Greetings DGC from small town Ontario,
As the title says, I was wondering if anybody knew what the role of oxygen was in both the drying and curing phases. Is oxygen necessary, beneficial, harmful, or irrelevant? Can we dry and cure in an oxygen free area, like a cabinet, by placing those oxygen absorber packs in there? Or would that be a bad idea?
Thanks and keep up the good work guys.
You can dry in an oxygen free environment like in a vacuum. But that’s not what you’re really doing. Oxygen molecules can come in many forms. The more oxygen ions chained together, the more “predatory” the molecule becomes. O3 is known as ozone and that’s going to oxidize the trichomes at at much faster rate. When trichomes outer waxy shell hardens during curing, it’s because of oxidation. That’s what “curing” is. There’s only small amounts of ozone in the air naturally. I wouldn’t particularly use an oxygen absorber pack (iron powder) to trap oxygen and moisture unless the air in the drying space had a RH over 65%. You don’t want the air too dry (under 55%) during the drying process. that’s why I’d be careful doing this in a small confined area.
I always heard microbes help to break down the plant material during the dry. Ones that use oxygen. When you remove the oxygen anaerobic microbes can take over and off gas ammonia. But like jmystro mentioned it is also required to oxidize the waxy layer on the trichome heads(seals in the good stuff) to insure their survival before they get turned into smoke/vapor.
Here’s an interesting article.
https://darkheartnursery.com/from-the-garden/drying-and-curing-cannabis/
Awesome, thanks guys, that answered it nicely. I’ll probably avoid doing that at least until the cure is done, but might still experiment with a jar.