I had a couple bags that were a bit low. I added a piece of a larger stem to each bag and that brought the humidity back up in range. Thanks for all your help.
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I found these 3 harvests ago and im totally sold on them. They told me about the meter and its been a game changer for me.
@Audiofreak, I have a General Moisture meter also, but a different style, and it also has the calibration cap on it.
I think my biggest problem is that I donāt even try the meter until the buds feels dry enough to my hands or snap test. By then there is not enough moisture in the bud to trigger the meter to turn on the auto read mode at or above 10%. When I use it on damp buds it works fine, but of course I donāt want damp.
While taking pictures of the meter and the auto trigger thing. I think that, I may have swerved into a trick that may help. Just touch the probes with a finger to trigger on the meter. This will give me a few seconds to read the bud, and it will allow me to read below 10% as well.
Sometimes it is the very simple things that give me trouble!
Donāt know that meter. Mine is a very simple o e. A hi and lo scale and thats it. But it has worked flawlessly
Does yours only read when something makes contact with the pins? I think mine is the newer style, and I guess it is a energy saving thing. When you turn it on the display stays dim, and doesnāt go into read mode until the probes make contact with something that is above 10% when in the wood mode. After it goes into read mode I have seen it show as low as 5%.
I get a reading on any material that can conduct electricy. In this case it is reading water in the bud. Could be a piece of wood,concreat ect it measures conductivity. Grove bags did the research and it works. At least for me its more accurate than the snap test.
Donāt get me wrong here I am not saying that moisture meters are crap, and I understand they may work very well for some people. Also I understand how the meter uses electrical conductivity to derive the moisture levels, and that it will try to read anything that is conducive including a finger. I am just saying that mine did not move the meter all that much for me.
You know, it is funny I like my weed trimmed very clean, and stored at 58% humidity. But I donāt like to put much effort into it.
When I was using jars, I would trim after passing the snap test, then burp the jars daily for a couple weeks. I would then put a 58% humidity pack in the jar for storage. I found the 62% packs were too damp for me, and makes the buds too hard to work with.
Along came the Grove Bags! Now it is pass the snap test, trim, and bag. The buds always come out of the Grove Bags perfect.
I have never used hydrometers in jars or bags. Just go by how it feels and works up when it comes out of the container. I am amazed when we are in the camper, and I leave a couple buds on the rolling tray, when the AC is running the buds will become crumbly within a few hours, and when the door is open while the outside is humid the buds will become too damp very quickly as well.
Cant explain your results. All i can say is dry them to the 11% moisture content and put in bags if dried properly they will read 58/62% Rh in the bag the next day. No secret sauce just in bag at 11% and then 1 month to smoke and 2 months for cure. This is 2 seporate events drying, curing.
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I got the same model you suggested and it seems to work much better for me. Readings are not jumping around like the other one I have. I have a GG4 I harvested just a couple nights ago, my final plant, so Iām anxious to use it on this batch. I do have one curious question however. I have some buds currently curing in grove bags reading 62%. I thought I would take my new meter and see what reading the meter would give me, expecting close to 11-12. But it actually came out to 13. Does this mean I should harvest my new batch at 13 or should I still trust the meter and get a reading closer to 11? Iām thinking perhaps even when you hit 11, maybe more moisture still gets released from the stem bringing the humidity back up higher and hence the 13 reading on the meter for buds showing 62%? In other words, maybe a true 11 reading on already cured buds bagged for awhile would be 56% or something, but buds still drying will show 11 but then rise a bit? Hope that is not confusingā¦ but I suspect it might be. Just wondering if my 13 reading is off or it that is what cured bud at 62% probably reads? Have you ever tested buds already bagged and holding steady for a few days?
As i trim once dry and bag only the nugs i cant say about the stemsā¦after thinking a moment Iād remove the stems if i thought they were skewing the results as they dont need to be cured.
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Iām referring to the stems actually running through the middle of the buds. I guess Iām going to maybe bag a few buds when my meter shows 12 and see where they end up after bagged. I suspect they will be too high, but I will still have the majority of my buds still hanging. Iām just paranoid about over drying. I would think under drying is a better thing to fix than having over dried. Iām just too new to the game to have experience as my guide at this pointā¦ but getting better with each batch I do.
If you you do end up too dry. I think it was @Newt had an excellent suggestion, and just exhale your breath into the Grove Bags for a few days. The buds will absorb the moisture from your breath, so easy!
That wasnāt mine. But it should work. I also freeze a few fan leaves in case of an over-dry.
I do that if needed. Just be sure to have had some really good bourbon to add to the terp profile when you breathe in the bag.
FYI, Grove Bags need some room to breathe!
I posted this question awhile back, and received answers that came down on both sides. Of course, I had to learn the hard way, and after cramming about 25 ounce bags in small safe. This started to effect the taste of the weed. The bags need to be able to breathe in good air while breathing out the bad.
I think that having the bags packed too tightly. Caused the existing bags in the safe to breathe in the bad stuff that was coming out of the newer bags.
I moved all of the newer bags to an empty chest freezer with the lid cracked slightly, and the older stuff, about 8 ounces, is still in the safe. Everything seems to be improving now. Not sure if it will return to what it was or not? Also I started using some 1/4 pound bags, and this helps save some room.
This the only disadvantage of the bags, (If you want to call it that), they need as much storage room as jars. I would suggest giving an ounce bag as much room as a quart jar would need.
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