how "bad" will my harvest stink up my house?

i have 5 plants, the tallest is 52", the shortest is about 42". using some friends advice, who had previously worked for a local caregiver, the conservative estimate as of yesterday is i'll yield at minimum 1 lb.

i have a big house, roughly 5200 sq ft, but my closet/dresser are my only real options - outside of drying at a friends.

i ask because i have a family member who has young kids who come by now and again, and i try to keep this away from them, for fear that they'll a) tell the wrong someone, or b) get into my shit.

if i dry my shit in my closet, am i going to stink up the whole house for a few weeks, before i can start curing in mason jars?

just looking for some advice from someone experienced (this year will be my first successful harvest)

thanks!

i used to grow in an apartment, about 900 sq ft. they stunk up the whole apartment, hallways, and a fair amount of the parking lot for about a week.

in the house i grow in now (about 1300 sq ft with decent front and back yard) you can still smell it walking down the street, but only for a few days. after a week you can probably jar.

thanks for that info, gave you +rep.

my nephew decided to pull a dumbass, and got caught smoking a joint on high school property, so now CPS is involved there, and i gotta keep it away from him in the event he decides to tell his friends, or worse, his caseworker...

my house is pretty big, but my closet is not. is there any way, outside of good ventilation, to minimize the scent of drying ganja? i'm assuming 10-15 days before i can pack em into jars.

carbon filter and negative pressure?

helheim said:

i have 5 plants, the tallest is 52", the shortest is about 42". using some friends advice, who had previously worked for a local caregiver, the conservative estimate as of yesterday is i'll yield at minimum 1 lb.

i have a big house, roughly 5200 sq ft, but my closet/dresser are my only real options - outside of drying at a friends.

i ask because i have a family member who has young kids who come by now and again, and i try to keep this away from them, for fear that they'll a) tell the wrong someone, or b) get into my shit.

if i dry my shit in my closet, am i going to stink up the whole house for a few weeks, before i can start curing in mason jars?

just looking for some advice from someone experienced (this year will be my first successful harvest)

thanks!

Click to expand...

Drying certainly brings out the smell, but I'd say more so the cutting. That fresh smell of trimmed bud, jesus after a few plants gives me headache and seems to stink for a decde. If you air it out right smell should be out in a few days. Try keeping the door to the room you're drying/trimming in closed and then air out that room. use air freshners and stuff, otherwise let the air flow and enjoy the smell. Also not sure what kindda plants you got but 3oz per plant is decent/good yield.

no clue on the strains, was all gifted bagseed.

here's my journal for this growing season.

https://www.rollitup.org/blogs/blog30508-my-organic-outdoor-photographic-journal.html

all very fruity, although one of the indicas has a 'minty' smell to it.

it's either chop, trim and dry here, or cut everything down, bag it up, and drive 20 miles to a friends house. that only adds to the possibility of getting pulled over, and i don't like the idea of bagging freshly cut plants to stick em in a hot trunk for a long-enough road trip.

guess i'll have to tape up the vents, put a towel under the door, and get some strong scented candles. and pray for no unwanted guests. bummer man.

as some already did mention, get a small 4" ventilation and carbon filter to fit and mount it in your closed (will also help air circulation that will keep mold/mildew away from your drying plant`s)

another option is a Ozone generator



mount that in the room with the closed and Im sure 99% of any smell is removed before it even get near the rest of the house


a air refreshner with a 4th filter on (active carbon) is also a option




last there is the "cheap" way, Ona gel, place a few jar`s in the room near the closed and around the room/house




do some more research, lots of options out there to cover/mask the smell

mmm yeah, most everything i am seeing other than that gel stuff is in the 100+ $ price range, which is way outside my budget. as in, 100+ $ more than i have to spend.

i suppose i should have stated that more plainly, but there is a reason i grow outdoors, organically: it fits the budget.

i only asked because i need to know, not because i'm trying to be a dick or anything. i can't chance potentially having state agencies (CPS, etc) intervene in my operation due to a smell.

I stinks up pretty badly if you don't got no filter or anything, if someone was to walk in your house they would know your growing. Carbon filter is the only way man,..

Well, with that new information, NO budget for ventilation, I would suggest the following. Buy a gallon bucket of Ona Gel $30-35. On the day you cut and bring the buds into the house open up the Ona and place in small containers around the house and as much as you can in the room and closet.

Next, check the humidity in the closet. If it's around 40% you are looking at only 3-4 days of hang drying. If it's higher than 50% buy a small de-humidifier for under $50 (still in your budget). Hanging bud doesn't smell as strong as living flowering plants. The Ona gel in the closet should do a good job.

Here is a couple other suggestions. Harvest day, when you are trimming all the branches and leaves is when the house will smell the worst. I do all my cutting and hanging then I flush the house. I turn on the fan on the central heat and air if the house. Then I open every window and turn on all fans. After about an hour the house will be flushed of the strong odors from trimming. If you can do this on a breezy day it's better and faster. And think about doing it in the middle of the night when most neighbors are asleep and not walking their pets!

You need a good three day window when you are "out of town" and can't have any visitors. Once in the jars, nothing to worry about. Throw all the fan leaves and trimmings into a paper bag or freezer bag and place into the freezer. All the trimmings can be made into dry ice hash in about 5 minutes. It's fast setup and clean up with out the time investment in bubble or butane. Just need to source the dry ice locally and a 160 micron bag is about $20. Think you would still be in your budget and you would have some tasty hash.

Good luck!

There is no way getting around the smell, trimming smells way stronger than drying and will stink up the place like you can't believe. When I trim I have a big carbon filter with a 6" fan sitting on top scrubbing the room, when the job is done everything goes on a drying rack in a tent with the filter/fan combo in the tent. I dry for 10 days slowly bringing down the humidity over that time and keep little tubs of Ona gel around and it's still noticeable when people come over however I usually just blame the smell on the dogs getting into the compost bin. Growing takes time, money and effort, when you finally get to harvest you want to make sure you get the dry/cure right while making sure you don't alert the neighbourhood to your clandestine activities.

Don't do the crime if you can't afford to do the time... Either Don't answer the door until your weed is dry. Or find somewhere else to dry it...

Febreze plug in outside the room drying in, drying room closed in with any surrounding rooms with plug ins

prosperian - thank you for that post, +rep given!

i already have a set of bubble bags and i built a custom dry sieve with a 70 micron screen, and i might grab a 40 micron screen too if i can scrape together a few extra bux between now and the middle of october; 2 x 2's + staple gun = the right price. dry ice at the local grocery store is easy enough to come by.

i have never smelled this ona stuff, are there different 'flavors'? are we talking about urinal cake type smell?

i'll expand a bit more too. the room i'm considering using is a spare bedroom downstairs, in a daylight basement. i'd likely use the closet, which is your standard issue ~6.5' high x 3' deep, with those 'accordion' folding doors. the room has a window near the closet, perhaps 4 feet away. that rooms door leads out to a room which is more than 1500 sq ft, which connects directly upstairs.

if i can confine the scent to the downstairs area, i think i'll be ok. i can vent out the window with a box fan. oh, also, i live in the sticks, literally. my 1 'neighbor' is an alfalfa farmer, and the next closest house is ~100 yards away.

thanks for all the advice!

Are you legal? If not, then its worth bearing in mind that smell is probably THE biggest risk factor in any grow. Apart from snitches perhaps..

If cops ever had to knock on your door for a routine enquiry or wrong address, I guarantee that having a carbon filter and fan would make that much less of a brown trouser day than if you're using open windows and ona gel to deal with the smell....just sayin

helheim said:

prosperian - thank you for that post, +rep given! i have never smelled this ona stuff, are there different 'flavors'? are we talking about urinal cake type smell? ...if i can confine the scent to the downstairs area, i think i'll be ok. i can vent out the window with a box fan. oh, also, i live in the sticks, literally. my 1 'neighbor' is an alfalfa farmer, and the next closest house is ~100 yards away. thanks for all the advice!

Click to expand...

If you are out in the sticks you will be fine. Vent out the window with a box fan and place some cardboard around the window opening. Put a piece of plastic draped at the downstairs opening until you jar the bud. This will create a negative pressure in the lower part of the house and will help keep the smell from creeping upstairs. Easy.

The Ona smells "fresh" only way I can describe it. It doesn't smell like anything, especially not urinal cakes. They have "Linen" also available but I use the original "Pro" stuff. Unless you stick your nose in it no one will know your scenting the room.

Save your nickels for a quality carbon filter and fan. It will last a couple years and is a worthwhile investment. I run a Phresh filter. (pics are here: https://www.rollitup.org/members/prosperian-552192/albums/equipment-30859/ click)

Good luck and thanks for the rep bump!

MajorCoco said:

Are you legal? If not, then its worth bearing in mind that smell is probably THE biggest risk factor in any grow. Apart from snitches perhaps..

If cops ever had to knock on your door for a routine enquiry or wrong address, I guarantee that having a carbon filter and fan would make that much less of a brown trouser day than if you're using open windows and ona gel to deal with the smell....just sayin

Click to expand...

nope. although i can get my card quite easily, i have issues putting my name on a list. especially given the number of legitimate caregivers in my area who have been raided by feds.

it's kinda funny (to me), because my shit is literally right out in the open. the farmer cruises by the fence on his ATV to check his pivot sprinkler thing in the field all the time. i know the neighbors, relatives of a high school classmate, and they are cool. it's the nephew and his issues i have to worry about mostly.

i'm so far off the beaten path, unless i need to call the cops myself (which i would never do, because fuck the police), they'll never show up here. even friends have a hard time finding their way out here, if they haven't been here before. lost many friends to the prescription drug/meth addiction pandemic that's sweeping my area, so my social circle is very limited. i keep it that way on purpose.

i do appreciate all the info from everyone, it's my first harvest, so this is all new to me. sorry for being the 'noob'.

Great question for us other Noobs to read!

I was planning on drying in a closet with a fan, Now I think I will buy a second tent, fan filter and dehumidifier to use as a drying spot.
My current tent would become my dry/trim tent.
I would like to get a slightly larger tent to continue to Flower.

About 400 bucks to have a controlled environment so smell is a greatly reduced issue sounds like a good investment.

I also have an inexpensive Ozone generator, I keep it with my air handler when I open my room.
I run the ozone generator for 20 minutes and the house smells like a doctors office.

If someone asks about ozone smell I tell them its for my allergies.

Ozone is poisonous if not used properly, be safe!

for now dry and trim somewhere else If you can't afford the odor.

drying elsewhere is an option, but with it comes the risk of transporting 5 chopped plants through a densely populated area with plenty of po po. i think in my situation it's either find a way to utilize the space that i have, or roll the dice and bag everything up, run through town and get it to a friends ASAP, without getting pinched.

i suppose, if the price is right, i could always try and get one of my friends who has their card to do the road warrior bit for me? in MT it's 6 plants/person, and i only have 5. i guess that's not a terrible option.

you'll be ok bro. just dry you're buds, and jar them. complicated thoughts, make complicated actions