How to grow & harvest your cannabis at home

Growing and harvesting cannabis is just like harvesting other fruits, herbs, and vegetables in your garden. Let’s walk through the steps of doing it yourself at home.

Is there a wrong way to harvest a tomato?

Not really! You’ve probably done this without thinking at the grocery store, or in your garden. You ask yourself, does the color look good? Is it firm, but tending toward softness? When you slice one open, is the aroma intoxicating? A tomato doesn’t have to be perfectly ripe to be amazing, and the flowers on your cannabis plants are the same. It is as easy to know when to harvest cannabis as it is for choosing a ripe tomato.

Cannabis Cues

Like most plants, the following are often important: size, color, aroma, and firmness. As you watch your plants grow, you’ll notice the flowering stalks, called colas, start to change. Their size will grow, they might develop intense colors, and as they become more ‘ripe’ they will be firm when you give them a squeeze and give off an incredibly aromatic scent. If you’re growing Victory, it will smell heavenly sweet and floral.

Cannabis plants have three ‘cues’ that are on the unique side; they will become sticky, they will look frosty, and the little hairs called stigmas will change from a light color to an amber/dried up looking brown. These ‘cues’ are a result of the flowers maturing, producing resin that contains many phytochemicals, including cannabinoids. Each week you should notice your colas become more frosty or sparkly in the sunlight, and more sticky to the touch. When about 50% of the stigmas are white and 50% are that dark amber, your plants are ready. As long as the weather is nice, colas will keep maturing and keep well on the plants, so don’t rush to harvest.

Not the biggest cola in the world, but the little hairs (stigmas) are turning mostly brown, and it is frosty, sticky, and aromatic. Ready to harvest!

When To Harvest

Most cannabis plants outdoors are not ‘ripe’ until the 1st week of October, but remember, just like a tomato, don’t worry about perfection. If it’s the last week of September and a big storm or 3-4 days of rain/freezing nights are on their way, go ahead and harvest. It is better to harvest while the flowers are sticky and beautiful, and mold free. One or two days of rain followed by sunshine is OK, wait it out and check your plants. The latest we recommend harvesting is October 15th for most areas. In summary, start checking your colas the 3rd week of September, see how they become fatter, denser, more aromatic, and sticky. When the weather is right, and sometime before October 15th, harvest!

How to Harvest

Just like you would cut flowers in the garden, cut your cannabis. A clean pair of pruners, a container to put the colas in, and you are good to go. The afternoon tends to be best, as it gives the morning dew time to evaporate so you have drier colas to work with. At this step, you can choose to remove the bigger leaves, called fan leaves. The more leafy material you remove now, the less you have to dry and deal with later. Is there a wrong way? No. You can de-leaf now or later, it is up to you. At this stage feel free to make some butter or other infusions with your harvest, it doesn’t have to be dry to infuse; think fresh rosemary or lavender vs. dried.

How to Dry Your Harvest

Location
Bathroom, garage, guest room, side yard in the shade? These are all options. As long as the space is out of direct sunlight, and 60-70F with 50-60% humidity you will do well. If you would dry persimmons or other fruit there, your cannabis will do great! A small oscillating fan can help with airflow.

Hang or Shelf Dry
Please feel free to use any contraption for hanging your flower colas. Coat hangers, garden fence, trellis, netting, even tomato cages. Whatever allows for some air flow and them to hang freely is great. Removing the flower buds from the colas is also an option. You can strip them off the stalk by hand, and toss all the ‘nugs’ onto a rack, shelf, or an herb-hanging basket. The disadvantage is just aesthetic as the flower will have a flat side. However, the advantage is that it will dry faster off the stem and is a great way to conserve space.

After you shuck the flower off the stem and give it a quick trim, you should have nice flower nugs for storing.

 

When Drying Becomes Preserving

As your hemp dries, give it a check every 2-3 days. Squeeze, smell, get to know how it is changing. If you are in a really warm area, it can take as little as 5-7 days to dry fully. Under ideal conditions, (60-70F with 50-60% humidity) it might take up to 10-14 days. That is ok! As long as it dries and is mold-free, it will be great. When in doubt like all fruit and veg, throw out any moldy parts. When it squishes and feels dry with little bounce back on the squish, you are ready to package it up. Your flower will store indefinitely when stored properly (think high-quality tea) and can be used in many applications.

When you grow your own, you’ll have an abundance of flower to store in your pantry or give as gifts.

 

First, simply take the flower nugs off the stem, and remove as much leaf material as you can with a quick trim. Second, plop the flower nugs into a food-safe container. I love these food-safe pouches for storing flower in my pantry and they make a great gift. Just like for other herbs or teas, tins, glass mason jars, and food-safe containers are the way to go.

Low Down On Burping

I know many on the internet disagree with me, and there is an extensive dialogue online about curing and burping your harvest. Yes, as any plant material ages there will be changes in the aromas and flavors. No, you do not need fancy equipment or a 2-hour lecture to store your flower properly after harvest. Checking your flower is much more important than ‘burping’ it.

For the first few days after packaging, give them a shake, smell, and check. Does it smell fresh and clean? Do the flowers still feel dry to the touch? It is totally ok if some water has traveled from inside the flower nug to the outside it can make your flower damp and squishy. If it feels damp, you can spread the nugs out onto a dishtowel on your kitchen counter and let them air dry for a day or two, and then plop them back in. If anything smells moldy or dank, take out the flower and remove anything that looks suspect and follow the one to two kitchen air dry. Products that regulate humidity in your container are nice (e.g. those desiccant packets you get with certain foods) but are not necessary to preserve high-quality flower at home.

 

Use and Enjoy!

Congratulations, you now have a crazy delicious supply of flower on hand for all of your projects. I hope this gives you the freedom to experiment with new recipes and preparations, and of course, be able to gift to friends and family.

 

About the Author: Emily Gogol, Ph.D. is the Head Gardener at Grow It From Home. Emily has years of experience growing all sorts of plants in urban gardens and is an expert on growing hemp and cannabis at home.