medica marijana

Sold: Starting a Medical Grow Business

Before starting a medical grow business, you need to do a ton of research.

Federal, state and local laws create a vast web of interconnecting rules that are unique to each medical grow (even if they are in the same city and industry). Navigating this miasma is both arduous and tedious by design but is also vital to remaining in business. The best place to start is with your states official rules.
You can’t simply put some seeds in backyard dirt or throw thousands of dollars around and expect to get anything competitive out of it. And this is a competition. The time, effort and skill needed to get a plant from seed to sale is a skill that can be developed over several years. A skilled hand can take a good strain and make it great while an unskilled grower can kill everything.

But it takes more than growing the dankest buds to survive.

Growing great herb is a prerequisite to a business based around growing weed. But equally important is the ability to manage costs and duplicate results. It doesn’t matter how much you can sell your product for. If it costs more to produce than what you get, it isn’t a viable business.
“Even if you get your costs under control, you still have to worry about duplication. If you can’t produce the same product every time, you have a problem.” Mike Boynton, the master grower for Oregon Imperial farms told me in an interview. “Changing anything in the environment from fan placement to light duration will change how your plants grow and therefore your bottom line.” The more people and the bigger the farm, the harder it is to control costs. If you can’t get it under control with 5 plants, you will never be able to with 5000.

The Marijuana industry is an especially challenging one.

Getting a business off the ground in the weed industry is a lot harder than most other industries. Cannabis is one of the oldest crops known to man and you can bet there are a lot of talented people out there trying to do it better and cheaper than you. Besides having to deal with the standard problems of location and competition, cannabis businesses are heavily regulated and lack traditional support infrastructure like banking services.
Marijuana businesses lack the ability to use banking services because it remains federally illegal. This is not to say that banks refuse drug money. SBC was fined $1.9 billion by the U. S. government for laundering cartel drug money in 2012. Yet the cannabis industry is forced to work on a cash basis regardless of how big the costs.

There are a variety of rules regarding how to grow legally.

With over half of the nation having legal weed in one form or another on a state level, there have been many ideas about what should be allowed. Each state has taken different measures to ensure a safe and effective cannabis industry. Some states require seed to sale tracking and vertical integration while others prohibit delivery or drive-thu services.
In addition to rules and regulations about where and how to provide services, there are also rules around what kind of equipment is needed in order to get a license. This further compounds the complexity with many states have a different set of rules for medical grows and recreational operations. As an example, Washington merged their medical grow and recreational grow rules for a single comprehensive program while Oregon kept them separate.

After all, growing weed isn’t cheap.

Even in places with ideal growing conditions like Northern Cali, Florida or Hawaii, plants still need water, nutrients and protection from pests/diseases. In areas where the weather is too dry or cold, growing indoors becomes a necessity. The cost of equipment pales in comparison to the cost of keeping the growing environment perfect.
In addition to lights; pumps, timers, fans, filters and air conditioners all use electricity. Keeping the juice flowing can be a challenge in itself. Grows with more than one room may even need to have a more powerful line run by the electric company to keep from blowing transformers. All of these little additions add up quickly and can quickly eat up all the potential profit.

A lawyer, an accountant and a lobbyist walk into a grow room.

If you plan to operate a successful company growing a federally illegal substance, you need to have some specific talent on your team. This team needs at least a lawyer, an accountant and a lobbyist to run interference while the head grower does their work. Without someone covering each area, the chance of getting blindsided is astronomical.

Lawyer

Find someone who specializes in canna-based business compliance and criminal cannabis defense. Ask others in your area who they recommend. Don’t forget to check online databases like www.martindale.com, www.avvo.com, www.justice.org to name a few.

Accountant

Look for someone with experience in the industry. Overly “creative” accounting can get you in hot water so make sure you can trust them. In addition to searching online for local tax professionals, ask colleagues for referrals. Asking others in your area who they use and why is also a great way to narrow the search for the right accountant.

Lobbyist

Look for someone with the time and energy to represent your cause. Their job is to keep an eye on local and statewide changes that pertain to your business. They are also there to help prevent others in the community from effectively banning your business or engaging in sneaky tactics to close you down. There are no lists/registries for this, gotta tap into that network to find the right person..

Head Gardener

Look for someone with botany experience. Many master gardeners hang out in local hydro stores or are at least known by them. Don’t be afraid to ask questions and be picky. This is the person who will dictate the initial and final quality of the product and choosing the wrong person can have dire consequences.

Skipping the support staff can have dire consequences.medical grow

Many states ban the operation of any marijuana based business (including a medical grow) within a certain radius of schools. But most states don’t ban schools from opening near a marijuana businesses. There is normally nothing explicitly stopping a preschool from opening next to a dispensary or grow location and putting you out of business.
A good team is the difference between closing up shop or staying open for years. It does you no good to spend millions of dollars on a medical grow business just to have a preschool open next door a week later and shut you down. Better to have the staff on hand to stay open and deal with the issue before it gets finalized than not.

You need to find just the right spot.

Besides schools randomly popping up, there is a lot to consider when starting a grow business. The first thing most growers work out is where they plan to grow. Most medical grows are done on a personal consumption scale. If the plan is to make it profitable, it takes a bit more consideration.
Because cannabis remains federally illegal, landlords are almost as hesitant as banks are to work with weed entrepreneurs. Even in the case of a medical grow, it can be almost impossible to get permission to start. In most cases, growers need to own the land/building they plan to operate in or receive written permission from the land owner before getting licensed.

Security is a major concern as well.

Each state has very specific rules on which types of security are needed for a medical grow to remain in compliance. States may require barriers like walls be erected around grow sites. They also might require closed circuit cameras linked to cloud backups but it depends.
Whole sectors of the economy have been dedicated to the outright eradication of cannabis for decades (I’m looking at you Big Prison, Pharma and Tobacco). As cannabis moves from illicit trade to regulated market, there is bound to be pushback from entrenched interests. Even a medical grow can face opposition from local religious or political groups that don’t like cannabis.

The market is growing.landrace 2

More and more people are getting in on the Green Rush and starting to grow cannabis. Like the Gold Rush that sparked westward expansion, the hype and obvious wealth being generated is causing a migration of talent and willpower. Fortunes are waiting to be made by talented and driven individuals willing to put in the work.
In the end, most of the states where weed has been legalized were ballot measures which means they were supported by voters. With the majority of the population clearly supporting cannabis reform, cannabis is primed to continue growing for years to come. Getting a good team will make every other part of the process easier.

Do you agree?

Or do you think I’m off my rocker? What advice would you give to someone just getting started? What do you wish you knew before starting a medical grow? Let us know in the comments down below. We would love to hear your take. And as always, thanks for reading.

Concentrates and Extraction Techniques

Concentrates are becoming a major player in the cannabis industry.

The word “Concentrates” often refers to the wax you vaporize, the tincture under your tongue, and your orally administered CBD oil. The potency of these cannabis products is steering consumers toward the more concentrated forms of weed. This is especially true as the therapeutic potential of non-smoking consumption is becoming better known.
People around the industry are taking notice of the meteoric rise in popularity of concentrates. OpenVape CEO Ralph Morgan believes cannabis concentrates will be more popular than smoking buds in the coming years. “I see concentrates becoming a part of folk’s daily regimen,” Morgan said in an interview.
The Cannabist’s concentrates expert Ry Prichard agreed with Morgan’s statement and his timeline. “Most of the clients that I work with have seen their sales go from 20 percent to 30 percent to 40 percent and now they’re about even,” Prichard said, “and a lot of shops, especially on the boutique end of the spectrum, are 70 percent concentrates.”

Concentrates make up a large segment of the current market.

Under the rubric of cannabis concentrates falls anything created through an extraction process. Solvents like butane, propane and CO2 strip the active compounds from the cannabis plant. Solventless processes also exist that can produce increadibly high concentrations as well.
Some types of extracts test in the 70-80% THC, while others are instead rich in non-psychoactive compounds like CBD. There are a lot of intricacies to cannabis and new methods of extraction are being developed regularly as the market expands. Here is a quick rundown of the most popular products the average consumer can buy that fall under the rubric of “concentrates”.

Solventless Extracts

Many solventless extractions are offered in less stable, sappy forms. Their color can vary from a golden opacity to a darker amber depending on production factors. Cure time and starting material play a big role in dialing in these nuances.
Heat, pressure, and exposure can impact the consistency of these products. Higher temperatures tend to create stable products that more resemble shatter, whereas lower temperatures often produce sappier, less stable products. Both high and low temp products appear on dispensary shelves these days and have begun to form respective niche markets.

Kief


Also known as dry sift or pollen, kief is made up of the resin glands called trichomes on cannabis flowers. These glands produce the terpenes and cannabinoids that bring the diversity of flavors and effects to cannabis. Kief is often used to make hash and is commonly collected in a grinder. It is normally sprinkled onto flower cannabis or vaped directly for a more potent high than smoking flower alone.

Rosin


Rosin opened the door for several different new products. Solventless shatter, a type of rosin that maintains a glass-like consistency, may resemble butane hash oil in appearance but is manufactured with nothing more than heat and pressure. Hash oil of this consistency is obtained through the acquisition of key genetics and the right combination of heat, pressure, and exposure to heat.

Hash


One of the oldest products in the cannabis industry is has. This concentrate is made by compressing the plant’s resin. Where kief preserves the structure of the trichomes, hash tries to merge them into a single superstructure. The powdery kief normally that coats your cannabis flowers can be collected and pressed together to form hash.
Solvents like ice water or ethanol may be used to more effectively strip the plant of their cannabinoid-loaded crystals but are not required. This method produces less potent results than BHO and other cannabis concentrates but remains a staple of cannabis culture around the world.

Budder

Another variation of hash is budder. Also called cake batter or “whipped” rosin, these products are created by incorporating light heat and agitation to rosin. The result is a whipped consistency that looks very similar to a salve of some sort. This technique has been known to significantly increase the aromatic properties of the hash oil it uses.
This method provides a new creamier texture that can be much easier to work with than shatter or sappy consistencies. While many retailers are beginning to sell whipped hash oils, the process can be achieved easily at home with preexisting rosin by simply stirring it with a warm dabber tool.

Solvent Based Extracts

Butane and propane are popular solvents used to extract cannabinoids like THC and CBD from cannabis plants. They are some of the more dangerous methods as well due to the explosive nature of the two solvents.
Extraction can be done at home using simple equipment and is also done on large scales, but the process is almost the same. To start, fill a tube (metal or plastic) with plant material. The quality of the material used directly affects the quality and yield.

C02 Oil

CO2 Concentrates
Supercritical fluid extraction is another method commonly used to extract cannabinoids. While it is possible to use other gasses, C02 is the most commonly used gas for this method. CO2 has the benefit of not causing harm if not fully purged from a product like butane.
C02 has become the connoisseur’s extraction choice because it goes past “critical” at around 90 °F, a temperature well below the deactivation temperature for cannabinoids. This means more flavor is preserved and a clearer high is produced than with other methods.
This extraction method relies on pressure and temperature to extract the terpenes, cannabinoids, and waxes from the cannabis material. Extractors use this knowledge of which temperature and pressure each terpene, cannabinoid, and wax separate them from the homogenous solution of marijuana material. This way they are able to target certain flavors and “types of high” produced by the genetics they are using or add additional flavorings.

Butane Hash Oil (BHO)

BHO, or butane hash oil, is an extremely potent concentrate used in dabbing and other vaporization methods. Cannabinoids are drawn out of the plant with butane which leaves behind a wax. The wax will either remain sticky or harden up, resulting in a crumbly “honeycomb” or a glasslike “shatter.” Because its THC content can reach into the 70-80% range, BHO is a popular remedy for people who need the highest concentrations available.
BHO is relatively easy to produce at home or in an industrial setting. After covering one end of a tube with a filter or mesh screen (with holes small enough to prevent plant material from seeping through), butane is sprayed into the tube. Refiners then allow the resulting cannabis-butane solution to drip into a glass dish below the filter end of the tube.
The butane must be purged from the solution for safety by heating the solution in a hot-water bath. The solution is slowly heated until the escaping gas produces bubbles.The water-bath quickly becomes cold, so it frequently changed or a heating plate is used until the solution is fully purged of solvent. The remaining “goo” is cooled and then used as the concentrate known as shatter.

Rick Simpson Oil (RSO)


In 2003 a man named Rick Simpson treated his skin cancer using a homemade cannabis remedy. By soaking the cannabis in pure naphtha or isopropyl alcohol and allowing the solvent to fully evaporate, a thick tar-like goo is created. Also known as Phoenix Tears, Rick Simpson Oil (RSO) can be ingested or applied directly to the skin. Many businesses sell their own renditions of the Rick Simpson Oil these days. Some are high in THC while others contain only non-psychoactive compounds like CBD.

Tinctures


Up until prohibition of cannabis in 1937, tinctures were the most common form of cannabis medicine in the United States. A tincture is a liquid concentrate using alcohol for extraction. Alcohol pulls out many of the plant’s beneficial cannabinoids and is stable to work with. A few drops under the tongue is a normal dose, but patients can safely use more as needed. Tinctures are a great way for patients to medicate without having to smoke and come in a variety of flavors.
Thanks for reading.

canna pests

Treating Common Cannabis Pests

Spider mites, thrips, fungus gnats…

If you are a cannabis grower you’ve likely been warned about these insects more than once. There are many pests that can endanger your crops. But some turn up a lot more often than others. Knowing how to identify and deal with the most common offenders can  be the difference between doing some extra work and losing a whole crop.
To start off, the best way to prevent a garden infestation is through prevention. Being aware of the symptoms and, above all, knowing how to eradicate them efficiently can save hundreds or even thousands of dollars. Not to mention months of caring for them. The main goal is to not give any potential pests or diseases a place to hide/nest/grow. This is best accomplished with some soap.
Wash the walls, floors and all surfaces with soap and water. Using diluted chlorine, bleach (although never together) or other disinfectant works too. Do the same with pots, buckets, utensils and any other equipment you plan to use. Make sure that nothing comes into the garden that might be able to carry stowaways.

It’s important to make sure everything is clean inside and out.

When changing reservoirs, make sure to wash and disinfect them as well. You never know what might be growing in there, even if the previous plant didn’t show signs of problems, eventually something will go wrong.
You may also want to cover the floor with plastic sheeting. The kind available at most home improvement stores but thick enough that you won’t tear through it. Carpets and similar flooring types make great homes for both pests and molds/fungi. Covering them with plastic ensures that they remain in good condition and won’t offer sanctuary to pests.
Keeping your air and water temperatures along with room humidity at the ideal levels while using adequate air circulation will prevent most pests/infections from ever getting started in a marijuana grow. As will filtering the air intake to block the path many marijuana pests use to gain access to the plants.

Soil-borne pests

One of the many advantages to using hydroponic/aeroponic systems to grow cannabis is that they prevent many insect and other infestations. There is no place for many types of larvae to incubate or hatch. When choosing soil, look for sterilized or composted soil. If using native soil, make sure to sterilize or compost it as well to prevent hitchhikers.
Covering soil in diatomaceous earth will prevent flying and crawling insects from laying eggs in your corp. This is because the sharp edges damage their tiny bodies like rubbing them across sand-paper. A less effective alternative uses a 1/2” or so of fine perlite on top of the soil as a barrier. Insect eggs generally don’t grow in perlite and most insects wont burrow deep enough to hit soil.

 Spider mites

garden pestsBest Prevention:
Keep the room clean throughout the grow. Fully disinfect and sterilize everything before attempting to start the grow. Also make sure to keep the room tidy and free of excess soil.

How to Identify:

Spider mites live underneath the leaves plants and are invisible to the naked or untrained eye. The mites drink the chlorophyll for sustenance. They also have eight legs which classifies them as a tiny spider instead of as an insect.
Spider mites are visible under a magnifying power of 15x or more. The magnified mites are whitish, red, or (most commonly) brown with two spots. These mites spin webs which makes them easier to spot. Once seen, it unfortunately means the mites are already a generation or two in.
Misting the undersides of leaves reveals the webs easily to the naked eye. Once fertilized, females remain so for life. After mating they can lay about 100 eggs every 5 days. With 75% of all spider mite eggs being female, their numbers can grow rapidly.

Repression Measures:

Spider mites ideal temperatures range between 70 and 80F or 21-27C. They also need average to high humidity to stay happy. Cooling a grow room to 60F/16C and dropping the relative humidity slows the reproduction rate of the spider mite.
Cooling the room reduces the damage an infestation can do. At 50% humidity and below the mites start getting uncomfortable. By spraying jets of water across undersides of leaves, growers can blast larger colonies loose and slow the spread of these pests considerably.

Best Predators:

Neoseiulus (Amblyseius) californicus and Mesoseiulus (phytoseiulus) longipes are the two most common and effective options out there. They can eat up to 20 eggs or 5 adult mites every day. And once their food supply runs out, they die off.

Sprays:

Neem oil is the most effective spray available. Other effective methods include pyrethrum, horticultural oil, and insecticidal soap. Spraying three times at 5 to 10 days apart should destroy a mite population if the room remains clean. Spider mite eggs hatch after 5-10 days which makes a second application necessary.
The first spray kills the adults while the second destroys newly hatched mites. A third application will kill any stragglers left behind. Make sure to also cycle to another chemical if using pyrethrum to spay frequently. This ensures mites don’t develop a resistance to the synthetic chemical. Several miticides have DDT or fungal relatives that are toxic if inhaled by humans so choose your miticide carefully.

Thrips

Best Prevention:

Keeping a clean grow area is the only defense against a thrip infestation. These miniscule insects avoid detection by even by the most cautious grower until they reach damaging levels. Best to make sure they don’t feel welcome in the garden in the first place.

how to Identify:

The thrip hits greenhouse more than any other garden. It’s difficult for the thrip to reproduce in large quantities outdoors and they must hitchhike into indoor gardens. Their small size helps them fit through all but the finest screens and finters.
Thrips can be almost any color, move very quickly and can fly which can make it hard to get a good look at them. Thrips tend to move in herds though, grazing tiny strips off the top of leaves like tiny lawnmowers. This can strip plants of chlorophyll so thoroughly that the leaves become brittle, dark, and begin to crumble. Tiny black lines across leaf surface are fecal trails left after gorging themselves.
The flying thrip easily infests gardens if protected from outdoor conditions. The female bores a hole into the plant and leaves her eggs in a hole. The opening is so small a magnifying glass is needed to even see it. In marijuana, the thrip colonies primarily infest and reproduce inside buds. A good shake of a cola infested with thrips produces a cloud as the tiny pests fall, jump and fly  out of the buds.

Repression Measures:

Using powerful fans to move air throughout a greenhouse or growroom can prevent the thrip from latching on to plants or taking flight. Regularly misting plants with water will flood the thrips and slow their travel, reproduction, and minimize their ability to damage the plant. Sticky traps do help, however the thip doesn’t migrate much. Which reduces the effectiveness of sticky traps.

Best Predators:

Nearly any predatory mite can effectively battle thrips. Parasitic wasps work but the size of thrip populations limit their ability to be effective. You might be able to see herds skittering across your plant. And while crushing them will reduce their numbers, it is of course not effective overall.

Spray:

Pyrethrum or insecticidal soap sprayed 2-4 times at 5-10 day intervals is the recommended treatment.

Fungus Gnat

Best Prevention:

Keep the relative humidity of your garden low, and don’t over water. Make sure the surface of your grow medium doesn’t stay soggy. Covering hydroponic medium surfaces also prevents growth of green algae which can entice these pests.

How to Identify:

Fungus gnats attack plants during their adult and larval stages. The maggots are almost invisible to the human eye. This is compounded by their see-through bodies and a black heads. The maggots infest the upper roots of plants and will spread throughout an entire hydroponic root system.
Fungus gnat maggots love dark, dank, and water soaked environments. Checking the medium at the base of a plant reveals these pests. The gnat larvae are also perfectly happy going through their life in rockwool. They infest root systems, damage larger roots and consume root hairs. This results in the plant weakening, slowing its growth, and visible fading of foliage.
Adult gnats are normally grey to black, so small they are hard to see and have disproportionately long legs. Females are prolifically breeders, laying an average of 200 eggs weekly. They can also usually be found at the base of your plant along with their maggots. They basically have a Hulk-like grip and are basically impossible to remove by force.

Repression Measures:

Damaged roots make marijuana insanely vulnerable to several types of fungus and prevents nutrient uptake. Maggots will consume decaying plant matter. This means that infestations reproduce faster the more damaged your plant becomes. Reducing surface moisture in your plants medium will slow fungus gnats reproduction dramatically. basically, the drier the better. Applying an anti-algae product to the base of plants kills any green algae currently growing. It also reduces the number of food sources of maggots. Yellow sticky traps placed 2 inches away from the growing medium will catch most adults looking to spread.

Best Predators:

There are no predators proven to be effective at controlling gnat populations themselves. Although the predatory soil mite Hypoaspis and the nematode Steinemema feltiae severely impact the insect population in soil grows. Unfortunately, they are not effective countermeasures for hydroponic applications. It is also impossible to force them out. Swatting a few adults doesn’t kill the eggs they lay underground.

Spray:

Neem or insecticidal soap applied as a soil drench kills eggs and larvae in 1-3 applications. Spray containing the fungal culture Bacillus thuringiensis var. israelensis (Bt-i) successfully eradicates adult gnats. The soil drenches and spray should be applied simultaneously every 5-10 days.

Do you agree?

There are way more ways to fight off these pests than I could possibly list on my own. Let us know in the comments below what pests you have come across and what you have found to be effective. I’d love to hear what else you think should have been included. Thanks for reading.

strains

Landrace Strains: Discover the Power

There has been a lot of talk about Landrace (LR) strains over the last few years. From Acapulco Gold to Malawi, people across the world claim to have landrace variants of many popular strains. These cultivators claim that their genetics are some of the oldest known to man. They take pride in the native, indigenous or heirloom nature of the cannabis strains under their care.
As humanities scientific understanding continues to grow, we have found that CBD may be better for treating pain and muscle spasms than THC. Without access to strains that had not been selectively bred, people would not have been able to create strains like Charlotte’s Web or LSD. Breeders needed to combine plants with new characteristics than what the market had available so they turned to the untapped potential of landrace strains.

What is a Landrace Strain?

Landrace Strain 1
A landrace strain never been crossed with a different phenotype and has grown in its natural environment for as long as people can tell. Like the Giant Tortoises of the Galapagos Islands, these plants have spent a long time in genetic isolation. Cultivators have taken the best of each generation and bred it with the next for many human lifetimes.
This isolation (and the resulting ) makes these varieties highly stable and extremely vigorous since only the best were kept. Over generations, people grew the plants that performed best for their environment. In the jungles of Durban South Africa, the plants needed to be able to grow above the trees so only tall plants grew well enough to survive.

Where Did Landrace Strains Come From?

Historical records (some dating as far back as 2900 B.C.) tell us cannabis has lived with humanity for thousands of years. Cultivated for food, fiber, and for religious and medicinal purposes, cannabis is one of the oldest known agricultural plants and has many uses.  According to the best available research, cannabis originally evolved in Central Asia and spread to nearly every region of the planet thanks to humans.
Outside of Asia, landrace strains are the result of escaped cultivars (strains that were selectively bred by humans) which gradually adapted to their environment over time. Over the centuries, other cultivars would have interbred with these feral escapees.  Due to the complex nature of the winds and plant/animal interactions, even the wild plants native to Central Asia are not believed to be untouched indigenous strains.

 Why Are Landrace Strains Important?


Not all cannabis is created equal in the eyes of growers. Plants that produce large colas full of cannabinoids like THC are traditionally prized over low yielding variants. Over generations, certain traits get bred out of or in to the genetic lines. People use this to make bigger and stronger plants than could be obtained otherwise.
This breeding method also has the effect of removing many of the less understood compounds. Since the same trichomes produce THC and CBD (and only one is psychoactive) growers selectively bred out the ability to produce CBD. That way all of the trichomes could focus on producing THC instead of some deciding to make CBD.

Where Are the Real Landrace Strains?


In today’s cannabis market people rarely see the pure landrace strains. On sites like Leafly and Cannafo, most of the sativas (the red tiled ones) are not pure sativas. Instead, they are sativa-dominant hybrids that exhibit strong sativa-like attributes. Same thing goes for indicas and hybrids. Landrace strains also exhibit these hybrid traits but to different degrees.
Landrace strains were embraced worldwide during the 1960s and 70s by growers who began collecting them in their own local gardens. Once the landrace strains were removed from their local growing environment, they became heirloom variants. For marketing reasons, most breeders don’t differentiate between landrace and heirloom.
These heirloom strains were then propagated in places like Hawaii and California. As the landrace movement grew, people who hunt for these hard to find strains became sought after. People like Arjan Roskam, founder of Amsterdam-based Greenhouse Seeds, and his colleague Franco Loja have spent millions obtaining these landrace varieties for use in their selective breeding.

What Landrace Strains Are There?

Here is a short list of some popular landrace strains:
Malawi Gold:
landrace 2Malawi Gold originated in Southeastern Africa. Grown on the shores of Lake Malawi (the third largest lake in Africa) the plant was adaptable to its local conditions. It’s genetic flexibility was perfect for the wildly changing environment which is why many phenotypes can be found in the market today. Aromas and flavors given off by the phenotypes of Malawi Gold help differentiate between the varieties. Two main phenotypes exist. One gives off a fruity smell while the other is a woody one. The fruity plants are normally smaller than the woody ones.
Afghan Kush Indica:
The plant is medium height with dark, broad leaves which makes it perfect for growing in the northern Afghani mountains. Its heavy, sweet aroma and taste mix with spices and incense to create a deep flavor. New smokers often find that this strain gives a very potent high that easily turns sedating. Perfect for people that are having trouble sleeping.
Hindu Kush Indica:
Cultivated in the Hindu Kush Mountain range for generations where it grows wild, the flowers of the fertile hillsides and valleys make the world’s finest hash. Years of selective breeding for resinous, indica-dominant plants with feral varieties have resulted in short, stocky bushes covered with huge, shiny trichomes. Known to relieve symptoms of pain, nausea, and stress while providing a pleasantly strong, earthy scent.
Lambs Bread Sativa:
Also called “Lamb’s Breath” Lamb’s Bread produces a bright green and sticky flower with a sativa dominant high. The effects have been known to help generate energy and positive introspection. Stress melts away under the warmth of the Lamb’s Bread buzz. This plant comes from Jamaica and it has been reported that Bob Marley himself enjoyed it.
There are literally tens of thousands of strains across the globe with a small percentage of them being landrace varieties. Because of the geographical nature of the landrace title, most strains retain the name of the area where they originated. Yet some places have made more of a name for themselves than others and it can be far easier to obtain their seeds or clones
 

gr

Weed Grinder: The Ultimate Buyers Guide

In the course of every cannabis consumers journey, the question of what grinder to use comes up. Are they even needed? Is it worth it to buy a high end model? Which one is best? There seems to be an infinite supply of identical products on the internet that come in a wild range of prices making the choice even more overwhelming.
The explosion of the legal cannabis industry has created room for a new generation of paraphernalia peddlers to rise and claim that their grinder is the best ever. Space Case, Medtainer, Phoenician, and Santa Cruz Shredder are just a few of the names that come up regularly in the conversation about quality. These companies have built a reputation for excellent products but cost a pretty penny.
Finding the right weed grinder can be a frustrating and expensive process. Nobody wants to spend $100 on a grinder only to find that a $5 one works better for them. Yet if a high end grinder is so expensive, shouldn’t it be that much better than a cheap one? But what it really comes down to is how it affects the smoking experience. Grinding is not required for most methods of cannabis consumption but it does a few really great things for it.

What does grinding actually do?

By breaking up the bud, more of the weeds surface area is exposed. Surface area is important for consuming cannabis flower. The higher the surface area, the more efficiently THC is vaporized so grinding will produce a stronger hit than otherwise.
Burning (or vaping) ground product also produces a more flavorful hit. Terpenes (the chemicals that make up smells) exposed by grinding increase the aroma before, the flavor during and the taste after a hit. It can be slightly harsher from the increased smoke density but the overall experience is of a higher caliber.
It’s not just the flavor that gets a boost either. Because of the consistent and small size of particles after grinding, it is easier to make every bowl the same size. Grinding simply produces a more consistent product to smoke or vape. People interested in monitoring the amount of cannabis they consume or trying not to overload a vape pen will find that grinding the product makes a big difference.
grinder

What is the difference between them?

There are a lot of options when it comes to getting an herb grinder. Most differences can be boiled down into variations of materials, styles and features. A $100 grinder may perform worse than a $5 version in many situations if it is significantly smaller/larger or produces a course grind.
When comparing grinders, it is important to think about how you intend to use it. If most sessions require less than a gram of product, a grinder that can hold an ounce of product will be less effective than one that can hold an eighth. People with arthritis or carpel tunnel may find a larger grinder with a crank handle easier to use than a small one with threads.
Cheap grinders also have a tendency to stick or jam up over time. Occasional users may not experience a perceivable difference between two models. If grinding cannabis is part of a daily routine, the smooth action of higher end models can make a big difference. Most of the difference between high and low end grinders is due to quality of materials and finishes.

What kind of materials and finishes are safe?

Grinders come in every material possible. From wood to titanium, as long as the material is stable enough, it can be used to make a grinder. That doesn’t mean that all materials are made equally though. Glass makes a great pipe but a very bad grinder. The brittle nature of glass makes chipping and breaking under normal use almost guaranteed so people don’t normally produce glass grinders.
Materials like aluminum and acrylic are cheap, stable and are unlikely to shatter under normal use so many manufacturers rely on them. Over time, grinders made from these materials will wear out and wear off. Small pieces of plastic or metal can work their way into the product you are grinding.
Materials like titanium, food grade polyethylene and ceramic are strong enough to resist wearing out and are significantly safer to use. Since titanium and ceramic are expensive to produce, many manufacturers will use an aluminum base and coat it with a thin film of the more expensive material. As long as the finish remains intact, there is little risk of contamination to the user and it then becomes a matter of style.

What are the main styles of grinder?

The most popular styles of grinder are manual and range from two to four pieces. Electric grinders are becoming more popular but have yet to dominate the market. They mainly serve the subsection of the community that loves gadgets or has motor-control difficulty.
Each style has a specialized use and will function better in situations it is designed for than the other styles. Manufacturers classify their grinders by the number of pieces and the diameter of the assembly.
Two piece grinders are best when used indoors and with a tray to dump the ground material. Three piece grinders remove the need for an extra tray while four piece add a screened off area at the bottom. The screen separates the trichomes that break off during the grinding process and collects them for later use.
Since trichomes are the plants chemical factories, this fine powder is very high in cannabinoids like THC and CBD. Vaporizers work best when using finely ground product so 4 piece models are very popular. Any style will produce vaporizable product as long as the teeth grind the cannabis evenly.

What about the teeth?

The parts of the grinder that actually do the work are called the teeth. They can come in a few shapes and configurations in any style or material of grinder. Their whole purpose is to break up the cannabis evenly but they go about it in different ways.
Pin shaped teeth are found on wood grinders pretty often and are better for grinding sage or thyme than cannabis.Diamond shaped teeth tear through dense nugs and can break up stems that are dry. They act like scissors, shearing the bud apart. They have straight sides and are the most common type of teeth on aluminum grinders.
Pyramid shaped teeth are able to produce a more consistent grind than diamond teeth but also produce smaller chunks. These are common on higher end grinders but can still be found on low end models. If these teeth are cheaply produced, the tips can sheer off and contaminate the cannabis. Inhaling burning acrylic or aluminum is dangerous and can have long term health consequences so they are best to avoid.

What size is right?

Most stores will stock a few different sizes of the same grinder. The manufacturers classify their sizes based on diameter. So a 2.5″ grinder is about two and a half inches from side to side. Each size generally corresponds to a different product amount. 1.5″ models are great if grinding less than 2 grams of cannabis while a 3.5″ model will chew through an ounce in no time. In the end, it comes down to personal preference and need. Does it feel good in the hand? Does it have the right number of pieces? Is it made of high quality materials? If so, it should serve you well in the years to come. Thanks for reading.
 
 

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Grow Lights: How to Choose the Right One

It is tempting to believe that there is such thing as the perfect grow light. A single radiant source that simply out performs everything else out there. Such a light does not exist at the moment but we have a few options. Even sunlight (the full spectrum, nuclear powered, plasma-based grow light in the sky) can damage plants if the rest of their environment is not well suited to them. Cultivators have to choose the right grow light for the right situation.
There are a few key considerations when debating between the most common lighting methods available. Using good old sunlight should work if you live anywhere near the equator but for those in the north or south need to rely on artificial means if they want to produce all year. Different growing techniques lend themselves to different setups as well.
Plasma, Induction, Ceramic Metal Halide, there are a lot of variations when it comes to lighting but for todays discussion we will be limiting the conversation to the three most popular methods. The lights we will discuss are easily obtainable, proven effective and utilized across the industry as the benchmarks that all others must compare to. There is a bit of variation within each category but they all function similarly (although you may need more than a wall socket for some).

Cultivators must consider the size of their garden.

Using a 1000-watt grow light in a two-foot by four-foot closet is generally wasteful and can lead to a lot of unnecessary problems like overheating. On the other hand, trying to cover a commercial garden with a 40,000 sq. ft. canopy in Compact Florescent Lights (CFL) won’t produce the same level of production as other lighting methods.
Growers working with small spaces need to prioritize heat dissipation over light penetration. While higher wattage lights provide more energy for your plants to work with, if the heat they produce is too much, it can stunt the plants growth. Using Compact Florescent (CFL) ballasts over High Pressure Sodium (HPS) or Metal Halide (MH) options can reduce heat buildup in small spaces while Light Emitting Diode (LED) ballasts provide a balanced mix of heat and light at a higher price point.
If you are growing more than 2-3 plants and have enough space for dedicated heat exhaust ducting, an HPS or MH light might be the right solution. The extra space needed to process the heat given off by these lights is made up for in high production levels. There are several sizes ranging from 150 up to around 1000 watts and each is designed to cover a different sized area.

Complexity is also a major consideration with grow lights.

There is a lot more to growing dank herb than sticking a seed in the ground and waiting for mother nature to work her magic. Top producers monitor every element of their operation with grow logs and performance metrics. Most growers can get away with going by eye and only measuring when they must but that won’t produce those head-sized colas that win competitions or get featured on the cover of High Times.
Adjusting CO2 generators, maintaining air conditioners and dehumidifiers, setting timers, calibrating sensors and monitoring schedules are all part of a commercial operation and can quickly add layers of complexity to a seemingly simply project. Getting the most advanced or largest lights possible may add extra layers of complexity like running exhaust ports, vent fans and electrical lines.
Having to install an extra circuit breaker is pretty frustrating but having to get the power company to upgrade the lines and transformers heading to your place in order to put in extra HPS lights can run into the tens of thousands of dollars. Using LED lights may have a higher initial investment cost (making quality versions expensive) but the energy savings add up over time.grow light

Budget is always important with grow lights.

Sometimes bigger isn’t better. If all you are doing is looking to offset the cost of buying cannabis, getting a massive light and converting the garage into a clean room worthy of NASA may not be the best route. A low cost (albeit moderate output) closet operation may work better, especially if you don’t consume only the freshest of rosin.
There are tons of options on the market for a small space grow operation with everything in a single kit. The kits normally come with a light, maybe a few pots or hydroponic bays, and they actually work pretty well (in general). They are more expensive than building it yourself but offer significantly higher quality than most people can cobble together on their own. If your goal is to make money, customization is the name of the game.
Installing LED lighting in an industrial in-door grow operation is almost a must. The initial cost is more than offset by the increased operational life of the ballasts along with the drastic (up to 30%) savings on energy. Industrial and commercial operations may still utilize CFL lights for seedling growth given the low overall cost of operating fluorescents.

When it all comes down to performance, a leader emerges.

In the end, we all want the best bang for our buck. CFL’s are great for seedlings/clones but not great for vibrant vegetative/flowering growth. Their low operating temperature also makes using them fairly basic. A low-cost alternative to LED’s for small-scale growers, CFL’s offer a solid base of performance to work up from.
HPS and MH lights offer greater output than CFL’s and are best for medium to large operations. They are specialized to vegetative and flowering and scale well for larger operations. The excess heat HPS and MH light produce compared to other options needs to be dealt with through specialized ducting or increased air conditioning but many ballasts offer specialized ports to make this easier for large strings of grow lights.
LED grow lights offer the highest performance of any grow light option but also come with the highest cost. While they don’t require the ducting of the HPS and MH lights, LED’s provide as intense of a light as any other option.  In addition to being the right intensity, LED’s require far less maintenance with a projected operating life measured in years, not months.

What is your end goal?

We have only toughed on the surface of grow lights and how to choose between them. If you want to get started quickly and easily, look into an assembled unit. It makes all the difference to have a station ready for you and not have to make all the little decisions yourself. Once you get the feel of things, you will likely be able to work with the prebuilt to fit your preferred style of growing until you are ready to do things a little bigger.
If your goal is to make money and you are just getting started, investing in HPS and MH lighting for vegetative growth and flowering along with some CFL may be the right call. Their overall cost is doable and they provide a great end product with a few extra considerations.  This is the most common setup for small to medium indoor growers looking to turn a profit.
If money is no object or you are working on a massive scale, LED lights provide the best returns over time. With minimal energy drain compared to other lights and the low operating temperature makes the energy savings a real consideration. Many units can also provide full spectrum light or specialized wavelengths for different plant cycles making them more versatile than the HPS and MH which must be switched between cycles.
Let us know what you chose to light your garden and why in the comments section. Thanks for reading.

weed drive

Accidents and the Dangers of Driving on Weed

Most people have been taught that alcohol increases the risk of accidents.

Smoking and driving can get you a DUI for an accident even in states where cannabis is legal. Current state laws for marijuana have focused on regulating it like alcohol while on the road. This is especially true when it comes to consuming and driving. Yet evidence of marijuana’s culpability in on-road accidents is difficult to prove.
Many states have reduced penalties for cannabis related crimes over the last few years. Yet as states continue to loosen regulations on marijuana safety, law enforcement is struggling to figure out how to establish a legal limit for drivers. They have focused on setting a blood-content test just like the .08 limit for alcohol.
A new study shows the challenges in accurately testing drivers.
One of the most difficult parts of testing is developing a threshold for what’s considered too high to drive. The conductors of the study concluded that “THC concentrations drop rapidly during the time required to collect a blood specimen in the U.S., generally within two to four hours.”
The low amount of time cannabis remains active for oral tests using the drivers’ saliva make it harder to fail than traditional tests. Saliva tests can be done roadside without a long wait but researchers found oral tests don’t provide “a precise measure of the level of impairment.”
Politicians are hesitant to implement concentration-based cannabis-driving legislation because it might ” unfairly target individuals not acutely intoxicated, because residual THC can be detected in blood for up to a month of sustained abstinence in chronic frequent smokers.” Depending on the direction that the new Attorney General Jeff Sessions takes the Justice Department over the coming years, detecting residual cannabinoids may be more important than registering intoxication.

Smoking weed is not safe while driving.

Cannabis intoxication has been shown to mildly impair a drivers psychomotor skills. It doesn’t appear to be severe or long lasting though. In driving simulator tests, this impairment was typically manifested by decreasing driving speed and needing more time to respond to emergency situations.
Yet this impairment does not appear to play a significant role in on-road traffic accidents. A review of seven different studies involving 7,934 drivers showed in 2002, “Crash culpability studies have failed to demonstrate that drivers with cannabinoids in the blood are significantly more likely than drug-free drivers to be culpable in road crashes.” And it’s not like people haven’t tried to prove a link either.
A Massive body of research exists that explores the impact of marijuana on psychomotor skills and actual driving performance. Researchers have done driving simulator studies, on-road performance studies, crash culpability studies, and reviews of the existing evidence. To date, the result of this research has shown how mildly cannabis affects driving abilities but that won’t stop the cops from hauling you off for having it in your system if you get in an accident.

Bad accidents

Marijuana has a measurable yet relatively mild effect on psychomotor skills.

Yet it does not appear to play a significant role in vehicle crashes, particularly when compared to alcohol. Researchers conducting a study for the National Institute on Drug Abuse said alcohol “significantly increased lane departures/minimum and maximum lateral acceleration”. Cannabis did not have the same correlation between consumption and decreased performance.

Researchers for the Highway Traffic Safety Administration funded study concluded Cannabis-influenced drivers are better able to measure their intoxication “may attempt to drive more cautiously to compensate for impairing effects, whereas alcohol-influenced drivers often underestimate their impairment and take more risk.”

People keep studying the link between cannabis, alcohol and car accidents.

The prevalence of both alcohol and cannabis use and the extreme morbidity associated with car crashes has lead to repeated research on the link between the two. According to another study, “drunk drivers are involved in 25% of motor vehicle fatalities, and many accidents involve drivers who test positive for cannabis.”
The researchers say that while both alcohol and cannabis impair performance in a “dose-related fashion” the “effects of cannabis vary more between individuals than they do with alcohol because of tolerance, differences in smoking technique, and different absorptions of Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active ingredient in marijuana.”
The effects of a cannabis “high” vary according to dose but are more pronounced with highly automatic driving functions than with more complex tasks.” Basically making it easier to focus on a plan than instinctively react to something. With alcohol the opposite pattern of impairment is produced and people get distracted easier.

Cannabis and alcohol have a synergistic effect.

Because of an increased awareness that they are impaired, “marijuana smokers tend to compensate more effectively while driving than drunks” by utilizing a variety of strategies. Mixing marijuana with alcohol removes the ability to use such strategies as the two substances increase the potency of the other when mixed.
Cannabis and alcohol work on many of the same levels in the brain and both inherently affect chemical production in the brain. Mixing cannabis and booze will amplify the effects of both and can lead to serious repercussions. While studies have been inconclusive regarding whether cannabis use causes an increased risk of accidents; in contrast, unanimity exists that alcohol use increases the risk of crashes.
In addition, the risk from driving under the influence of alcohol and cannabis together is higher than the risk of driving under the influence of either alone. One study even recommends that patients who smoke cannabis wait several hours before driving, and avoid combining the two drugs.

Even schools have studied how dangerous driving while high is.

The first study to analyze the effects of cannabis on driving was conducted by Researchers at the University of Iowa’s National Advanced Driving Simulator, sponsored by National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, National Institute of Drug Abuse, and the Office of National Drug Control Policy.
The researchers found that cannabis use caused almost no impairment. The impairment that it did cause was similar to the change observed while under the influence of a legal alcohol limit. They basically couldn’t get cannabis to impair driving as much as one beer.
They tested impairment mainly with a simulator. “Once in the simulator—a 1996 Malibu sedan mounted in a 24-feet diameter dome—the drivers were assessed on weaving within the lane, how often the car left the lane, and the speed of the weaving. Drivers with only alcohol in their systems showed impairment in all three areas while those strictly under the influence of vaporized cannabis only demonstrated problems weaving within the lane.”

More research is needed to find the right limits.

All these study’s findings show that alcohol is a much more dangerous drug than cannabis yet regulated in a more relaxed manner. While driving while under the influence of cannabis can still get you locked up, it is unclear how dangerous it is. More research is needed to show exactly how much cannabis should be legally allowable but for the time being, driving after consuming any cannabis remains illegal.
Until the whole world switches over to autonomous vehicles and we don’t have to worry about driver error any more, people are still going to get into accidents (sober or not). It is best not to contribute to the problem and simply don’t drive while high. You never know when you might need to instinctually react to something in your lane. Thanks for reading.

cann history

A History of Medical Cannabis Part 2: Modern Cannabis

In Part 1 we talked about ancient cannabis and how it has been used throughout the ages.

Today we are going to talk about modern cannabis and how it moved from prominence as a medicine to a recreational drug. Yet medical cannabis is not relegated to the ancient past. Modern medicine uses the term marijuana instead of the ancient name: cannabis but it means the same thing.
The original name can be traced back to the Greek physician Pedanius Dioscorides. He was a roman army doctor from around 40-90AD who traveled widely on campaigns throughout the Roman empire. He wrote the medical text that virtually all others were based on for over a thousand years and had a special entry for both male and female cannabis plants. It wasn’t until the 1930’s when the plant became known a marijuana in an effort to re-brand it. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

By 1621, medical marijuana had made its way into the English Mental Health Book.

Cannabis was entered into one of the most popular medicinal textbooks from the era to treat depression. Because of the work of an Irish doctor working for a shipping company during the colonization of the new world, medical cannabis moved to the Americas.
Cannabis treatments were a staple of a professional doctors curriculum up through the industrial revolution.  Before Alaska and Hawaii were states, America had laws on the books that supported medical marijuana in all 48 states. Cannabis was not seen as a recreational drug, it was medicine with little risk of side effects.

But in 1936 all that changed.

Pressure was being placed on the U.S. by the international community to sign the International Treaty on Controlled Substances. While not directly listing cannabis as a controlled substance, the treaty forced all countries that signed to adopt similar drug policies. Propagandists later used the treaty to get cannabis banned across the developed world.
A very popular anti-marijuana campaign burned through the nation. Funded by the government and directed by the talented propagandist Larry Anslinger, “Reefer Madness” was a sensational tale about marijuana. It featured the plant ruining people’s lives through sex, insanity, and horrific acts of violence. Although Reefer Madness was a work of pure fiction,  it was accepted by a whole generation as fact with the tenacity of religious convictions. The influential power of the Reefer Madness propaganda laid the groundwork for Larry Anslinger to get cannabis banned.
Larry Anslinger was a potent propagandist that was able to convince the developed world to outright ban cannabis use, cultivation and distribution. He used a mixed media of propaganda to accomplish this. Anslinger was a master of using media and used the newspapers, radio and television to spread a web of half-truths and outright lies.
After spreading a racially motivated panic with the Reefer Madness propaganda, Anslinger convince the U.S. to pass the Marijuana Tax Act of 1937. Anslinger provided his political masters a new way to target their political opponents voting base. The politically motivated police force acted quickly on the new laws to target the poor.

The Marijuana Tax Stamp Act brought America Modern Cannabis.

On the day the Marijuana Tax Stamp Act was enacted (Oct. 2, 1937) the FBI and Denver Colorado police raided the Lexington Hotel. They arrested a man named Samuel R. Caldwell for selling modern cannabis. He was a 58 year-old unemployed laborer. Three days later, on Oct. 5, 1937 Caldwell became the first person convicted under U.S. federal law of distributing cannabis.
In 1942, cannabis was removed from the U.S. Pharmacopeia. When that happened, cannabis lost the last vestiges of medical legitimacy. Because of the International Treaty on Controlled Substances, most of the other countries in the developed world were forced to enact similar rules.

Over the next decades, criminalization of cannabis continued.

As more and more regulations were heaped on medical practitioners, they became unable to prescribe cannabis. Legal penalties increased massively with the Boggs Act of 1951. It established minimum prison sentences for simple possession of cannabis. Thanks in great part to Anslinger’s work, cannabis was classified as a schedule 1 controlled substance in 1970.
Schedule 1 substances are substances no medical benefit and high risk of abuse. The controlled Substances Act of 1970 Classified Marijuana as a having “No Accepted Medical Use”. After the passing of the Substances Act, medical practitioners were barred from prescribing modern cannabis for any medication, effectively removing the oldest known medicine from a whole generation of healers across the globe.
In 1971, the Shafer Commission was created by the U.S. president to determine the merit of criminalizing cannabis. The Shafer Commission was bi-partisan and overseen by congress. President Nixon himself ordered it to determine “if the personal use of marijuana should be criminalized.” The commission came back with an answer and Nixon ignored it because he didn’t like that they believed there was no reason to scale up action against users.
In 1971 president Nixon chose to aggressively pursue action against cannabis consumers by declaring the War on Drugs. Motivated by personal prejudice political corruption, he saw marijuana as a way to get at his political opponents. He even admitted at the time that his reasons for attacking cannabis users and increasing penalties was motivated by personal directives.

Nixon acknowledged his action was not based on empirical evidence.

He increased criminalization despite the commission he put together telling him officially and unequivocally that cannabis use should not be criminalized. Over the next two years, the Nixon built a force specifically designed to scale up violence against modern cannabis users.
The Department of Drug Enforcement (DEA) was established in 1973 by merging the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs (BNND) and the Office of Drug Abuse Law Enforcement (ODALE) into a single agency. It comes as no surprise that the DEA continues to aggressively pursue cannabis consumers, producers and distributors to this day. They use every tool at their disposal regardless of legality or constitutionality to continue the criminalization of marijuana.
Things continued to go downhill for cannabis in the coming years. It wasn’t until 1976 that Robert Randall (who was afflicted by glaucoma) used the Common Law Doctrine of Necessity (US v. Randall) to defend himself against criminal charges of marijuana cultivation. In 1976, federal Judge James Washington made waves with his ruling. Judge Washington ruled that Randall’s use of modern cannabis constituted a ‘medical necessity’ and the case was thrown out.
Modern cannabis 2

The next milestone for modern cannabis crusaders came in the winter of 1991.

Modern cannabis took a step forward with the passing of medical marijuana reform in California. The first medical marijuana initiative was called Proposition P and was in San Francisco. It passed with an overwhelming 79% of the vote in November of 1991.
Proposition P called on the State of California and the California Medical Association to restore hemp medical to the list of available medicines in California, and to stop penalizing physicians for prescribing hemp for medical purposes. It only effected San Francisco but the cogs of bureaucracy had been activated. It would take another 5 years for legislation to go statewide.
Voters in California passed the first statewide medical marijuana initiative on November 5, 1996. Known as Proposition 215, it permitted patients and their primary caregivers to possess and cultivate marijuana for the treatment of AIDS, cancer, muscle spasms, migraines, and several other disorders. It also protected doctors from state sponsored punishment if they recommended marijuana to their patients.

The wheels of bureaucracy turn slowly.

In September of 1998, the House of Representatives debated a resolution called H.J.Res. 117. They passed H.J.Res 117 at the same time Oregon, Washington and Alaska provided their medical marijuana programs. In H.J.Res. 117, Congress declared support for the existing federal drug approval process.
They decide not to reschedule marijuana despite the overwhelming evidence coming forth that it should be decriminalized. While cannabis is classified as having no medical benefit, the United States Department of Health and Human Services) currently holds a patent on medical cannabis.
Patent No. 6630507 covers the use of cannabinoids for treating a wide range of diseases and was submitted to the patent office in 1999. The Department of Health and Human Services was awarded the patent in 2003. Yet the Department of Health is not the only regulatory agency that has chosen to abandon science, compassion and reason.
Modern Cannabis

In 2002, the FDA decided how to use modern cannabis in a study.

They decided that shipping 300 pre-rolled joints to patients in metal canisters was the best way to judge modern cannabis. The material was frequently two or more years old upon receipt by patients and a close inspection of the contents of NIDA-supplied cannabis cigarettes revealed them to be a crude mixture of leaf with abundant stem and seeds.
The study concluded that “cannabis smoking, even of a crude, low-grade product, provides effective symptomatic relief of pain, muscle spasms, and intraocular pressure elevations…” and that “clinical cannabis patients are able to reduce or eliminate other prescription medicines and their accompanying side effects.” The FDA report was ignored by those in power and cannabis remained a schedule 1 controlled substance despite the undeniable evidence.
The DEA has still not reclassified cannabis. It remains a holistic herb used throughout time as a medicine that current U.S. legislators are violently opposed to. While international progress has been made with the UK rescheduling cannabis to Class B and the Netherlands also making great strides in medicinal research, the U.S. still struggles to come into the light. Use of scientific reasoning is about to get even harder for the U.S. government as President Trump decides who will take the reigns of power. Yet his choice of Jim O’Neill to head the FDA (who openly supports cannabis legalization) gives modern cannabis hope for the future. Only time will tell. Thanks for reading.
Featured image: shutterstock

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THC vs. CBD: What Do They Do?

Have you ever wondered what THC and CBD are?

For those who don’t know, tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and cannabidiol (CBD) are potent chemical compounds produced in the trichomes on cannabis flowers. Trichomes are the small mushroom looking structures that sparkle like crystals in the light. Cannabis with a high concentration of THC or CBD is prized over just about anything else.
The states that allow cannabis sales require licensed retailers to prominently display the THC, CBD and possibly several other three letter words for everything with cannabis in it. People are always talking about how potent cannabis has become compared to times past and equating it with the THC and CBD content. This all points to THC and CBD being important, but why?
To start, cannabinoids are a group of compounds that our bodies and plants produce naturally. There are over 85 different cannabinoids identified so far with more just waiting to be catalogued. They are called cannabinoids because when Raphael Mechoulam  first identified them back in 1964, they were in the cannabis plants the Israeli doctor was studying.
Science has shown that our own bodies produce and process cannabinoids in immune and nerve cells. Humans are not unique in this ability to process cannabinoids either. The systems needed can be found in many mammals including dogs and cats.
Some animals simply can’t process THC and CBD. Insects like bees and ladybugs don’t have the right systems to be affected by the cannabinoids produced in cannabis. So even if insects or reptiles get covered in cannabinoids, it can’t get them high.
Science is discovering that the connection humans have to cannabis goes down to the molecular level. Continued research into the structure of THC and CBD has revealed that they are structural isomers. Essentially, they have the same basic parts but get arranged in a different way.

How do THC and CBD Work?

Cannabinoids like THC and CBD are able to bond with a special network or system of receptors in our cells. This system is present in most mammals, that is why cats and dogs will respond to cannabis in similar ways as you and I.
The specific receptors responsible for how weed makes us feel are called the CB1 and CB2 receptors. They were named after the different cannabinoids they are specialized to work with. I agree it’s not a very interesting name but being as simple as possible makes for easier science.
This system is called the endo-cannabinoid system. Endo for inside and cannabinoid for the type of chemical they work with. Cannabinoids like THC and CBD activate the receptors by mimicking the  neurotransmitters our bodies naturally produce called anandamides. Our bodies can’t tell the difference and accept the imposters without question. Yet each cannabinoid has a unique effect.

  • CB1 receptors respond to THC and are responsible for the psychoactive effects of cannabis. They are present in most of the brain and play a role in vital functions like; memory, mood, sleep, appetite and pain sensation. Cancer, insomnia, PSTD, MS, and many more disorders respond positively to CB1 stimulation.
  • CB2 receptors respond to CBD and are responsible for the anti-inflammatory effects of cannabis. They are found in immune cells and help reduce inflammation. Since inflammation is an immune response that is believed to be a factor in many diseases and conditions, controlling it can have life altering effects for people.

THC Ladybug

How are THC and CBD different?

THC is psychoactive, meaning it affects consciousness. Things like irritability, hunger and pain are all tied to brain function. THC reduces activity in the hippocampus, the part of the brain where memories are formed/stored). It also inhibits the amygdale, the part where the fight or flight instinct is stored/triggered.
If enough THC is added to the hippocampus, it can lead to a build-up of anxiety. Feelings of paranoia often accompany this negative reaction as the brain tries to deal with the elevated levels of cannabinoids. While no deaths have ever been recorded from weed alone, consuming cannabis does lead to reduced activity in certain parts of the brain.
While reducing brain activity is normally a bad thing, trauma and chemical imbalances can lead to hyperactivity in these brain areas. Conditions like PTSD and anxiety are examples where THC is one of the best treatments available. In fact, the VA recently made strides toward incorporating treatments into the framework of our military.
CBD is a totally different beast. It’s non-psychoactive, meaning it doesn’t affect consciousness directly. Yet it has been shown to have many beneficial properties. Things like swelling, decreased blood flow and seizures are all treatable by CBD.
Besides calming muscle spasms, CBD is able to counteract the psychoactive elements of THC. They have a balancing duality and because of their chemical similarities, it only takes a little acid to transition from THC to CBD and back again. Several companies have successfully synthesized cannabinoids already but it appears that the best effects come from natural plant sources.

How do we use THC and CBD?

Given that our bodies are hard-wired to benefit from cannabinoids, how do we get more? The oldest and most reliable way is to smoke some of the cannabinoid-rich trichomes that cover the cannabis flower. Vaporizing, eating and creating topical creams are also common ways to consume cannabinoids.
Modern extraction techniques exist that can produce almost 100% pure THC from raw plant matter. While this is the most potent/efficient way to consume THC, most commercial products range from 60-80%. Part of the reason lower percentage extracts are more common is the high cost of extremely pure THC or CBD comparatively.
Most people today consume cannabis in the form of food or concentrate to treat a malady or illness. Research has shown THC from smoking weed to be a neural-protector and helps slow/prevent Alzheimer’s. Cannabis can also provide relief to people suffering from neural conditions like Parkinson’s and Cerebral palsy. Patients often find more relief from their tremors, seizures and chronic pain than through other treatments.
Cannabinoids also play a part in the success of traditional cancer treatments like chemo therapy by stimulating appetite, relieving depression and reducing pain. While these benefits may seem minor, the increase in quality of life to these patients is measurable. Over time, the body will adapt to elevated cannabinoid levels so monitoring dosing is important.
Higher concentrations of THC and CBD are often needed for treatment of life threatening illness than can be found in raw cannabis. Over the centuries, this problem has been solved by refining the raw flower into concentrates. Products like BHO, PHO, RSO and CO2 extracts are excellent sources of concentrated THC to modern consumers.
Thanks for reading.

8 Things NOT to Do When Smoking Weed With Your Friends

8 Things NOT to Do When Smoking Weed With Your Friends

We all love to get together with our friends and pass around the cannabis, right? It promotes bonding, stimulates conversation, and it just makes everything better – food, music, movies, you name it.
But just like any other social activity, there’s etiquette to be observed; unspoken rules that must be followed so that everyone can enjoy the smoking session to the fullest. These are bound to vary from group to group and place to place, but I’ve put together what I think are the most universal cannabis “no-nos.”
Here is what NOT to do when getting high with your friends:

1. Stealing Lighters

If I had a nickel for every time my lighter went missing during a smoking session, I’d have shit load of nickels.
I get it. You’re stoned, zoned out, not paying attention, and there’s several different lighters being passed around… it’s easy to pocket someone else’s. (I’ve probably done it myself.) But it’s a definite buzz kill when you go to light up later on, and find that your trusty flame has disappeared.
So be aware, and make sure that lighter in your pocket is your own.

2. Torching The Bowl

When sharing a bowl with your friends, don’t hold your lighter over it until the whole thing is ablaze. It burns up the weed too fast, and the next person in line is gonna taste nothing but burnt herb. Just a touch of flame is all you need to get one edge burning. Save some green for the next guy – it’s common courtesy.

3. Never Throwing In

Let’s face it: nobody likes a mooch. We all know that guy who always wants to come over and smoke, even though he’s never got any weed of his own. Not cool. So whenever you get your hands on some good cannabis, remember your friends who smoked you up when you had none. Call ’em up, and return the favor.

4. Slobbering On The Joint

Don’t you hate it when you’re smoking with your friends, someone passes you the joint, and the end is all soaked in spit? It’s hard to hit because the tip keeps sealing closed. Not mention it’s just gross. Don’t drool on the joint. Just don’t.
This goes for pipes and other smoking accessories, too. No one wants someone else’s slobber on their glassware.

5. Holding The Joint Too Long

You know that guy who gets so caught up in the story that he’s telling that he forgets to pass the joint? And by the time he realizes it, the damn thing has gone out. So annoying!
But I have a confession to make: I am that guy. I’m sorry. I know it sucks, and I’m working on it. Really, I am. Don’t be like me. When it’s your turn, shut up and hit it. Pass it on, then you can finish your story. Okay?

6. Taking Too Many Hits

This is similar to holding the joint too long, only it’s less about being absent-minded and more about being a selfish, weed hogging jerk. You know the rule: “Puff, puff, pass.” Two puffs. Count ’em! Don’t try to sneak in a dozen hits every time it’s your turn. We see what you’re doing, and it’s not cool.

7. Smoking In Public

Just because cannabis is being decriminalized across the country, doesn’t mean you can get high whenever, wherever you want. Alcohol is legal, too. Getting drunk in the parking lot… not so much. Same goes with smoking and driving – don’t do it. Come on, we’re not in high school anymore. Smoke responsibly. Smoke at home.

8. DIY Pipes & Screens

And speaking of high school, remember making your own pipe out of a Pepsi can? Or a bong from a 2 liter bottle? Cutting a screen out of an old, rusty window screen? Yeah… it turns out that’s not such a good idea.
Aluminum, plastic, and other DIY materials can release toxic chemicals when exposed to high heat. So, you end up inhaling a lot more than just cannabis – and possibly doing real harm to your throat and lungs. So, unless you happen to be a professional glass blower, don’t make your own pipes. It’s just not worth it. Save up for a real piece. And in the meantime, go get some papers, and roll it up!
What did I miss? What are your weed smoking pet peeves? Tell us about it in the comments below!