There's a flurry of new numbers on marijuana product labels, and the ratios can feel like a confusing math problem.
But there's a method to the madness — one based more on anecdotes than broadly recognized scientific research.
A variety of vape oils, tinctures, salves, and edibles with numbers like 18:1, 4:1, and 1:1 — noting the amount of CBD to THC — have been showing up at dispensaries in recent years in both medical and recreational states. THC will make you high, while its sister compound CBD generally won't — and has therapeutic potential. Most marijuana strains have around 18 percent THC with less than 1 percent CBD (with THC sometimes being pushed beyond 20 percent).Â
The cannabis companies behind the trend aren't chucking THC; they’re just flipping the ratios. For decades, growers have focused on breeding weed with increased amounts of THC. That’s still the case to a large degree, but a sliver of the market sees big things for CBD-rich marijuana products.
"They kept getting bred to go higher and higher in THC, so most strains have very low CBD," said Dennis Hunter, cofounder of Cannacraft, a Santa Rosa cannabis producer with a line of CBD-rich products under the brand name Care by Design. "Now they're starting to breed those to be higher and higher in CBD."
Care by Design, and other companies like Pure Ratios in San Diego, use previous customers' experiences to guide new users toward their preferred ratio.
But with scant evidence-backed scientific research regarding the impact of each ratio, consumers resort to trial and error to see what works for them...