There’s gotta be a better option for trimming

[Keith]

I spent like 10 hours trimming 2 plants.  That seems crazy.  This took longer bc of all the dead leaves that got fried before i harvested.  So i know a lot of the time was spent digging into buds trying to get the dead out.  But still.  I don’t think I could handle any more plants come trim time.

Could I take the cut and dried branches and keep them in a big Tupperware for a day or 2 and get to them when I have the time?  I was up until 2am trimming the other day bc I didn’t have anything else to do with the bud, I had to get it into jars.

Was just hoping to hear how some of you guys do it.   Maybe you’ve got some tips or tricks to speed up my process.

Here’s a pic.  I’m have to try to take more later.

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[Loves2Trim]

FISKARS TRIMMING SCISSORS!!!!!

[Keith]

That’s what I used but ended up switching to the finger nail scissors after the fiskars got too gunked up.

[Atom]

I find the piranhas trimmers work better than fiskars. Fiskars are a bit lighter but also smaller, I feel the piranhas fit my meat hooks better. There a few bucks cheaper but the better option imo

[Somatek]

I use something similar to the piranha trimmers, ARS bonsai snips as I prefer not having the spring.  I can trim longer without cramps in my hand without the spring and find the blades are better on ARS since their thinner.

It’s a good idea to have some alcohol to clean your snips off with, after scrapping off the finger hash to smoke of course.

[Brad104]

There is you farm it out bro to friends and family who hopefully you can trust.

[Loves2Trim]

Also the bud trimming bowl with the black tabs works. I think you have to wet trim to use that. I don’t really like to  it beats the hell out of the nugs. but it will take hours off your trim times. especially when youve got 2 lbs of flower waiting to be snipped!

Also i usually end up with a half gallon jar full of “JOINT WEED”.

[Scream]

This is quoted from Exotic Genetics server on Discord. It explains how trimming can be a multi day task, as long as you’re binning. Allows you to spread the moisture throughout the bud while you get your chores done

> 💰 **Step 5 – Reconstitution, De-bucking & Cure **
>
> Now that you have your plants broken down and fairly sealed inside the bins, your next step is to keep them in those bins for 24-48 hours. This is called the **reconstitution** or the reconstitution process. While your plants are in the bins, the wettest areas of the plants are going to slowly spread the moisture out to other parts of the plants that are dryer. You will notice that when you first put the plants in the bin after the break down that the leaves and the outsides of the plants will be somewhat crispy to the touch. However, after your 24–48-hour period not only will the outsides not be so crispy, but if left long enough, the moisture will be evenly distributed throughout everything that is inside the bins.
>
> Generally, I will check the bins after 24 hours and see where the process is at. If I feel that more moisture can be distributed more evenly, I will leave it in for another 24 hours. After a full 48 hours I will do what I call a fluff on the branches in each bin. This includes just a flipping here and there of some branches to bring the bottoms to the top, and the tops to the bottom for more of an even distribution of residual moisture. I also like to leave each bin open for about 15 minutes while I’m doing this process once daily, then seal them all up again and let them sit yet even longer.
>
> After 3 days or so of fluffing, you should have branches and flowers that share a very even level of moisture. The smells should begin to turn from the weird phase of drying foliage to a nice intrinsic aroma of whatever smells your plants naturally give off. You are now ready to begin the de-bucking process!
>
> **De-bucking** is the process of removing the actual flowers from the stalks of the plants so that they can finally be trimmed. I usually start by removing flowers from the stalks until I have bins that are about half full. This allows room in the bins to fluff for the next few days if I don’t get all the flowers trimmed in one setting, which I never do. After de-bucking a room, I end up with several sometimes dozens of bins. At this point it’s very important to keep the de-bucked flowers tightly sealed in that plastic inside the bin until its they’re day to be trimmed. The last thing you want is your flowers drying out too much after you have gotten them to this perfect moisture level.
>
> After the flowers get trimmed, they are then placed back into the bag and thoroughly sealed to keep all the air out. You will want to continue to move through your flowers, bin by bin, until you have trimmed everything. It usually takes my crew about 7-10 days to get though everything, but this time frame will be different for everyone depending on how much you grew and how much help you have during all these steps. At this point the flowers can either be packaged into individual portions for retail, turkey bags for the unit movers, or percy jars for the head. This part all depends on you baby!
>
> 🍃

[Keith]

This is exactly what I’m going to do.  Thank you for relaying that info.

[Somatek]

My process is similar but I don’t buck the buds until after it’s trimmed so the buds are handled less so fewer trichs are knocked off.  My process is:

-hang dry buds for 7-14 days depending on temp/humidity: until the outer fan leaves are brittle and the small stems are just beginning to snap instead of bend.

-cut into roughly 12″ lengths, strip fan leaves (usually by hand) and store in buckets or totes. Leave for a day or two while burping to balance moisture.

-final trim of sugar leaves trimming a full bucket/tote per session and jarring it to keep the moisture consistent.  I hand trim everything, only handling the stems while being as gentle as possible with the bud.  A comfy chair, trim bin, good scissors and something to entertain you are essential and then just relax and enjoy the down time trimming and taking it easy.  Growing commercially I spent as much time trimming bud I as I did growing it, so you learn to just relax and be present instead of thinking about how many endless hours of mindless work you’re doing.  A good podcast, youtuber (the adam dunn show is a personal fav as it’s just random drug chatter usually that’s easy to drift in and out of), a movie or show you love or having someone to chat with all make it much more bearable.

-burp jars for a couple days until even moisture content and ready to be stored long term.

With all the excitement/hype about grove bags for auto curing your buds without needing to burp them, one of the more interesting uses people have mentioned is using the large bags to store untrimmed branches until they get around to it.  I’ve got one of their 1/2 oz sample bags to try once I harvest some plants and if they work as advertised may splurge on some of their 1lbs bags to replace the totes/buckets in my harvesting process.

Here’s the link for free samples for any Canadians interested in trying them.

[Keith]

That’s really great.  I bought a tote the other day so I’m ready to give this a try.  I also am very careful when I trim.  I don’t touch the buds either.  Except this last time I had to to get all the damn dead out.  My fingers were fucking caked in thc that will never be smoked by me, or anyone for that matter.  Completely wasted.  I had never heard anything about putting them in totes for a couple days.  Not only does it free me up from having to trim everything in one night, it also balances out the moisture.  Like a pre cure.  It makes perfect sense.  I’ll have to check out the Adam Dunn show.  I think I’ve heard of it.  So far I’ve just done books on tape while trimming.  This is very helpful and reminds me that we need a favorite button or a bookmark button.

[Somatek]

You want totes/buckets with a good seal or else you’ll end up with over dried bud, adding a bit of weather stripping between the lid and edge works if there isn’t one already.  Drying is all about managing the water content, so you really need to pay attention to get that nice dry but slightly squishy bud that’s perfect for smoking or pressing.

Adam Dunn is the breeder behind THSeeds who brought a lot of american genetics to the dutch market like Bubblegum, SAGE (big sur hollyweed x afghan), MK Ultra (G13 x OG Kush) and was a really popular company from the late 90’s through 2000’s, so often there shows are a lot of reminiscing about the wild west days.  It has the most definitive dive into OG Kush and it’s lineage, there’s like 2-4 shows about it.  Most episodes are 3 hours long of people rambling while getting high, including the occasional melt down lol.

[NeuroticTurtle]

I hear good things about https://www.getcannabrush.com/ for dry trimming your harvests.

[Somatek]

Interesting looking product, looks like the bud needs to be pretty dry for the leaves to be that crispy though but I imagine the trim would make good bubble hash.

[Atom]

You can speed up the process a bit by preping it just after you harvest. You can pull the big leaves off by hand at this stage than you could ever trim them. The will kinda pop off with a little quick snap of the wrist, there’s a sweet spot you’ll find it after doing it a bunch.

 

There’s also the bowl trimmer option. I have bought one for my outdoor and used it for a few years. It worked great, but gave it away because I’ll only be doing FF. I did lots of research and found this one from risentek. It’s much more expensive than traditional bowl trimmer but for good reason

One it’s very heavy. It is made out of food grade stainless steel and it has a CNCed out grate. It stays put while your spinning unlike the other plastic crap trimmers

Two it has very soft silicone fingers. It’s not going to beat up your buds as bad. Some trimmers have stiff fingers and will maime your bud.

Three and probably best is it comes with a grate for dry trim. This is where the trimmer shines. Wet trim it doesn’t do a great job to be honest. But dry it will clean everything and will leave a very nicely trimmed buds. It is going to knock some extra thc off, but it will make for some awesome hash material.

Unfortunately I do not have any pictures to show it in action. If you guys would like I can throw up a link to there site.

[Keith]

Dang man that sounds really great.  I appreciate you explaining it.  I’m going to go check one out.

Edit: that thing looks pretty damn awesome.  And like you said the thc that’s getting knocked off is all being collected.  I didn’t save any of the keef from trimming either time I trimmed.  Though more is being knocked off its all being collected vs less being knocked off but none being collected.

• This reply was modified 1 year, 6 months ago by Keith.

[Atom]

For sure. It’s not really a terrible amount that gets removed but certainly more than hand trimmed. Plus you it’s premo materials for bubble hash.

I would also still hand trim your nice tops. Hard to machine trim those prize colas. Also I know they have a motorized version, I just got the manual one.

[Keith]

I’d prob go with manual too.  Having the control seems better.  I’m still a ways off from having enough need to justify spending the money, but it’s really cool to know the product is out there and seems to work pretty well. What I will be doing from here on out is using bins to store the dried branches which will allow me to trim over the course of a few nights after work.  Staying up until 2am trimming bc I didn’t have anywhere else to keep the pot isn’t going to work.  I did put all the low larfy branches in a box and did them the next day though, which saved me 3 more hours that first night.  Thanks for all the help bro.

[Atom]

An extra day or two probably won’t make much of difference if you can’t get it all in one day. If you end up doing that, you could always go back and dump all the jars and blend them together. That way if some are a bit dryer, it will take some moisture from the ones that you previously trimmed.

I definitely understand not liking trimming, I have bad wrists and joints in my hands from playing video games alot. It’s all part of the process and gotta take good with the bad. I personally hand trim my indoor. It’s not as bad as outdoor less leaves and much denser buds. I just crank up some tunes, roll a bunch and have em ready to go. Pop some Tylenol and grind it out. All part of farming my friend 🙂

[Loves2Trim]

damn good info my friends! Im glad a good wordsmith explained the reconstitution thing. This has been a drying theory of mine since the beginning. Outside dry plus inside wet just seal it up and boom even moisture!

I have a pain in the ass schedule  im a construction worker so I never know when ill be able to get home. So ive developed habits that fit my unforeseen absences.  For instance my dehumidifier, after my harvest is close to drying I set my basement to around 55-60 humidity and my neglect usually goes unnoticed. In theory if my curing jar or grove bag is between 58-62 RH why cant my whole basement amiright?! One of the best buds ive cured was one I accidentally stepped on and threw up on the counter for about 8 weeks!

[Keith]

That’s hilarious.  Maybe I should go check under my dresser from that bud I know I dropped 2 months ago.  I’m a construction worker too and have had to deal with the unpredictable schedule.  The Inkbird helped a lot but that wasn’t until recently.  A lot of the time they’d just get colder and colder until I could get there and shut the ac off after lights out.  I’m at work stressing about it, getting pissed bc I can’t do anything about my plants freezing.

[Brad104]

I’ve been checking out the 16inch trimming bowls on Amazon and it popped up a set of electric trimmers that looked amazing if they work well, believe me when I tell you I know the pain of reaching in there deep inside of the bud to cut that stem off you know!

[Keith]

Man I don’t think I could use electric trimmers, I’m too anal about not touching the buds. Except this last time I had to to get inside to get all the dead leaves out

[Loves2Trim]

I do the deep plunge to nip a leaf off my buds too and it leaves a horrible looking gap everytime lol

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