When growing your own weed, harvest is one of the few times of the year when you might ask yourself: “What am I going to do with all this extra weed?”
With an average of a ¼ – ½ pound per plant, or 112-224g at least, even if you only grow a plant or two, you’ll likely end up with more weed than you know what to do with.
You can store and save your buds for later, but chances are they won’t be as fresh as when you harvested them. There’s also a chance you’ll be tired of smoking the same thing after months.
So if you just harvested a bunch of weed plants or find yourself with tons of weed some other way, here are some products you can make if you’ve got too much weed on your hands.
Bubble hash (ice water hash)
Bubble hash is a great, cheap, and easy way to transform extra weed without using chemicals. Also called ice water hash, bubble hash is created by using extreme cold temperatures to break trichomes off of buds and plant material, which are then collected to form hash.
Bubble hash gets its name from how it melts or bubbles, and is rated by its “meltability.” “Full melt” or “six-star” bubble hash is the most refined, and measurement goes all the way down to one star.
To get even a small amount of potent hash, you’ll need a lot of flower. We recommend starting off with at least an ounce, if not more.
Luckily, You can usually buy all the gear you need to make bubble hash for under $100. All you need is:
- Two 5-gallon buckets
- Bubble Bags
- Ice
- Tap water
- Stirring stick
To make it, you’ll soak buds in ice water in a 5-gallon bucket for at least 20 minutes, and then agitate it or stir it around. Then pour the ice water/plant material mixture into a set of Bubble Bags inside of a second 5-gallon bucket.
Bubble Bags are a set of mesh bags, each with a different fineness, or micro grade. Once the ice water/plant material mixture is in the set of Bubble Bags, pull them out one by one to refine and further refine the trichome mixture.
The finer your bags, the more refined your bubble hash will be.
Read more on ice water or bubble hash here.
Rosin
Rosin is another great concentrate you can make at home that doesn’t use chemicals. Using heat and pressure, rosin is made by pressing buds between two heated plates and collecting the hot oil that oozes out.
You can make rosin with a curling iron and some parchment paper, squeezing buds until they crackle. Or you can invest in a rosin press, which will set you back a few hundred bucks. Presses usually come with a device to pack flower into little pucks, which are then pressed.
After pressing, remove the squeezed weed from the parchment paper, scrape off some rosin with a dab tool, and load it into your favorite dab rig.
Learn more about how to make rosin here.
Cannabutter
Edibles are great for consuming weed without smoking or vaporizing. To make them, break down your weed to create more surface area, decarb it, and simmer in butter. The THC will bind with the fat in the butter, and then use that cannabutter to make whatever you want: brownies, cookies, cake, and more.
You’ll need:
- 7-10g weed
- 1 cup butter
- 1 cup water
- Cheesecloth
To decarb (or decarboxylate) your weed before simmering, heat it at a low temperature for about 30 minutes. The heat will activate the weed by turning THCA into THC, which will get you high. When smoking, this is done with your lighter; when making cannabutter, it’s done with an oven.
After decarbing the weed, simmer it in butter and water for a couple of hours and then strain it through some cheesecloth. Let it solidify and then throw it in any baked good you want. When eating your creation, remember: start low and go slow.
Learn more about making cannabutter here.
Using a similar process, you can also make cannabis coconut oil. You can cook with it, add it to food, and even use it as a topical.
Cannagar
Nothing says “I have too much weed for my own good” like a cannabis cigar. A modern take on a Thai stick, you’ll probably want several friends to help you finish this dense log of weed.
To make one, you’ll need a special mold: for example, this one by Purple Rose Supply. Grind up about 2-3 grams of weed and pack it into the mold, which has a stick through the center of it. Let it sit and solidify for a while and then pull the stick out to allow for airflow.
You can wrap it with a blunt wrap or any rolling papers you like. If you want to be real classy, save a couple of fan leaves from your harvest and wrap it in those.
To give it more of a Thai stick feel, you can also douse it in hash oil or another concentrate before you wrap it to really kick it up a notch.
Tinctures
Weed tinctures are the ultimate in discretion—they don’t smell, and you can just put a couple drops under your tongue for fast-acting effects. This product takes a little longer to make, but will last you a long time.
Tinctures can be made by soaking flower in high-proof ethanol alcohol (like everclear or moonshine). We recommend an ounce of weed per 750mL bottle of alcohol, or about 3.5g per 3 fluid oz.
You’ll have to decarboxylate your weed first, as in the cannabutter example above. After it’s decarbed, put it in a mason jar with the alcohol for a few weeks and shake it once a day. Strain it through a coffee filter when done.
You can also make weed gummies with your tincture.
Learn more about tinctures here.
Bonus product (while harvesting): Finger hash
While trimming your harvest and handling plants, resin will build up on your hands and you can collect it and smoke it. An old form of this is called charas—weed farmers in India would get resin on their hands while tending their crops and roll it into balls of hash to smoke.
Some people stay away from it because it can be harsh, but if you can’t wait until your weed is dried and cured, finger hash is a quick way to get high and you’ll get the most out of your harvest.
Weed storage tips
For all the rest that you can’t smoke, press, or infuse, be sure to store it properly. Keep it in airtight containers in a cool, dry place, out of sunlight. You can use a Boveda pack or similar product to control humidity levels.
And always remember: label anything you store unless you want to surprise your future self with some mystery weed.
