How To Run A Test Wash

The Technique Of Test Washing Your Flower Before Running A Full Wash

What is a Test Wash?

So you have just cropped your harvest and have either freshly frozen the whole plant (whole plant fresh frozen, wpff) or cured and dried your cannabis and now you want to make some hash. A noble endeavor indeed! Unfortunately, not all cultivars are worth being washed. From flower to hash rosin, the best cuts can yield about 5-6%. This means that a pound of wpff will, at most. yield you around an ounce of hash rosin. Although your harvest may look wonderful and smoke fantastically, if it only yields 1-2%, it is not worth it to wash. 

The test wash is used to give yourself an idea of how the full wash will yield before you commit. It is simple to do and can save you from washing a plant that is not worth washing. You do not even need bubble bags or rosin bags. All you need is cold water, ice, a known quantity of flower (usually about 14 grams), and a glass mason jar with a lid. Inspecting the results of the test wash will help you determine if you want to proceed with the full wash. Using this relatively small amount of flower for a test wash can save the rest of the flower from going through a low yielding wash. 

How to Test Wash Flower

You can run a test wash in about 15-30 minutes with just a few simple materials. You will need enough cold water and ice to fill a large glass mason jar about ¾ of the way. Make sure you have a lid for that mason jar. The last thing you need is a known amount of starting material. We usually use 14 grams of flower. 

Pro Tip: Use the same amount of flower every time so you can begin to develop a baseline for what indicates good wash potential

To begin, make sure your mason jar is clean and free of contaminants. Now, fill it up about ¾ of the way with CLEAN water and ice. Throw in your flower then cap it. Let the flower material soak in the mason jar for 5-10 minutes. If you are using cured material rather than fresh frozen, you can soak for a few minutes longer to fully rehydrate the flower.

Now you shake the heck out of that jar. You really want to agitate the flower in there to knock as many trichomes off as you can. Do not be afraid to really give it a good shake. Do this for about 10 minutes. Finally, let the mixture sit until all the hash has settled on the bottom of the mason jar. Now you can inspect it and decide if that plant is worth washing. 

How to Test Wash Flower: Good Wash Indicators 

After vigorously shaking your mason jar then letting it settle, you should see the bottom of the jar lined with yummy trichome heads. You will probably also notice some plant material in there as well. Generally, if the bottom of the jar is completely covered in hash and the layer is a bit thick, this is a really good indicator that you have a plant that will wash well. Notice the color change of the water as well. This is another good indicator that your starting flower is filled with terpene-containing trichomes. 

If you really want to get into it, you can filter out the water and plant material using a nylon mesh micron bag (like a rosin bag or bubble bag). You can then weigh the remaining hash and see what your yield is from flower to hash.