What to Look for in Good Weed

What to look for in good weed article graphic

Posted on January 7th, 2019 to Uncategorized by

What to Look for in Good Weed Post image

Follow these seven guidelines to find a high quality strain!

While there is no real substitute of a genuine smoke test to know exactly what you’re getting, there are methodical ways to inspect buds that will give you a pretty good idea about the quality of strain you’re getting. 

Here are 7 ways to help you determine if you’re smoking dank or schwag buds:

adult-smelling-a-flower
Smell is a “go-to” for most people when looking for high-quality cannabis.

1. Smell

Cannabis that is well grown will have an identifiably pungent smell that indicates your bud has a high terpene content. On the flip side, poor quality buds will usually smell like hay or lack any sort of distinguishable smell. For instance, a pungent coffee or chocolate scent is usually indicative among good quality Indica strains and strong citrus is usually a calling card of a good sativa. 

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Color can indicate a lot about how a strain was cared for.

2. Color

Visually speaking, a good quality bud is generally green, however, a good strain can create different shades like purple or almost an orangish-red color depending on its genetics. The key thing to take note of is if the majority of your bud is yellow, brown, tan or red instead of just hints of other colors—it is likely it didn’t come from a healthy plant and isn’t a high-quality bud. Same goes for buds that are too white and look bleached; that usually means it was a light burn victim after being subjected to too much high-intensity light. 

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Taste is a huge indicator of the quality of a strain.

3. Taste

For those of you who are new to the cannabis scene, it may be a little harder to determine good vs bad weed via taste, but good bud will have a nice fresh taste. Bad bud can taste off or even stale. Many experienced Cannasseurs can immediately detect good quality weed from bad by the taste of it—but keep in mind don’t go off of taste alone.

image of high quality cannabis buds
Good buds usually are little sticky and compress when squeezed, not disintegrating between your fingers like dry cannabis.

4. Touch

The way marijuana is textured is another factor that can hint at good or bad bud. Marijuana that is properly cured will feel slightly dry but a little sticky. If your cannabis isn’t sticky icky—it means its dried out and will crumble to dust very easily.

Kush-trichome-closeup
The structure of your cannabis can indicate the strain and the quality of the grow your weed came from.

5. Structure

Generally, the rule of thumb is a good quality or well-grown indicas tend to be dense and tight, with sativas typically being lighter and fluffier in their overall structure. Alternatively, when you have a poorly grown indica it can take on the appearance of a sativa with looser and incomplete buds with visible stems. However, hybrid strains do take on both structural characteristics of sativas and indicas so looking at the structure of them alone is not enough to determine good or bad bud.

Beautiful cannabis trichromes
The presence beautiful trichromes indicate the care of the plant, handling, high quality and generally how potent the strain will be.

6. Trichomes

The ultimate goal of any quality grown cannabis would be to produce buds that are packed with trichomes because all the good stuff is stored in the cannabinoids and terpenes. The density of trichomes are relatively simple to distinguish with your naked eye by determining how “frosty” the bud is. Quality cannabis will be laden with trichomes whereas bad quality bud lacks the thick trichome dusting. 

Now, this is just the first part of trichome knowledge you need to know about. Determining ripeness is a little more difficult to figure out without help from a magnifying glass. Instead, the color of the trichome head is the most efficient way to assess the ripeness of your trichomes. In a perfect world trichome heads will be a milky white color with hints of amber. Clear colored heads mean the bud was harvested too early, and if the heads are entirely amber—the plant was harvested too late.

Pest, pets and mold can indicate a terrible grow and a plant that has struggled to survive. Avoid at all costs.

7. Pests & Mold 

This should be a no-brainer that high-quality cannabis is free of pests and mold, but it needs to be stated. Mold will look grey and fuzzy or white and powdery; pests like gnats, mites, aphids and thrips are visible and can leave behind eggs, fecal matter, or dead carcasses on your buds—which is something you definitely don’t want to be smoking.

The Key Takeaway

Apart from not wanting to smoke bad weed for the obvious reasons ranging from bad flavor to not getting high— finding and knowing what good quality cannabis looks and smells like is imperative to making quality edibles, tinctures, oils, and concentrates. Every type of consumption method literally stems from the flower that the plant produces. High-quality plants have a much better chance of creating buds that are densely packed with cannabinoids—the most beneficial compounds of the plant. 

We hope this was useful in helping you identify what to look for in good quality bud so you can have an enjoyable session that gives you the best bang for your buck. For a good visual reference on good vs bad weed—check out the video below from C.E.H/Money Driven Ent’s youtube channel!

How to tell good weed vs bad weed.

Breckenridge Organic Therapy carries a variety of cannabis products that are naturally sourced and high quality. Feel free to stop by or contact us with any questions you may have and we will be happy to help!

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