1. You’ve probably been filling your joints wrong.
Yes, you herd me right, you’ve probably been filling your joints wrong.
If you, like most stoners, have at some point put a little too much bud in your paper only to have it’s weight bend the paper and dump your flowers onto the floor, then I have bad news. You’ve been doing it wrong.
”There are several variations of the sprinkle-fill method and they all suck”
Most people will hold their paper in one hand and sprinkle the weed into the paper with the other. There are several variations of the sprinkle-fill method and they all suck, posing the risk of your bud being dumped out or blown away by a big gust of wind. This is where the European method comes in.
Rather than using one hand to fill your paper and one hand to hold it, instead you should put all of your weed into one hand in a neat line (make sure it is not longer or wider than your papers), then simply put the paper upside-down on top of the weed and flip it over with both hands. Voila! You have just filled a joint without having to even think about the wind or dropping it. the only risk here is pressing too hard with sweaty hands and having your bud/paper stick to them, but at least you’re not loosing it!
2. Clearing bongs
It’s a fun party trick, and used to be something I would do any time I wanted to show off. Bongs, however, were not designed for this (if they were there would be no carb). While ripping through a bowl can give you bigger, more impressive clouds (and street cred) it is fundamentally a waste of a bowl.
”Using a bong correctly will allow you to get up to 3 equally large and potent hacks”
Bongs are meant to be used as follows: Fill bowl, light bowl, cover the carb and hack until the chamber is full, release the carb, clear the tube, light bowl, repeat. Using a bong correctly will allow you to get up to 3 equally large and potent hacks and wont run the risk of you coughing half way through a hack and wasting half your bowl. Not only that but something about getting more than one big hack from a bowl (whether psychological or not) seems to make me feel much higher at least.
3. Using bleached/flavored papers
If we were to make a list of 10 things you should never ever smoke, then bleach would probably be quite near the top.
the occasional chemical-soaked flavored paper wont send you to the ER, the ”long term consequences of using them too often are very real.”
Despite this, almost every single rolling paper uses it. It may seem trivial but when you are smoking a joint, you are also smoking everything in the paper too. Whilst one bleached paper or the occasional chemical-soaked flavored paper wont send you to the ER, the long term consequences of using them too often are very real. With flavored papers you are also smoking sugars, artificial flavoring and dye/ink, and with white papers you are almost always smoking bleach.
The best way to look after your lungs & future health is by using unbleached organic papers, and there are plenty of these on the market! The most common unbleached papers are without a doubt raw papers, though if you go to any head shop or tobacconist and they will have a whole range of unbleached papers.
4. Finishing joints in one go
A super common mistake, or bad habit, many of us have is smoking more weed than you need to just because you can.
” you should [only] smoke them until you have to relight […] once your joint has gone out more than once you are probably high enough”
For example, you roll a joint with what you think is the perfect amount, you then realize fifteen minutes later that you are really stoned and only half way though smoking that J, which has has become a task. You power through, get to the end of the joint and dont seem to get any higher. This is because you got high for getting-high’s sake.
In my view when you smoke joints you should smoke them until you have to relight them. Once your joint has gone out more than once you are probably high enough, so why not save yourself some money and put the second half in the ash tray and finish it off later.
Not only will this save you getting higher than you wanted (and stop you essentially wasting your high by passing/zoning out) but it also saves you having to roll a second J!
5. Not freezing your bud
This one may sound strange at first, it did to me too.
”If you get through your bud quickly this is a great trick for you as you are essentially re-cycling your nugs.”
So some years ago a friend of mine in Spain showed me a load of hash he had made himself. I was curious as to how he had made it and asked, he told me that he made it at home in his freezer. This only confused me more so I asked one more time and got a better answer. Basically my friend puts all of his weed in a jar with a stocking placed over it and leaves it to freeze overnight, the next day he then shakes the jar as hard as he can over a sheet of paper, and saves the kief until he has enough to make hash.
If you get through your bud quickly this is a great trick for you as you are essentially re-cycling your nugs. See when you freeze weed all of the trichomes freeze too and become extremely brittle, this allows you to separate them with the jar-shaker and to make your own hash. The good news it that not only do you get free hash, but your weed isn’t noticeably weaker either as the majority of cannabinoids (especially THC) are stored in the sap within the bud and not the ‘frosting’ on the outside.
This practice is so simple and commonplace in Spain that most street vendors do this to their herb to maximize profit.
6. Storing your bud in a wooden box (or anything other than a mason jar)
In all my years of being a stoner, one of the most common and possibly frustrating mistakes I have seen people make is storing their bud in a wooden box.
”The reason this is such a terrible idea is because wood is inherently porous, meaning that any moisture inside any wooden box will be drawn out.”
I’m not entirely sure where to start with this, frankly awful, misconception. Perhaps Ill begin with ”Do not ever ever ever store your bud in a wooden box ever unless it is freshly trimmed and not cured!”
I don’t know where this one comes from, but it is so pervasive and common that about a good 8/10 stoners I know do it. Perhaps it has something to do with the thought of storing it somewhere natural, or perhaps you have a cool looking etched wooden box, or perhaps you simply hate nice weed.
The reason this is such a terrible idea is because wood is inherently porous, meaning that any moisture inside any wooden box will be drawn out. This is why growers (like myself) use wooden boxes to dry out our bud before curing it.
Even if a box is lacquered, the fact that it is a wooden box means it probably wont be airtight, and anything non-airtight will dry out your bud.
In all honesty, the only way you should ever store bud is in a mason/airtight jar. Not only will using an airtight jar ensure a good deal of protection from your bud drying out but it also allows light through, preventing the possibility of mold forming. Best of all though is the fact that curing bud is literally a case of storing it in a mason jar and allowing it to ‘breathe’ every so often, meaning that by storing your weed in a mason jar you are essentially continuing the curing process and improving the smoothness & flavor of your bud!
7. Not checking your bud for contaminates
Whether you grow your own, get it from a dispensary or off the street, there is absolutely no excuse not to check for possible contaminates. Contaminates can be anything from string and hair added to bulk out the products weight, to chemical sprays such a pesticides and harmful drugs (such as spice, a growing problem over in the UK) or even molds which formed at any stage of the buds life. Smoking any of these things can be detrimental to your health and in some cases your life!
”I am a big proponent of this rule as I have both found buds loaded with plastic fibers”
I would always recommend having a close look at your bud before smoking, and if you find anything that you don’t trust, don’t risk it.
I am a big proponent of this rule as I have both found buds loaded with plastic fibers (back when I was younger and couldn’t grow my own) and loaded with mildew (from some bud I didn’t dry enough) luckily I didn’t smoke the fiber-loaded bud, but I did smoke the mildew contaminated nugs for at lest three days before I checked them out, so I know how easy it can be to smoke these things without realizing!
8. Throwing away your seeds
If I had a time machine to go back and round up all the seeds I threw away before I started growing I would never have to pay for my greens ever again.
Many people, especially younger stoners, throw away their seeds, a concept now totally alien to me.
”Even if you think that you can’t or wont be able to grow your own weed, nobody can predict the future”
Even if you think that you can’t or wont be able to grow your own weed, nobody can predict the future and where you might be or what the laws will be. This is why I would recommend freezing all of your seeds, no matter how many you wind up with or what your local laws, just to be sure. Storing seeds is a small commitment and can preserve them for up to decades!
Even if, in future, you wind up with a bag of seeds and the laws wont let you germinate them you can always use them to make highly nutritious hemp-milk by blending them with water. Alternatively you could crack the shells, remove the husks with water separation, and sprinkle the hemp-hearts you have just made over cereals/ other snacks for a nutrient boost.
In shot, there is no reason to throw away seeds! Ever!
9. Using roaches instead of cigarette tips
Like many, many stoners I agree that tobacco should be kept well away from your marijuana (and body, for that matter). However, most people don’t just happen to have an unlimited supply of weed (though we can dream) and as a result will need to bulk out their joints with the stuff.
My only real advice for using tobacco isn’t necessarily to use less as using more can make your weed go a lot further (at the cost of your own health), but to use actual cigarette tips instead of roach cards. This is part of the ‘Spanish’ rolling technique, where you rip the very tip off of a cigarette. Making sure to rip off the little 2mm bit just after the filter which contains a little bit of tobacco & the name of the cigarette brand will give you exactly what you need. You then use your teeth to pull out the whole cigarette filter, rip it in half, toast it, and put it back in. Not only is this much quicker than rolling a roach, but it also gives a smoother smoke.
”the best thing about using cigarette tips is that […] you don’t have to worry about getting a lungful of roach card smoke, instead your joint simply turns into a very small cigarette.”
”But what about the THC being filtered out?” you might ask, well the good news is that toasting the filter stops it from filtering a good 80% of the smoke so the amount of THC lost is really inconsequential.
However in my view the best thing about using cigarette tips is that when you are finishing your joint you don’t have to worry about getting a lungful of roach card smoke, instead your joint simply turns into a very small cigarette.
Unless you smoke joints all day, every day, then this helpful ‘tip’ should make your smoking experience easier and no more expensive.
10. Judging quantities by eye
Bud comes in all shapes, sizes and densities. This of course means that you could have ten nugs, all the same size with totally different weights.
”Imagine if surgeons or chefs were as careless with their measurements as stoners were.”
Imagine if surgeons or chefs were as careless with their measurements as stoners were, so why, with something as costly and precious as out bud, don’t we weigh it up every time so that we can actually moderate our income? This is why your bud can sometimes last you weeks and sometimes only days, even if you buy the same amount.
This all comes down to density, and there is a lot of variation between strains there. For example Blue Cheese has tight dense nugs, yet Lemon Haze has loose fluffy nugs, as a result 1g of Lemon Haze will look like more than 1g of OG Kush.
This is why you should always use gram scales to dose your marijuana, this way you can plan your allowance and be super efficient!
