Eliminate Weed Odor--But Protect Those Terpenes!

Grow Room Smell: Friend or Foe?

At Cannabusters, we’re all about getting rid of weed smell in the air--but we also know that terpenes are the key to a good weed harvest. If you’re just starting out in the cannabis industry, or if you’re a hobby grower looking for ways to improve your process, it’s important to do your research before you start. It’s easy to get focused on removing smell from the air around a facility and forget the most important part of all:

Terpenes are your friend!

The cultivation process should never involve your terpenes getting destroyed. Here are some ways to make sure you preserve the terpenes on your plants, no matter how you choose to eliminate your grow room smell.

What Makes Weed Smell?

First, what are terpenes? Along with CBD and THC, terpenes are a compound, and one of the defining--and most recognizable--elements of the cannabis plant. Love it or hate it, the skunky, musky cannabis smell is what defines the experience of smoking, and like wine, connoisseurs can differentiate strains by their taste and smell. 

The many different types of terpenes are generally divided into two categories: primary terpenes, which determine the plant’s overall smell, and secondary terpenes, which layer and nuance the odor.

Besides the pleasure it provides consumers, the odor produced by terpenes in cannabis serves many other purposes, including protecting the plant from pests. Terpenes’ benefits also include part of the psychoactive effects of cannabis, and their preservation or destruction during growing, harvesting, drying or curing can make or break the experience for consumers--as well as the grower’s reputation.

Know Your Enemies: How To Preserve Terpene Smell During Harvest and Drying

Terpenes are present through all stages of a cannabis plant’s life, and they are even visible to the naked eye in the form of trichomes. These are the tiny, hair-like filaments that cover buds and leaves, giving them an icy look. Trichomes produce terpenes, so a good rule of thumb is to be very gentle with them. Even roughly handling a plant can burst the trichomes, releasing the terpenes’ smell onto your hands or the surface which brushes the bud.

Luckily, there are a number of ways to preserve terpenes when drying and growing to prevent your buds losing their smell before the harvest. 

Be sure to not expose your drying plants to light, heat, over-handling, or excessive periods of time between the phases of production. This rule actually doesn’t only apply to terpenes, but also to the preservation of several types of common herbs. Terpenes are found in many popular cooking spices including thyme, turmeric and rosemary, as well as in fragrant flowers like lavender. 

Preserving terpenes is essential to maintaining the taste, color and texture of herbs, and exposing them to light and heat while drying inevitably robs the final product of its flavour and intensity. The same goes for cannabis. Keeping your drying plants in a cool, dark place with consistent humidity levels will ensure that the terpenes don’t get destroyed.

How To Save Terpenes AND Eliminate Weed Odor

It’s essential that you don’t let weed smell take over and escape your facility, bothering your neighbors and potentially creating problems for you and for your business. However, it’s just as important to make sure that your plants are healthy, happy and ready to deliver an optimal experience for your consumers.

Whatever solution you choose to eliminate weed odour, it has to work for both you and your plants. Cannabusters are a guaranteed way of eliminating odors as they escape your facility, with no effect on your plants or their terpenes. It’s safe for you, for your plants and for the environment--best of all, beyond just delivering odorless air, it delivers clean air.

Ready to find the best odor control solution for your workspace and your plants? Cannabusters offer turn-key weed odor control solutions. Contact us today to get a quote.