Another Tincture Thread - Try it, You'll like it

Well, I certainly hope that it helps her out. It's just that Indicas are better for pain if there is an option.

 

Let me share a little tidbit that someone just told me. I have a friend who is starting to use concentrate instead of flowers for tincture and oil because of the scarcity of good material. Because she is new to the whole thing, I advised that she get a Nova which she did.

She used it for the first time last night and had an interesting experience. She was going to make 2 batches of GD from shatter, each of which was a nice amber. The first one turned out like you would expect, a nice gold solution. However, the second one had a surprise in store. While the shatter was amber, the tincture that it made after decarb in the Nova was the color of grape koolaid. It was a purple strain but I'm not sure which one. I wish I had a picture of it. She said it was very pretty.

I'm not exactly sure why that happened since it was an amber extraction. We've seen that with flower but that stayed purple from the beginning. I wonder if it's a Nova effect on the compounds. It's something I'm going to have to delve deeper into.

 

If you used 23g and it's all in that ounce then it should be pretty darn strong. However, I would have felt better if you had said that you evaporated all the way down before adding the oil. That shouldn't be affecting the potency, though.

There's a couple of things I can think of and the first that comes to mind is that 1ml just wasn't enough. That would be the easy fix.

I'm concerned about the 90% iso, not so much for toxicity but for the moisture content and since you used the MBM, there's no way to tell if you're getting some separation. If that were to happen then your cannabis oil would glob up and a lot would remain on the leftover material. Hopefully that's not what happened. Let's wait to see if a higher dose does the job before we delve into the "what if's".

 

Oil isn't weaker, it's different. It's absorbed differently and in different locations. I need a larger dose of oil than I do GD because it has to go to the liver first and stomach acids and other "first pass" issues will destroy some as it goes through. However, once the oil does reach the liver the effects are enhanced by the 11-hydroxy metabolite.

The GD is absorbed beginning right in the mouth and stomach lining before the destruction begins so the dose needed would be less. The thing is, though, that the effects are different so it's more like apples and oranges. I use them for different things. I use the oil for deeper pain relief because of that 11-hydroxy effect. I use GD for everything else. I smoke for recreational. The oil lasts longer.

Yes, we like our strains' taste while toking but some of us also like for that taste to come through in other products, too. It's not all about the THC. If I thought that was the case then I'd be advising everyone to get a Magic Butter Machine. No, taste makes a big difference. I swish GD in a shot glass of water and I really enjoy that it tastes like the flower did when I toked it. I also like it in hard candy. I use very little flavoring so I can taste the strain. The flavor makes a difference to many of us.

You wouldn't notice anything distinct about the flavor profile in brownies or cookies but you would notice the lack of chlorophyll and other compounds that can give them quite an aftertaste. But what do I know?

 

I just came across something interesting and I know that some of you will also be interested. It has to do with how long it takes for cannabis to decarb naturally in plant form. I had never been able to go beyond 2 years in my testing but this week I had a chance to carry it out another year.

Earlier this week I was present for the extraction of a couple of pounds of hemp "biomass" and another of very old high THC flowers that wasn't in good shape. My friend runs a cannabis business and had collected a lot of odds and ends over the years. This material was at least 3 years old and that made it a good choice for this new type extraction since it would be no big loss.

We extracted that pound and the hemp and had the results tested. Those results have come in and indicates that those of you thinking to use your older material without decarbing should think again. Only half of the THCA had converted to THC whereas 10% had converted to CBN which is going to make it sedative.

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I'm not really surprised that only a little more than half was decarbed. We specifically used this material to see how far decarbed it would be. Nor does it surprise me that we have such a high CBN value. The 2 year sample I had previously tested was trending in those directions.

The thing I find most interesting is the CBD. First, there's so much of it for the kind of material from which it came. Secondly, and more to the point, is that nearly all of the CBDA converted to CBD in that same time span. We're not able to see degradation of that since they don't test for CBE but we can think that isn't a factor due to still a little CBDA remaining.

We can take away from this that 3 year old high-THC cannabis still needs decarbing but high-CBD strains, including hemp, does not as long as THC isn't a factor. Of course we would have to test some 3 year old high-CBD material to further verify that but at least we now have a data point for that.

 

Well, if you operate a cannabis delivery service you get a lot of odds and ends from the turnover. It was kept in a safe but no other special treatment. No vacuum. That kind of stuff builds up quick. It's the stuff that had lost its bag appeal. Ziplocks and turkey bags.

 

I use a long, thin glass thermometer I got for testing the abv of reclaimed alcohol but it's hard to read and in Celsius. Be sure that you can see the etching/print on it. A "lab thermometer" in both C & F would be good.

 

No, sir. Everything's still pretty much the same although I did try some lecithin in a couple of batches. It didn't seem to make any difference in the effects but it did make the cream softer with the same amount of beeswax. I stopped using it and went back to old faithful that has been servicing me nigh these many years so well.

 

Seems like the gummies experiment was a success for the shelf life. I'm not sure that I'd ever keep any for a month. My chocolate is still shelf stable after nearly as long and I'm happy with that.

When you're ready to make the honey give me a holler.

 

Yep, that's it. Reduce it to the strength you want it before you do the honey.

Sorry I'm late.