or twine to attach and hang the weed plant upside down from the roof of your drying room. Alternatively, hang your weed from a clothesline or standing rack installed in the drying. Hanging your weed upside down helps buds maintain their structure and retain resins.

Put enough space between each hung weed plant to ensure sufficient airflow between them for even drying.

What if you have fresh, undried buds instead of a whole cannabis plant? You can dry your fresh buds in the same drying room. But instead of hanging them, spread them out on a wire tray or cooling rack. Provide enough space under the tray and between each bud to facilitate airflow and drying.

4.      Set Up a Fan and Dehumidifier

An oscillating fan will help circulate air within your drying room, ensuring optimal airflow for moisture loss. However, don’t point the fan directly at your hung weed or set it on full blast. Exposure to rough or direct winds from the fan may cause damage to the buds and trichomes.

If the humidity in your area is low, you don’t need a dehumidifier. However, if you have high humidity, a dehumidifier can help lower air moisture in your drying room.

5.      Monitor Temperature and Humidity

With the right humidity and temperature, the weed-drying process should take 7 to 14 days. Check on your drying room and weed daily to confirm everything is going well. During your daily checks, watch for the following:

• Humidity: Use your hygrometer to confirm that humidity levels haven’t exceeded 45% to 55%.
• Temperature: Use your thermometer to check if the room’s temperature is still within 60 to 70°F (15 to 21°C).
• Airflow: Check that your fan is working correctly and that your weed is evenly spaced to facilitate airflow.
• Infestation: Check every weed plant or bud for signs of mold or mildew. If you notice mold or mildew, take down the affected products and isolate them from the rest. Adjust your dehumidifier and fan to further reduce humidity and improve air circulation.

How to Know If Your Weed Is Dry Enough

During daily checks, while drying your weed, test each bud’s dryness. The dryness test involves gently squeezing each bud. Sufficiently dried buds will have a dry but not crumbly texture. They’ll also feel slightly springy when you squeeze – not too soft (still wet) or too hard (over-dried).

Another effective test for confirming dryness is the snap test. Attempt breaking your weed’s small stems. If the small stems bend or feel flexible, the bud still contains too much moisture. But if small stems snap cleanly, while larger stems bend, the weed should be dry enough.

How to Dry Weed Fast?

Yes, you can dry weed fast, reducing its moisture content within hours. Fast weed drying techniques are ideal if you have a small batch of freshly cultivated weed or wet buds. It’s also ideal if you don’t have the patience or space for air drying.

The three fastest ways to dry weed at home are with a food dehydrator, oven drying, and freeze drying.

1. Food Dehydrator for Fast Weed Drying

After trimming your freshly harvested weed, set your food dehydrator to its lowest temperature (between 95 and 105°F or 35 and 40°C. Next, arrange your buds on the dehydrator’s trays and leave enough space between each bud to allow effective airflow.

Load the trays into the dehydrator and check on the buds every 30 minutes for dryness. During each 30-minute check, flip each bud and rotate the trays to facilitate even drying. When the buds feel dry but not brittle, and the small stems snap cleanly instead of bending, your buds should be sufficiently dry.

2. Low-Heat Oven for Fast Weed Drying

Your convection oven will work just as well for drying your wet weed. Simply set and preheat your oven to 105°F (40°C) and trim your fresh cannabis. Place the trimmed weed plant or buds on a baking tray lined with parchment paper before sliding it into your preheated oven.

Check on the buds and flip each one every 15 minutes to ensure even drying. The entire drying process may take one to two hours. Same as with air drying and dehydrator drying, you’ll know the weed is sufficiently dry when the small stems can snap cleanly. The buds will also feel dry but not brittle when you squeeze them.

While your oven and food dehydrator can dry weed quickly, they aren’t better than air drying. Ovens and dehydrators expose cannabis to heat that degrades cannabinoids and terpenes. The degradation will result in weed with a less impressive cannabinoid and terpene profile than air-dried weed. Also, drying weed in an oven or dehydrator increases the risk of over-drying your buds.

3. Freeze-Drying for Fast Weed Drying

Cryo or freeze drying involves using extremely low temperatures to quickly dehydrate cannabis. You can do it with a cryo chamber, dry ice, or lyophilization (freeze-drying). Unlike air drying, which takes days, these methods take hours.

Weed drying with a cryo chamber involves rapidly cooling your buds to below -100°F (-73°C) in a cryo chamber. With dry ice, you rapidly cool the weed over dry ice, while lyophilization involves freezing your fresh buds in a vacuum chamber.

Since vacuum chambers and cryo chambers are expensive, drying weed with dry ice is your best bet since you can get dry ice at the store for cheap. Besides dry ice (solid CO2), you’ll need an insulated container (like a cooler), a wire rack, protective gloves (for handling dry ice), and paper towels.

Here are the steps to dehydrate weed quickly with dry ice.

• Prepare Work Station and Items: Dry ice releases harmful carbon dioxide during use, so work in a well-ventilated space to avoid CO2 poisoning. Wear protective gloves and line the bottom of your cooler with parchment paper before pouring in your dry ice. The dry ice should be equally laid out for even cooling.
• Spread the Buds: Lay your weed buds on a mesh or perforated tray, and place the tray one to two inches above the dry ice. This prevents the dry ice from touching the buds and causing damaging freeze burn. Also, ensure the buds don’t touch, evenly spacing them to ensure free flow of air and even drying.
• Freeze: Leave the container partially open to vent released CO2 gasses as the dry ice dehydrates the buds. Check on your buds every few hours to monitor the drying process, and add more dry ice if necessary to maintain consistent cooling.

Once the buds feel dry to the touch but still retain some moisture inside, you can move to the weed-curing stage. However, just like drying with heat, freeze-drying can cause cannabinoid and terpene loss. Also, the risk of over-drying your weed during freeze-drying is higher than if you use air-drying.

While fast drying can let you enjoy your weed sooner, slow drying and curing your buds delivers better results. Slow-dried and cured weed has a fuller cannabinoid and terpene profile, meaning it tastes, smells, and feels better when you light up.

What Happens If You Over-Dry Weed?

If your weed gets too dry, it’ll have fewer cannabinoids and terpenes. Cannabinoids, such as CBD, THC, and CBG, are the compounds in weed that deliver your desired therapeutic effects. Over-drying weed reduces the presence of these cannabinoids in buds, lowering the weed’s potency and ability to deliver your desired results.

Also, lower terpene levels in over-dry cannabis will prevent you from experiencing your weed’s true flavor and aroma. Lastly, excessively dried weed burns quickly in pipes and blunts, producing harsh smoke. The smoke may irritate your throat, eyes, nose, and lungs. 

How to Cure Weed

Weed curing helps mature your buds’ smell, taste, and potency to deliver a better smoking experience. This makes cured weed a better product than fresh or dried weed if you prefer blunts, pre-rolls, or pipe smoking.

Would you like to learn how to cure weed yourself because you grow cannabis or know where to get fresh buds at a bargain? If so, I’ve got you. Below are the most effective weed-curing methods you can DIY with the resources you already have.  

Method 1: Curing Weed with the Jar Curing Method

Jar curing weed involves aging dried cannabis in an airtight jar. It preserves and enhances your weed’s quality. You can only use this curing method if your weed has been dried to at least 10 to 15% moisture content. If your weed is any wetter, this curing method may lead to mildew or mold growth.

Follow these steps to cure your weed with the jar-curing method:

1. Prepare Your Jars: You need clear, glass jars (not amber jars) with airtight lids. Plastic jars don’t support proper air circulation or prevent mold growth as effectively. Also, transparent glass simplifies monitoring the curing process. Prepare the glass jars by thoroughly cleaning, disinfecting, and drying them before use.
2. Trim Buds: Prune excess stems off your already-dried buds to prepare them for the jar. Don’t forget that your buds should be 85 to 90% dry before jar curing. Wetter buds will take longer to dry and may become moldy.
3. Fill Your Jars: Place your dried and trimmed buds into your clean jar, filling it to no more than 75%. Not filling the jar to the brim leaves room for the buds to breathe and release moisture. Screw the lid on tightly and place the filled jar(s) in a cool, dark place, such as a cupboard, closet, or drawer. The storage space should have a stable temperature of 60 to 70°F (15 to 21°C) and protection against direct sunlight. Exposure to UV rays or high temperatures will degrade cannabinoids.
4. Monitor Curing Process: Check on your jars and open them thrice a day for at least five minutes. Opening the jars (burping) purges the moisture released by the curing buds. During each check, inspect your buds for mold and other issues. If you notice any mildewy or moldy buds, take them out so they don’t contaminate other buds in the jar.
5. Maintain Humidity. Use a hygrometer to monitor humidity levels in jars. The ideal humidity level for optimal curing and preventing mold is 55 to 65%. If humidity isn’t within the desired range, use humidity control packs like Boveda or Integra Boost packs. Placing a Boveda pack in each jar will maintain humidity levels by absorbing excess moisture.
6. After One Week: After your first week of jar curing, your bud’s moisture content will be less. So, scale back burping (opening) your jars to once a day but keep the curing jars stored in your cool, dark place.
7. After Two to Three Weeks: After your second or third week of jar curing, your weed should have a sweet, earthy, or fruity aroma. This indicates your weed is sufficiently cured and ready for use. If you like, you can jar-cure your weed till the fourth or sixth week to further boost its flavor.

Method 2: Curing Weed with the Paper Bag Method

Paper bag curing (or sweat curing) is an excellent alternative to jar curing. Instead of jars, you’ll cure your weed in brown paper bags, like grocery bags.

Also, unlike jar curing, you can use the paper bag curing method even if your weed isn’t 85 to 90% dry. The paper bag will absorb excess moisture from the buds and release it to aid drying. However, the drier your weed, the less time it’ll take to cure your buds with the paper bag method.

Follow these steps to cure your weed with paper bags.

1. Prepare Your Bags: You can buy fresh paper bags or use paper bags from your last grocery run. However, only use clean, odor-free bags. Paper bags with contaminants will taint the buds you place inside for curing.
2. Prepare Your Buds: Trim excess stems off your buds and lay them in a single layer on the bottom of the paper bag. Don’t stack buds on one another and leave some space between each bud to facilitate airflow for curing.
3. Close and Store Bags: Fold the top of the bag, closing it loosely so air can flow in and out to aerate your buds. Next, place the filled bags in a cool, dark, and well-ventilated room with a temperature between 60 and 70°F or 15 and 21°C. You can place an oscillating fan in the room to aid ventilation. The room’s humidity should also be about 55% to 65%.
4. Monitor Curing: Check on your curing buds daily by opening the paper bags to inspect the buds for moisture loss and signs of mold or mildew. Also, gently shake the bags and rotate the buds to ensure even curing and moisture distribution. If the buds are drying too quickly, fold the bag more tightly to retain moisture.
5. Testing Readiness: After the first week of bag curing, test the buds for readiness by gently squeezing them. If they feel dry or brittle, you’re done with bag curing and can transfer your buds to an airtight glass jar for storage. But if the buds still feel moist during the squeeze test, continue bag curing, checking on your buds daily for another week.

Paper bag cured weed is ready for use or storage in airtight glass jars when the bud’s exterior feels dry. The body should give slightly without crumbling when you squeeze it between your fingers. It should also have a rich and pronounced aroma that doesn’t smell like grass or hay.

Method 3: Curing Weed with Water Curing Method

Water curing is an effective solution for curing your cannabis faster. It’s faster because unlike jar and paper bag curing, you don’t need to dry your weed before water curing. Also, the actual water-curing process takes five to seven days, allowing you to enjoy your harvested buds sooner.

The water-curing process involves rinsing your fresh buds in clean water to wash out chlorophyll, salts, and other unwanted compounds. Removing these unwanted compounds with water curing will give you buds that give a clean smoke when blazed in blunts or pipes.

Follow these steps to water cure your freshly harvested cannabis:

1. Prepare Your Buds and Tools: Trim off excess leaves from your cannabis, leaving just the buds. Get a clean glass jar or another container and fill it with clean, room-temperature water (or distilled water).
2. Soak the Buds: Submerge your buds in the water and leave them to soak for 12 hours.
3. Change the Water: After 12 hours, gently shake the container to dislodge impurities, unwanted compounds, and phytochemicals from your soaked buds. Drain out the water and refill the jar with fresh water to again submerge the buds. Gently shake the jar and change the water every 12 hours to repeatedly wash out unwanted compounds and other impurities from your buds.
4. Rinse and Repeat: Repeat this process for five to seven days to keep water-curing your buds. You’ve successfully water-cured your buds when the water your buds are submerged in stays clear after a 12-hour soak. The buds should have a firm but not soggy texture at this point.
5. Let Buds Dry: Dry your buds by placing them on paper towels or a drying rack to air dry for two to three days. Drying should occur in a ventilated room and without exposing your buds to UV rays.
6. Store: Once dry, you can immediately light up or store and continue aging your water-cured buds in airtight glass jars. You’ll need to burp the jars daily to release moisture and prevent mold growth

While water curing is faster than jar and paper bag curing, it does have a few downsides. For instance, water curing tends to wash out terpenes, giving you weed that’s less flavorful and aromatic. Also, water-cured weed typically has a washed-out color due to its prolonged soak.

But on the upside, water-cured weed maintains a rich cannabinoid profile (not as rich as air-dried and jar-cured weed though). Since cannabinoids like THC and CBD are fat-soluble and hydrophobic, they can’t be diffused or washed out from buds by exposure to water. Terpenes, on the other hand, wash out because they are water-soluble. So, while water-cured weed may be bland, it still delivers potent therapeutic effects.

What Is Weed Curing and Is It Necessary?

Weed curing comes after drying, and it typically involves storing dried weed in an airtight container to let the buds age and continue drying. This process can take a couple of weeks, but you can get faster results with water-curing techniques.

As the buds mature during curing, unwanted compounds, such as chlorophyll, sugars, and plant starch, will break down. The breakdown of these compounds leaves you with buds rich in terpenes that deliver weed’s desirable tastes and aromas.

Also, cannabinoids like CBDA (cannabidiolic acid) and THCA (tetrahydrocannabinolic acid) will convert into CBD (cannabidiol) and THC (tetrahydrocannabinol) respectively. CBD and THC are the most popular and sought-after cannabinoids in weed for their therapeutic effects.

The combined outcome of enhanced flavor and potency makes cured weed more valuable, effective, and desirable than uncured cannabis.

How Long to Cure Weed

How long you need to cure weed depends on your chosen curing method. With jar or paper bag curing, your weed should be sufficiently cured in two to three weeks.

However, you can further enhance your weed’s flavor and potency by curing it for up to four to eight weeks with the jar method. It won’t spoil, and its flavor, appearance, and smell will remain desirable if your curing jar remains airtight and stored in a cool, dark place. You’ll also need to burp the jar to prevent moisture accumulation that may aid mold and mildew growth

But don’t cure weed for more than six months. After six months, cannabinoids will start expiring, and your cured weed will start losing its potency. The texture, flavor, and aroma will also begin declining, and the risk of oxidation and mold and bacteria will increase.

Why Dry and Cure Weed?

Weed starts off as a plant (obviously), and when it’s freshly harvested, it has a high moisture and chlorophyll content. The moisture and chlorophyll content gives weed leaves and buds a rich green color and a wet or spongy texture.

Weed with a high moisture content doesn’t burn well in blunts and pipes, requiring repeated lighting. Also, lighting weed with excess moisture and chlorophyll generates a harsh, bitter smoke in copious amounts. This can make smoking undried, uncured weed unpleasant and unsatisfying.

Another problem with excess moisture in weed is that it makes the product more susceptible to mold, bacteria, and mildew infestations. Such infestations negatively impact weed’s quality, appearance, and shelf life. If you want your harvested weed to last longer, drying and curing it soon after harvesting is crucial.

Besides chlorophyll and moisture, other unwanted compounds removed by weed curing and drying are:

• Sugars
• Plant starches
• Ethylene
• Ammonia
• Residual pesticides and fertilizers

Removing or minimizing these unwanted compounds makes weed more enjoyable to smoke. Other benefits of drying and curing weed are:

1. Enhanced Flavor: Curing allows weed’s terpenes and flavors to mature, providing a more satisfying taste and smoking experience. It’s comparable to aging beef to enhance its flavor and texture. Also, drying gets rid of unwanted compounds like chlorophyll that can interfere with enjoying your cannabis’ terpene flavor profile.
2. More Potent: Dried and cured weed can be more potent than uncured weed. This is because weed drying and curing enhances the product’s THC content to deliver a more pronounced high. According to Kindled Grow Lights, “Over time, curing can increase the THC content of your buds by converting non-psychoactive THCA into THC, delivering a more potent high.”
3. Reduced Weight for Logistics: If you intend on selling your cannabis harvest, drying and curing reduces moisture content, making weed lighter and easier to pack. This makes handling and shipping less of a hassle.

The End

That’s my complete guide on how to dry and cure weed at home. As you can see, it’s not complicated if you know how to go about it. If you have any questions about drying and curing your weed at home, don’t be shy to ask in the comments.

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