how to harvest????

ok, this is probably a dumb question, but how exactly are you supposed to harvest the buds? i mean do you have to wait til the end of the flowering period to start harvesting or what? also are the plants still good afterward???

There is even an FAQ on this subject covered in the dry & cure your buds.

Did you check the grow FAQ?

I'm stoned and dont mind answering if your lazy and dont wanna look. Theres a bunch of ways to do it but to each their own... I have two methods that work nicely. To answer your question though, it depends on how you harvest. You can sit there and prune away ALL budsites from teh plant and cut it back some then revert to 24/0 and save your plant... it takes awhile but your plants usually donot bloom quite as large as the orig. (this is information ive read in grow bible books - i personally have never done it.) And no, you snip stems and clip away.

Imma do this as a 3 part post for pic reasons... this being first post ;)

This was NL. And true to NL - last 2 weeks of her life she herm'd on me w/ a few last min male flowers. No seeds though, and amazing plant! Stinky tho despite everyone's misconception of "low odor" :P

Anyway, here I chop em... clip away all the fan leaves... tie em up... then hang em upside down in the dark w/ a lil air circulation. Check on em every couple days, youll know when they're dry. Good smokin then as of that point on -- or cure it in a jar. Or both, I cure as I smoke <3

Or another method is to cut them and manicure them like so... then you place your herb spread out on a sterilite lid in the dark. You can chop up (I like doing with some while fresh for joints and such, then I also get scissor hash :) ) Or leave it it buds, which is good for pipes and bongs imho. Rotate your buds every other day and stir up your pile some. Again, youll know when its dry. Then again.... smoke or cure :)

Also, your looking for when about 70% of the stigmas are brown... least I do. :thumbsup:

Hairs mostly brown is a good sign, but depending on the variety, this could be off. You need to buy a pocket microscope at radio shack for $8 and look at the trichromes (search if you don't know about this but check the spelling). How dopy do you want to be? Harvest when they are mostly clear and you will have a more clear high. Harvest when they are amber and you will have more of a dopy narcotice couch high. Experiment to find what you like. I usueally go for a few amber ones, but mostly cloudy.

I just cut mine down, hang them upside down so they are not touching (no mold please) in a cool dark place. In about a week when the branches snap when bent, I go ahead and manicure and vacume pack and freeze.

Send me some please. I'm down to shake for the next 4 weeks.

When you harvest, you want to manicure the buds, removing the leaves. This allows for quicker drying overall, since there is less plant matter to retain moisture. Then, you use the trimmed leaves and make hash with it. You *do* want to make hash, don't you?

:D