For as long as intoxicants have existed, you can bet people have been trying to make them stronger. Early cannabis plants were not great producers of THC; like, even worse than in the 70’s. To produce a psychoactive effect, vast quantities of plant matter had to be smoked or consumed. To that end, many of the first cannabis products were concentrates. Early on, cannabis flowers and leaves were rolled by hand until the sticky secretion was workable as a hard sap. And thus, hash was born. This technique is still popular today, and hand rolling cannabis into hash is still widely practiced across Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Technically, a concentrate just means some effort was put into purifying the product. Shaking the kief off the nugs technically counts as making a concentrate. If hand-rolling hash for hours isn’t your style, you can also extract THC from the plant by “blasting” it with a solvent. This is how vapes and most dabs are made today. CO2, Ethanol, and Hydrocarbons bind to the THC molecule, making a solvent/cannabis slurry. The solvent is cooked off and the cannabis concentrate remains. This product may come in a variety of consistencies.
Naming conventions for dabs generally refer to the consistency. This gives the users an idea of how to work with it. Some prefer soupy, saucy dabs, and others dry, brittle dabs. Here’s your quick guide to raw concentrate. NOTE: this is not an exact science.
Naming conventions for dabs generally refer to the consistency. This gives the users an idea of how to work with it. Some prefer soupy, saucy dabs, and others dry, brittle dabs. Here’s your quick guide to raw concentrate. NOTE: this is not an exact science.
Solvent: a chemical host for the THC molecule: lipids, oils, hydrocarbons
Solventless: extractions use pressure, water, and low heat to coax the THC out of the plant.
Live: Made with fresh frozen flower
Cured: Made with cured flower, or aged after production
Wax: A common consistency, like ear wax, also used in the general to refer to all concentrate THC 60-90% above 90% the dab gets cryastaline
Oil: liquid dabs, in general. Usually referring to vapes. Sometimes a person means tincture
Kief: most basic of all concentrates. solventless. Dried trichomes gathered with agitation and screens. approx. 30-40% THC
Hash: Kief that has been worked into a hard/ sticky black ball. Solventless 30-40% THC
Blonde Hash: less worked kief. Solventless 30-40% THC
Rosin: less a consistency, more about the process. Kief that has been worked with distilled water and low heat to form a brown-grey wad. Always solventless. above 60% THC
Resin: less a consistency, more about the process. Always a solvent process. Most all dabs are resin; crumbles, shatters, waxes, vapes
Bubble Hash: Ice water poured over cannabis flower, strained with screens into bags.
Solventless. Even finer than kief. Full-melt if made properly. THC: around 60%
Moon Rocks: Cannabis flower rolled in sticky distillate, coated in bubble hash or keif
Boom Stick: cannabis pre-roll infused with hash or oil
Full-Melt: When used in a banger, the product liquifies instead of burns.
Badder/Budder: fluffier and more viscous than waxes like margarine THC above 60%
THC Distillate: this is in vape pens. Solvent process. Active, delta 9 THC, usually mixed down with cannabis oil to produce a liquid for vaping. THC above 60%
Shatter: This is the driest concentrate can get. Brittle like glass, or ”pull-and-snap”. Solvent. THC above 60%
Crumble: another dry consistency, clumpy, that, as imagined crumbles THC above 60%
Sugar: a fine crumble
Sauce/Soup: ultrafine THC suspended in a terpene solution
Diamonds: Ultra-pure THC Crystals. A white powder or crystal THC 97-99%
Rocks and Sauce: Diamonds suspended in a terp solution
