Since the dawn of time, pre-, peri- and post-menopausal women have had to endure a spectrum of hormonal shifts ranging from the irritating to the debilitating. Often these changes bring bouts of pain, anxiety, sleeplessness, mood swings and more. To quell their symptoms, women traditionally have relied on nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs), sleep aids and a good dose of tolerance. While NSAIDs can be effective for decreasing symptoms aggravated by the prostaglandin — an inflammatory enzyme that increases when progesterone decreases during menses — frequent, high dose use is known to adversely affect the gastrointestinal system and potentially the liver. This is one reason why women are exploring non-traditional options. Lately, women are increasingly reporting that CBD and THC products are their best alternative for treating menstrual pain. A 2019 […]
Cannabis and the Common Cold: Helpful or Hurtful?
We’ve all been there. One moment you’re feeling great, the next moment your energy’s zapped, you can’t breathe, your head’s pounding and your throat feels like sandpaper. Welcome to the cold and flu season. While plenty of rest and lots of fluids are a prescription as old as time, some people believe there’s a new over the counter (OTC) remedy to consider. It’s cannabis. But is it helpful or harmful? Let’s explore. On the positive side, cannabis contains cannabinoids and terpenoids, compounds that are purported to offer anti-inflammatory effects on the body, which may help to reduce inflamed sinuses, headache pressure and puffy eyes and face. Moreover, cannabis’ uplifting effects can lessen general aches and pains, which are common cold symptoms. However, cannabis opponents may be more likely to claim […]
What is Delta-8?
When you think about cannabis you probably think of THC (aka delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol), but have you ever heard of Delta-8? Don’t beat yourself up if you haven’t, there isn’t even a Wikipedia page about this cannabinoid. While you might not have heard of Delta-8, it’s been on researchers radar for years as one of the four most researched cannabinoids. You might be asking yourself “why haven’t I heard of it?” While Delta-8 is present in most cannabis plants, it isn’t as abundant as THC. But with recent advances in technology making it easier to isolate specific cannabinoids, Delta-8 has been getting a lot of press. If you analyze and compare Delta-8 to THC’s chemical structure you’ll find that Delta-8 is very similar, with only a slight difference in the location of […]
Get Involved! Support SB-1302 and AB-2215
We’d like to express serious gratitude to Senator Ricardo Lara, who introduced SB-1302 this past Friday in the California Senate. “This bill would prohibit a local jurisdiction from preventing delivery of cannabis or cannabis products on public roads, or to an address that is located within the jurisdictional boundaries of that local jurisdiction, by a licensee who is acting in compliance with MAUCRSA and who is acting in compliance with any license, permit, or other authorization obtained from another local jurisdiction. The bill would include findings that the changes proposed by this bill address a matter of statewide concern, rather than a municipal affair and, therefore, apply to all cities, including charter cities.” If this bill passes, cities like Fillmore, Santa Paula, Camarillo, Thousand Oaks, Oxnard and Ventura would no […]
Rosin: The clean, quick, and easy way to make concentrate
You may have heard of the latest trend in cannabis concentrates called Rosin. Rosin utilizes the process of heat pressing cannabis flower, hash, or even kief and collecting the essential oil that is forced out of the original product. What you’re left with is a pure cannabis oil, with all its original terpenes, that will satisfy even the most hardcore dabbers. Unlike BHO (butane hash oil), however, Rosin doesn’t require the use of harmful solvents, only heat and pressure. Another benefit of Rosin is how easy, cheap, and safe it is to make compared to other concentrate production methods. Lab equipment required to properly make CO2 concentrates or BHO can run into the thousands of dollars. To make Rosin, all you need is a $20 hair straightener and some parchment […]
Enough Research
You’ve heard it repeated so many times, by both industry advocates and adversaries: “There’s not enough research. We need more research! We don’t know enough about the medical benefits of cannabis.” The problem with this statement is that, while it contains some truth, it is ultimately false. The truth? There is absolutely a need for more cannabis research. But when this argument is used to maintain the current prohibitions until more research is done, it is dangerously short-sighted. To be clear: there has already been more than enough research to tell us that cannabis use is safer than cannabis prohibition. We also have pre-clinical and mounting anecdotal evidence suggesting a long list of potential benefits that could save (or improve) countless lives. Controlled clinical trials on humans are happening now around the world, […]
Seven Reasons Why Delivery is the Future of Cannabis Retail
There have been some interesting developments regarding applications for cannabis delivery services lately. Startups like Nestdrop have already come under fire, being slapped with a lawsuit from the city of Los Angeles before it could take off in that city. Eaze and Meadow are other offerings, both claiming to be the Uber of weed, promising quick and easy delivery from participating dispensaries. The problem is these apps are essentially glorified versions of the Yellow Pages and provide little more than marketing value (at a steep commission) to the dispensary. Unless you do business in a city dense with dispensaries to choose from, there is little incentive for you, as a dispensary, to sign up with such a service. They make big promises of convenience to consumers, and sit back collecting fees while the dispensary does all the work […]
The Family Tree of OG
OG Kush is a legendary strain whose origins are bit mysterious. The most likely theory states that sometime in 1993, a guy who had original Chemdawg got together with a guy who had a Lemon Thai x Paki Kush male he called the “secret ingredient”, and the brilliantly balanced hybrid OG Kush was born. It became wildly popular by 1995, and remains a staple in California dispensaries. Growers have worked with this strain extensively over the past twenty years, creating an amazing variety of phenotypes and hybrids. Phenotypes have the same genetics, but differ in the expression of the genetic instructions, which are influenced by environmental and developmental conditions. The fantastic variety of phenotypes shows the versatility of the OG genotype, which gives growers so much to work with. The following graphic shows the […]
The Price of (Delivered) Weed
In the interest of transparency, and to help illustrate why we’ve implemented a per-delivery fee, here’s a breakdown of what it costs to provide safe access to medical cannabis in this area. Because we have avoided the “backpack delivery” model where drivers carry their limited menu with them (on the advice of our attorney), we require a larger communications budget than those types of services, and we have a much higher staffing need and the expense of cars, gas, and maintenance over brick-and-mortar shops. Additionally, we require testing of all our medicine, something that is not a practice with many California collectives. We do this for the same reason we don’t carry any BHO products, because in the absence of adequate safety and quality regulations, we are holding ourselves as providers to the standard we would want to see […]
Juicing Raw Cannabis
The world has discovered the health benefits of juicing in recent years, and Sespe Creek Collective hopes to start regularly bringing those benefits to our patients. Juicing helps pull the essential oils, minerals and vitamins out of plants into an easy to consume, nutrient-dense form. This holds true for the cannabis plant as well. Prior to drying or heating (from baking, vaporizing or smoking) the plant has little to no THC/CBD because the plant itself creates THCA/CBDA, or THC/CBD acids. THCA/CBDA becomes THC/CBD through a process called decarboxylation which occurs through heat. While still in its acidic form the THCA does not have psychoactive effects. It instead works on the endocannabinoid system to create neuroprotective and anti-inflammatory effects. It has been used in the treatment of epilepsy, cancer, autoimmune and […]