Trimming, Curing & Storing Cannabis for Commercial Use

A huge part of the marijuana flower production process is the trimming and curing that occurs at the end of each flowering cycle. Most commercial grow operations are set up for continuous harvests, meaning a section of a grow room, or sometimes an entire modular grow room, is harvested every few days or every week. Over time, the balance between planting, harvesting, and customer demand is found.

Marijuana cultivation sites all contain trimming rooms where machines and humans remove extra leaf matter from the flowers, sometimes in a wet state, and sometimes dry. There are advantages and disadvantages to both approaches. Wet trimming by hand takes more time, but it retains the resin coating on the cannabis flowers better. Wet trimming machines tend to have less useful waste materials than dry trimming machines because of how the resin gets damaged during the process.

Dry trimming is become more and more common as cannabis production sites grow in size. The dry trimming machines are getting better all the time, but no matter how good they get, the resin content of the final product will always suffer. This is because resin easily breaks off of dry flowers, and even gentle handling will have this effect, so you can imagine how much damage occurs when a dry flower is tumbled around in a machine.

The drying and curing process has its own art and science to it. Certain temperature and humidity ranges must be maintained in order to maintain the integrity of the plant terpenes, and the time it takes to completely dry out a marijuana flower has a drastic effect on how smoothly it smokes.

The storage of dry cannabis flowers must be carefully done in order to maintain consistency in cannabinoid profiles and increase shelf life. High-dollar marijuana cultivation operations use nitrogen storage bags for maximal plant stability, and several humidor-like containers exist that can provide the next best option. The method chosen for storage depends very much on the scale of the operation, along with the turnover rate of the inventory. Additionally, some state regulatory bodies require consistency standards that require extra investment into more advanced storage methods.

Further Reading:

Documentation - Business Plans, SOPs, Tracking Systems, R&D
Site Design - Floor plans, Room Subdivisions, Ease of Access and Use
Security - Internal and External Controls to Minimize Theft
HVAC - Air Quality, Monitoring, Clearance, Temperate and Humidity Control, Co2, Ozone, Fumigation, Fire Safety
Electricity & Gas - Power Usage & Energy Efficiency
Water - Input and Waste Management & Analysis
Equipment - Ensuring the Purchase of Energy-Saving High Performance Equipment & Supplies
Staffing Plans - Workflow Simplification & Error Minimization
Worker Safety, Satisfaction & Professional Development
Pest Management Plans - Quarantines, Visitor & Worker Restrictions, Protocols for Each Pest Type
Plant Material Disposal Plans, Hazardous Waste Management
Site Sanitation Plans
Nutrient Regimens - Standard Protocols, Lab Testing, Modification & Results Tracking
Grow Methods - Flowering, Cloning, Mother Plants, Veg Growth, Seed Production
Supply & Demand Production Management
Quality Control - Lab Testing Finished Materials and Standardizing Systems
Ongoing ROI Analyses