August 12, 2020
After months of attention and effort in your medicinal plants garden, it’s finally time to finish what you started. Many people dread the process of trimming medicinal plants buds (also known as “manicuring” your medicinal plants), but luckily there are ways to make it more enjoyable and efficient. Knowing the basics before picking up a pair of trimming shears or leaf trimmer machine will help ensure you’ll end up with the perfectly manicured buds that you’re looking for when going in for that first smoke.
Trimming medicinal plants is essential during the harvesting process because it reduces the harshness of the finished product.
Leaves contain more chlorophyll than the flowers (buds), so they will always feel more acidic in your throat when burned. Getting rid of those leaves will make the buds smoother and easier to smoke.
Trimming medicinal plants also improves THC concentration. Leaves, by nature, have a lower concentration of trichomes.
If you leave the leaves on the bud, gram-for-gram there will be fewer trichomes and, as a result, less THC in the finished product. That can affect potency, flavor, and the overall experience of burning down.
How to trim your buds
Set Up Your medicinal plants-Trimming Area
Give yourself plenty of room when setting up your area for trimming medicinal plants. A kitchen table works well in this regard.
Having done this many, many times, we recommend having some type of entertainment on hand. Trimming medicinal plants in a quiet environment can get extremely boring and tedious really quickly.
If you have a large coffee table in front of your TV, clear it off and set up your trimming area there. Or maybe you have a folding table you use for cards or puzzles. Spread your trays and tools there and go to work.
If all else fails, just sit on the floor. That said, you will need to be comfortable because you’re going to be here for a while.
This is a great time to binge watch one of your favorite shows or movie series. Preferably, something you’ve already seen since your attention is going to be on trimming medicinal plants.
Wash your hands and put on a pair of gloves
I prefer latex gloves as they’re sturdy and it feels easier for me to change into a new pair. But any gloves you like will do the trick!
If you don’t use gloves, get some rubbing alcohol ready, because you’ll need it to get all the resin off your fingers once you’re done trimming! Soap and water won’t cut it! You can also save the resin – it’s basically hash!
Use Big Scissors
You first want to start off taking your big pair off shears and cut off one branch; just you can get a feel for the trimming.
Please note that you shouldn’t cut off everything at once.By cutting off the first branch, you have an idea of the size of the branch you would like to work with at a time.
If you are trimming immediately after the harvest, you can harvest the medicinal plants in stages.If in the event that you need to stop trimming for whatever reason, your branches will still be fine for a day or two.
Especially if they are still attached to the plant.So instead of going and chopping off all of your branches at once, work with one branch at a time.
Also, cut them to a comfortable working size and not larger or you may have a hard time handing them.
Remove Large Fan Leaves with Your Fingers
These are the leaves that are easily pulled off by their long stem. Put these fan leaves in a pile to be disposed of later.
Most fan leaves do not have a usable amount of trichomes on them. If you plan to save your trimmings to make hash you may want to put these bigger fan leaves in a separate pile so you can throw them directly away, instead of mixing them in with your trim pile. The big fan leaves add a lot of plant matter that you have to process, but without adding much THC.
Trimming Off Sugar Leaves
Next, you want some of the sugar leaves.Neither this morning that sticks out of the box.You’ll be able to see the tips but not the stems.
These are usually referred to as the sugar leaves they don’t need to be removed only trimmed with the assistance if there sticking out.
Some growers choose to leave the sugar leaves on if they are, did a lot of tri-Combs.Ultimately the medicinal plants growers disagree with this decision because it is believed that extra leaf matter will make your parts hot show when you’re smoking them.
So ultimately lots of growers of the opinion that you should get your see as close to the pillbox as possible.
If you are scared of wasting the try comes on you should leaves, the basing to do save them in a separate trip how we’ll be able to extract the try comes off the lease at a later stage.
Ultimately these trichomes can be used to make caps, but and hash. So ultimately, you’re still getting all of the THC without the added harshness of extremity matter.
Once trimming of the sugar leaves, you should be left with a branch that has trimmed buds on it. So this means you’re getting the hang of it, and you can repeat this process on the remaining branches.
Do your best to ensure that all the trimmings fall into a tray designated for that purpose. So ultimately, you have more trim left to make the hash and less cleanup later.
The actual bud should not be cut off, and if you do it by accident, it’s fine; however, at all times, try to preserve the buds as much as possible.
The trimming process can take a while, depending on how much you end up with.However, if it’s more than what you can handle doing in one day, it’s perfectly fine to harvest your content in stages or over a couple of days.
In cases of buds already been dried, put them in a jar to prevent them from drying out irrespective of whether they are trimmed or not. You can always come back to trim them at a later date.
Your scissors will likely be covered in hash after trimming, but you don’t need to throw that stuff away.It is a concentrated medicinal plants resin. You can cook, consume, or smoke the hash, just like medicinal plants flowers.
What To Do After Trimming medicinal plants
Unfortunately, trimming medicinal plants is only the first step in producing a finished product (i.e., ready to smoke). We know the wait can be hard, but the next step — drying and curing — is crucial if you want a smooth-tasting product with plenty of cannabinoids and terpenes intact.
Drying and curing involves hanging your nugs in a temperature- and humidity-controlled environment for a week or so, then transferring them to storage containers to cure for anywhere from one month to six months.
But wait! That stuff you cut off while trimming medicinal plants is useful too. And it gives you something to do while you wait for the buds to cure. Here’s how you can get the most out of every part of the medicinal plants.
Honestly, there’s so much you can do with the medicinal plants that once you start looking, you’ll be amazed at the awesome things canna-enthusiasts have come up with (smoking meat with the stems!).
Do a little research and try out your favorites.