Marijuana Horticulture: The Indoor/Outdoor Medical Grower's Bible

technology from Mila. This information is very useful to process the leaf that is left over after the harvest. Using an everyday washing machine will save hours of labor. Following all the steps and paying attention to the water temperature in this simple process will extract all remaining cannabinoids from the leaves.
    The best bet is to purchase the proper bags that have been tested. Mila and other manufacturers make different bags for outdoor and indoor crops. Plants grown outdoors have smaller resin heads than plants grown indoors and require a smaller mesh bag to collect the resin.

    Use an everyday heavy-duty washing machine.

Fill the “zipped” Ice-O-Lator bag with leaf and place in the washing machine filled with cold water and ice.

Stuffing bags of cold leaves into the washing machine takes a little patience.

Make sure to include plenty of ice so the mix stays below 41°F (5°C).

Turn the machine on and let it agitate for 12 minutes to knock loose and separate resin glands from foliage.

Drain the hash-laden water and strain through an Ice-O-Lator bag.

Remove large Ice-O-Lator bag from the container.

Squeeze excess water from the large Ice-O-Lator bag.

Dry the wet resin.

The dried resin.

Once dry, Colombian hash makers rolled and pressed the hash into a beautiful ball.
    A washing machine filled with cold water is used to agitate the leaf and glands that are located inside of a zipped silkscreen Ice-O-Lator bag. This process separates the resin glands from the green leafy material. Once separated, resin glands fall through the sieve into the washing machine water. The leafy material stays inside the bag. The hash-laden water is evacuated out the washing machine’s drain hose and separated from the water in a simple filtering process.
    The machine is filled with ice and ice-cold water. Cold water is used to keep the resin glands intact and facilitate separation from the leaf. The principle is simple. Resin is oil-based and leaf is water-based.
    First, the Colombians place paper bags of 500 grams of leaf in the freezer for one and a half hours. Cold temperatures make the leaves brittle, which allows them to easily separate from the resin glands.
    Next, the two, one-pound (450 gm) bags of the cold leaves are loaded into a zipped Ice-O-Lator bag. The drum of the washing machine is filled with very cold water. Chunks of ice the size of your fist are added to the water until the desired temperature of 41°F (5°C) is achieved.
    Two zipped Ice-O-Lator bags are loaded into the drum and the machine turned on to agitate for 10-12 minutes. Twobags are used to keep the machine in balance. As the machine agitates the bags, resin glands slip out through the mesh of the bags into the water.
    The next step is to evacuate the resin-laden water out the drain. The drain water is sifted through an Ice-O-Lator bag to remove any remaining leaf. The water is collected in a larger bag placed in a large container. Once all the water is evacuated, they lift the large bag from the container. The “clean” water flowed out the sieve in the bottom of the big bag, and the wet resin stayed in the big bag. They squeeze the last of the water by hand out of the big Ice-O-Lator bag and the resulting unpressed hash is set out to dry. Every one-kilo bag of leaves yields 30-40 grams of dried resin. In a single 14-hour day they can process 100 kilos of leaf and transform it into three kilos of quality resin that is later pressed into hash.
Resin Extraction for Cooking
    Cannabis butter and oil are simple to make. Each takes a little time to make, but large batches can be processed and stored in the refrigerator or freezer.
    The psychoactive cannabinoids dissolve in butter, cooking oil, or alcohol (see “Tinctures” below). Dissolving the resin in the butter, oil, or alcohol makes it available for absorption by the body. Cannabis butter contains about 80 percent of the cannabinoids that were in the original foliage used to make it.
    Heat 1.6 quarts (1.5 L) of water in a large pan on the stove. Add 4 ounces (112 gm) of marijuana leaf, one pound of butter (or margarine) and stir.
    Bring the liquid to a boil. Put the lid on the pot and simmer two hours on low heat, stirring occasionally.
    Strain the mix through a colander, catching the liquid below. Press the wet foliage to get all the liquid out.
    Pour 0.5 quart (0.5 L) of boiling water over the wet leaf to wash out remaining butter. Press the leaves to squeeze out all the liquid