Can You Smoke Fresh Weed

Beginner Grow Guide is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. If you click on a link on this site that takes you to Amazon, I will earn a small commission and help keep the lights on at no extra cost to you 🙂

Even if you are a weed expert, you might have some questions about when you should and should not smoke your cannabis. After all, cannabis tends to be a wildly different product depending on when and how it is harvested, so it seems logical to wonder how long after picking it you should wait to smoke it.

While you might know about smoking old weed, you might not know quite as much about fresh weed. Fortunately, there’s plenty of information to be had about marijuana when it is freshly picked.

Can You Smoke Fresh Picked Bud?

Let’s start with the cheap answer here – of course you can’t smoke fresh picked bud because it’s too wet to light. The amount of moisture present makes it impossible for you to actually smoke the product, so you can probably stop worrying about it right there.

What you’re really asking, of course, is whether you can smoke fresh bud if it’s actually dry enough to smoke. Another incredibly cheap – and incredibly accurate – answer here is that you definitely can smoke the bud as soon as it’s off the plant and dry enough to smoke.

The real question, though, is why you’d want to do that. In fact, a little research will tell you exactly why doing so is a waste of a good plant.

Can I Cut A Bud Off My Plant And Smoke It?

Yes, you absolutely can cut a bud off your plant and smoke it as soon as it is dry enough. The problem, though, is that you’re going to have an awful smoking experience if you do this.

When you choose to smoke a fresh bud, you’re not just dealing with water – you’re dealing with the fact that you’re smoking a product that’s low on all of those lovely cannabinoids that makes weed worth smoking. Choosing to pick off a bud and smoke it is essentially like choosing to eat a cookie before it’s done baking – it’s technically a thing that you can do, but you’re really robbing yourself of getting to experience the final product when you do so.

Can I Harvest One Bud At A Time?

Again, we’re at a place where the technical truth is a little bit different than the practical truth. You absolutely can harvest a single bud at a time, as there are certain buds that would naturally develop faster than others.

This is not, however, the best way to harvest. Ideally, you’re going to make sure that you can harvest all of your buds at once because harvesting only a few at a time can really stress the plant out.

This, in turn, is going to slow down the development of other buds and is going to make it hard to get a quality product out of your plant.

Can you smoke fresh weed

This isn’t to say that skilled growers don’t often harvest some buds before others. It’s simply a note that doing so is something that can cause problems for your plant, so you’ll definitely want to think before you start cutting.

Learning how to balance the necessity of cutting now versus the need to wait for the plant to be in the right condition is a skill that comes with time, so make sure that you work on honing that skill.

Why Should the Drying and Curing Process Be Slow?

Drying and curing weed is as much of an art as it is a science. It’s the process not just of getting rid of excess moisture, but of learning how to balance the moisture in your buds so that you can create a pleasant smoking experience.

The big reason why so many people look towards drying and curing slowly as a given is because that’s the way that you have the most control over the process. It gives you a better chance to deal with problems and to make the decisions that you need to make in order to ensure that your final product is perfect for your needs.

Drying or curing fast is possible, but it simply puts too many variables into play at once. You’re almost always better off choosing to go slow.

How Can I Dry My Buds Faster?

What if you do decide that you need to dry out your buds more quickly? There are methods of doing so that will not only help you to get drier weed faster, but that will also ensure that you have as good an experience as you can manage.

While you’re not going to get the control you’d get with a traditional drying and curing process, it’s still worth doing correctly.

Some people absolutely swear by using a microwave or high-intensity lights to dry out their weed, but doing so tends to dry them out a little too rapidly. It might be better to consider using a food dehydrator or even an oven to get the job done, but you should note that doing so will often still lead to weed that’s drier than you might like.

Still, knowing that these options are out there can help you to figure out exactly what corners you’re willing to cut when drying out your weed.

Dangers Of Wet Weed

Wet weed is, in and of itself, not actually all that dangerous. It’s not good, of course, and it’s incredibly hard to smoke, but it’s not going to hurt you. It will taste horrible and it will certainly be a sub-par experience for most, but you’re simply going to end up smoking weed that’s not really ready to be smoked.

The end result may put you off of smoking for a bit, but that’s the worst thing with which you’ll have to deal. The real danger is in smoking moldy weed.

Wet weed is a fertile ground for mold growth, and mold that grows on cannabis absolutely can get you sick. That’s why it’s vital that you carefully inspect your wet marijuana for any kind of foreign growth if you absolutely have to smoke it before it is properly dried and cured.

How To Smoke Wet Weed?

The honest answer, of course, is not to smoke it at all. If you are going to smoke wet weed, though, you’re going to want to do it in the correct manner.

Always start by drying off your weed as best you can. You can store it in rice, which will absorb moisture, or try to dry it off with a paper towel.

Get rid of as much excess moisture as you can before you start smoking so that the experience can at least be mildly pleasant.

Cropped shot front view of young man making marijuana joint

Next, examine the weed. Think about not just what might be growing on it, but how it got wet.

Dropping a little water on your weed isn’t a big deal, but you shouldn’t smoke something that fell into a swimming pool. Using a little bit of common sense will go a long way.

Finally, smoke as normal once you’re sure the cannabis is safe. It’s not going to be your best experience, but it’s safe enough as long as you follow the advice above.

FAQ

How Long to Leave Jar Open When Curing?

One of the most important parts of the curing process is exposing your weed to fresh air. This process not only brings in fresh oxygen, but it also allows moisture to escape – a real must if you’re looking to avoid mold.

As such, you’ll want to let in air for about ten to fifteen minutes at a time every day for about two weeks. Once you pass that mark, you’ll leave the jar open for a minute less every day until you don’t need to leave it open at all.

What Is The Difference Between Drying And Curing?

Drying is, as the term suggests, a process by which you get rid of the moisture in a plant. Curing, on the other hand, is a process by which you’re trying to achieve a perfect moisture level.

In the vast majority of cases, you’re actually going to want to do both. You’ll start by drying out your cannabis so that you can get rid of as much excess moisture as possible, then you’ll finish things up by finding that perfect moisture level that lets you have the best smoking experience through curing.

Conclusion

Smoking fresh weed is a really great example of the difference between whether you can do something and whether you should. While you can smoke fresh weed and it’s not going to hurt you, you’re going to end up wasting weed and you’re not going to have a great time while doing so.

Patience is really a virtue, so take the time to dry and cure your cannabis before you decide to smoke it. Making this choice will allow you to have a much better experience and to get much more out of every plant you grow.

Â