5 Tips to Store and Prolong Your Cannabis

High doesn’t come cheap, even Rocky Mountain high. Whether you buy legit or not, cannabis does not come cheap. But it does have a very long shelf life if you take care of it.

5 Tips to store and prolong your cannabis

1. Location: Assuming you’re not inclined to stash your weed in a sock drawer or under a sofa cushion, you can prolong your cannabis in the right environment.

• Keep it dark. Cannabis does not like bright light or UV rays. So, while glass containers are a good option, you might try finding amber, green, or other colored glass.
• Keep it cool: Some recommend a storage temperature between 10 °C (50°F) and 23.8 °C (74.84°F). But you might shoot for 12.78° C (55° F) to 21.11° C (70° F). Too cool may prolong curling, which can dry out the product, and too high a temperature invites oxidation and mold.
• Keep it dry: “Dry” can be a tough call. You do not want grass to dry its powders, but you don’t want moisture leading to mold. You might add a lemon, an orange, a potato, or a lettuce leaf to your stash to share its moisture, but anything organic can develop mold, so keep it fresh.

2. Container: Flimsy plastic bags create static electricity, which causes weed to deteriorate, so you want to avoid the plastic sandwich bag. (The products listed have been selected randomly and should not be considered an endorsement.)

• Cannador® produces a line of high-end humidors for weed storage. Storage sits at the recommended 55% to 62% relative humidity. Weed rests snugly in canisters inside elegantly finished wood boxes.
• Miron Violet Glass containers come in apothecary or wide-mouth styles. Stylish and decorative, they also protect the contents from harmful light.
• CVault® Humidity Controlled Containers come in a variety of sizes. Made of food-grade stainless steel, they seal airtight with a 0.24-inch silicone seal.
• Cannaline offers best-practice stash jars with thick walls and custom-made seals. They are sold with a 100% full refund guarantee.
• CoolJarz™ sells child-proof containers. The CJ Evolution™ Child-Resistant Extract Containers are silicone-lined to protect the quality.
• Budvac® has an innovative vacuum jar. A pump is positioned on top of the jar lid to extract the oxygen from the container.
• Enjoy Jars promotes a partitioned container to organize and store several strains of cannabis. Containers hold four herbs without mixing product or smell. They come with a mini-Nugtainer and slip into an eco-friendly drawstring bag for travel.

Despite the caution against plastic containers and bags, readily available food vacuum sealers make it easy to package your product and remove all the oxygen before heat sealing the edges. You want to avoid crushing buds with excessive handling or damaging them during the vacuum process.

3. Seeds: Citizens can raise their own cannabis plants in states where use has been legalized. And that may be a specific help to medical marijuana patients. In any case, seeds need careful storage.

• Room Temperature: You can store seeds safely in any appropriate, airtight container at room temperature for several years.
• Seeds will remain viable for a long time if you keep them in sealed containers. So you don’t want to leave the container open any longer than necessary. Seeds will lose their germination potential over time, which is not a short-term worry.
• Refrigerator: The refrigerator is workable if seeds are vacuum-sealed or in airtight containers. If you can avoid moisture buildup in the container, you can store the seeds for years.
• Freezer: Freezing will save well-packaged seeds for a very long time. But freezing is likely to rupture the seed cells. If you’re willing to lose some of the product, there’s no problem.

Commercial farming, harvesting, and distribution will likely use freezer processes for quality’s sake. But, commercial freezing will also have been done with specialized equipment the average user won’t have access to.

4. Oils and Concentrates: Concentrates appeal to the new cannabis demographic. They do not involve smoking and soothe a lot of the edges for those who have been flirting with cannabis use. On their own, they can be extremely THC-potent, so using concentrates needs some coaching.

• Gloves are required because concentrates are very sticky. You want to avoid transferring oils and germs from your hand to the concentrate, which is probably being processed for medical administration.
• Parchment paper is a cheap, easy-to-use surface for handling sticky concentrates. And, when storing the concentrate, you want to set it in a parchment pocket to keep it from sticking to glass or another container surface.

5. Edibles: Cannabis-infused edibles will retain their potency if you handle and store them well. They should be stored in cool, dark, and dry places. 

• Original Packaging: If the packaging is suitable, keeping it in a labeled container will avoid confusion with other pantry items.
• Perishability: Baked goods like infused brownies and breads should last as long as pastries would typically last. They should be used before the “use by” date on the packaging.
• Oils and Tinctures: If frozen in ice cube trays with a touch of herbs, cannabis-infused oils will last longer. Tinctures and butters, too, will last when frozen until needed.

Cannabis is a fragile herb. It breaks apart easily, and its quality is sensitive to cold, light, heat, and humidity. If you are buying it for casual use, it’s convenient to maintain two stashes, one for daily use and one for use sometime down the road.

If you are growing or buying for medical use, you want the discipline of a medical practitioner to ensure product quality and to organize its preparation and use.

Packaging and storing your cannabis carefully will protect your investment and enjoyment and put you in charge of quality control.