“My driving force behind all of this is really discovery.” – Dr. Hornby.
I recently had the pleasure of talking to one of the world’s leading cannabis research scientist, Dr. Hornby. For the last five years he has been helping the Vancouver Compassion Club to better understand how cannabis helps their patients. He had been identifying cannabin profiles that will help specific ailments. This means that some day patients will be able to get the cannabis that works best for them. Perhaps in the future doctors, who prescribe cannabis for their patients, will be able to choose from specific strains that will help specific problems.
Dr. Hornby had been collaborating with Advance Nutrients and together they have been able to come up with many products designed specifically for growing cannabis. Dr. Hornby has four products with his name on them. You may have seen them at your local hydroponics store. Right now he’s working on perfecting a new product called Scorpion Juice which is suppose to make the plant produce more oils and be more frost tolerant.
I called Dr. Hornby at his home in Richmond, B.C., late on a Saturday morning. He was very open about many things and then there were a few things that he didn’t really want to share but he did share a lot of new exciting discoveries. We talked for hours and I’m looking forward to meeting him in the future. This is a portion of the conversation we had.
Dr. Paul Hornby
April 17, 2004.
F: Hi Paul, What type of doctor are you?
P: I have a PhD in Human Pathology. During my masters degree in Biochemistry I worked with compounds that altered human physiology and in my masters degree I worked with anaesthetics.
F: Until a few days ago I had no idea who Dr. Hornby was. I’ve seen the products around but I never paid too much attention to them. I’m just a regular old backyard gardener. How did you come to be as deeply involved in marijuana as you are?
P: Through hemp.
F: You started in the hemp business?
P: Well industrial hemp. A fellow called me years ago at a lab that I was working in and asked me if I could measure THC in hemp. So, that kind of struck me, for reasons of my own, being interesting because I’ve known for years how useful the cannabis plant is. You could make 35 hundred different products from it.
F: So you actually originally started out in the fibre part of it all.
P: Yeah, after a lot of hassle I got a license to analyse hemp for its THC level. So I started analysing hemp and looking at the profiles and I just got more and more involved in it. What happened is, I guess I ran into people like Hilary Black of the Vancouver Compassion Club and she was telling me about strange and specific symptom relief. This is people with certain ailments will keep going back to the same strain over and over again.
F: When did that research start?
P: That was 5 years ago. But, at the same time as that as I was looking at these hemp samples and noticing the profiles from them and also talking to Hilary realizing that these profiles could give an explanation to why people went back to the same strain over and over again. Because I was noting the difference with the cannabanoid profile in the different strains. It didn’t surprise me that she was observing this.
F: What strains have you seen that keeping popping to the top of the list?
P: Well, I’ve look at many different strains over the years and from what I’ve been looking at, the ones that can be affective at the Compassionate Club. So if they get people who need relief from epileptic seizure smoking a specific strain, then I will look at the cannabanoid profile of that strain.
F: And have you bee able to narrow it down to…
P: Well we’re building data on it, you know. This is all brand new! What’s so exciting to me about it all, this research, is that it’s all brand new; no one has done it before. Now, years ago when I started getting interested in the medicinal aspect of cannabanoids, I went on my research network and searched all my data bases for any valid scientific work that’s been done on cannabis. In clinical trials on natural product cannabis, not synthetic dronabinol or marinol made by the pharmaceutical companies.
F: I didn’t know that most clinical trials used synthetic forms.
P: Well look at the research. Look at the data that is out there. It’s not done on natural product cannabis. In smoking experiments done on natural product cannabis there’s not been a lot of the research results, but clinical trials done on synthetic dronabanol, the results are sort of scattered and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.
F: OK. Like I was asking before, can you pick a certain case where there’s a patient with a particular problem and this particular strain works well for them?
P: No we have not because we haven’t found that strain that work well for them and to get a better idea as to which cannabanoids are relieving symptoms.
Nobody knows yet. We’re not allowed to do this research but we have to reach for it and we have to do it kind of clandestinely and move slowly. We’re learning. What’s, too, exciting about it is there is so much stuff on this topic, so much to learn.
F: I’ve heard of some new products, strain specific nutrients for Indica and Sativa.
P: Who’s done that?
F: Advance Nutrients.
P: Oh, yeah. Advance Nutrients is, umm, I have to give them a lot of credit because they are pushing the envelope in cannabis research and I think that there is no one else quite like them in this field. Michael is a scientist. He has a scientific mind, he is a visionary and he’s helped us a lot, in move with research because we couldn’t do without them. You see with Advance stuff they run files on certain strains and give them certain nutrients and I analyse the nutrients they’re giving to the plants at specific stages in the growth cycle. So, we know the nutrients the plant’s getting and we know the cannabanoid profile that’s coming out in the bud as a result of those nutrients. And no one else is doing this research.
F: Is anybody doing research like this, in other plants like in tobacco or wheat?
P: I’m sure similar research is done in other plants but no one has done this in cannabis. And I’m interested in what can be done with certain fertilizing regimes to the cannabanoid profiles that they want to be put into the Compassion Club.
F: Is higher THC always the goal?
P: No. CBD and THC ratios are very important.
F: I recently heard about a sample that was at 36.8%. THC (Laughter) Do you know anything else about that profile?
P: Yeah, I did the analysis.
F: What plant was that?
P: I watched the thing come out. My mouth was hanging down around to my knees. I couldn’t believe it. It was amazing. It was just an incredible sound.
F: And was it mature?
P: It peaks….I don’t know if I should be talking about this. Well I guess it’s ok.
We’ve recently discovered a phenomenon in growing an eight week plant. The THC peaks between weeks six and seven and it’s about two or three points less at week eight as it is at week seven.
F: Why?
P: Well that’s because you’re flushing: And when you flush, you stop your nutrient flow into your plant; it quits producing the cannabanoids, these resinous cannabanoids, your leaf weight increases into the last week but you don’t see the cannabanoids increase and you’re diluting your cannabanoids in the leaf weight. But if you cut it at week seven you’re going to get nutrient piece in your bud. There’s a catch 22 there. We’re trying to sort out which nutrients are required to keep the THC coming while the flush in continuing, if that’s possible. So, this is news for all growers. We discovered this phenomenon about a month ago. We’ve seen it before but hadn’t really come clear in our minds but it does appear to be a definitely happening.
F: For a very long time, I’m infamous for cutting early. When the plant is completely in full bloom and all the flowers all at once kind of turn from white to a creamy colour. Bang, that’s where I go.
P: What week would that be at?
F: Depending on the variety but, yeah, somewhere around week seven.
P: And do you get the nutrient taste in the bud?
F: I’m completely satisfied with it. I’m not using any Advance Nutrients. I’m pretty much still stone axes and bare skins. (Laughter)
P: You should be ashamed.
F: Alright. This strain with the 30% plus THC, what was that?
P: It was a Northern Lights strain.
F: A pure Northern Lights strain?
P: As far as I know a Northern Lights strain number 1 and it’s grown in Calgary.
F: I know that Advance Nutrients has a lot of medical patients with exemptions and that’s how they get their data from rooms and things. Over the years, have you recognized a certain strain as the one that just keeps on coming out in front? That meets most people’s requirements and needs?
P: I’ve seen magic strains from time to time. These past two weeks have been bizarre. A fellow brought me a strain called Salmon Creek and Big Bud. It’s kind of two names. It’s a B.C. bud strain. It was 21% cannabadial CBD. Now getting 21% THC is fair enough but this was 21% CBD and 8% THC. That could be a very useful strain medicinally because CBD is important. It’s things like that that blow me away rather than the strain that I’m focused on for medicinal value. I look at different properties from different strains for medicinal value and rather than focusing on a strain.
F: And have you reached any conclusions about strains and any particular disease.
P: I’ve seen the more wild type of strain to have a more balanced cannabanoid ratio. With B.C. bud the THC is through the roof and all the other cannabanoids have more or less stuck it out.
F: They’re suppressed a little.
P: The true medicine I believe has more cannabanoids in it than just THC. THC does one job and the other cannabanoids are important for modulating the affect of the Delta 9.
F: Are they working with any breeders to develop strains.
P: Yeah, sure.
F: Any breeders in particular?
P: Yeah, I work with two, I don’t know if I can give their names.
F: Is there a particular direction that you are going with the breeders and a certain type of strain? Is there a goal?
P: My own research, most definitely. We’re looking for, like I just told you, the strain with the right profile, the most medicinal benefit. Because I know what will help epileptics, what will help a person with multiple sclerosis, what will help a person with glaucoma, what is the right THC, Delta 9, CBN, CBD ratio.
F: Would you name something for each one of those?
P: A natural product cannabis medicine for those specific ailments, we’re looking for strains to fill that hole.
F: Have you chosen any yet?
P: Yeah, we’ve got them lined up.
F: Well you’re not telling?
P: No. But I’ll tell you that for an epileptic, you want a lot of CBD there. A higher CBD to Delta 9 ratio is better for epileptics as a general rule. So, if I find a strain with a high CBD level to a Delta 9 ratio, then I’ll put that into my epileptic group as a potential for epileptic treatment.
F: But you still haven’t told me anything.
P: I haven’t told which strains are specifically working on certain ailments?
F: Right.
P: No because those things will change. The cannabanoid profiles don’t. I’m looking for specific cannabanoid profiles rather than specific strains. These strains may have the same profiles that I want.
F: But of them all you must be able to know that that one there fits the profile the closest and it does time after time after time. You won’t step on that one will you?
P: I told you the profile for epilepsy had higher CBDs Delta 9 ratio. That’s the epileptic profile but strain names, I really don’t know. One called Hero is an excellent strain. It goes to 25% Delta 9 and has 2% CBD. It’s very effective in treating people with pain and it’s a Sativa like strain
F: It sounds like something that would make me paranoid if I smoke just a little too much.
P: It’s the high Delta 9.
F: Yeah and the low CBD.
P: CBN is an interesting one. I understand that CBNs are destroyed when you smoke but not when you eat it.
F: Could you clear this up a little bit for me? Could you explain Delta 9 to me? What is Delta 9, how many compounds are we’re talking about?
P: Delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol is a psychoactive cannabanoid. It’s what gets you high . In B.C. bud there’s only five compounds there in any great quantity. There’s tetrahydrocannabitriol acid, THCA it’s abbreviated. Then there’s Delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol, then there’s cannabinol, then there’s cannabidiolic cacid, and then there’s cannabidiol. Those are the five compounds you see in any sort of quantity in B.C. bud. This is the way they have been bred and environmentally manipulated to produce these five compounds by the breeders over the years to push up the THC level. Now, when I look at a B.C. sample, the compound that you see in the most abundance is THCA because when you heat THCA it converts directly one to one to Delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol, the compound that gets you high. The way I analyse cannabis is by HPLC, high pressure liquid chromatography. Ninety- nine percent of the world analysing cannabanoids use gas chromatins. Liquid chromatography works at near room temperature. Gas chromatography, you have to heat the sample to vaporize it, to put it in the gaseous state. When you heat cannabis you change its whole structure, you change its properties. Because I’m not heating it I see the way it is in nature with the THC acid unconverted to the Delta 9. When you see the way it is in nature, you get an idea of how to make the medicine. If you burn the sample, if you do a gas chromatography, you miss all that because the THC acid is not psychoactive and you’re converting it one to one, to a compound that is, you don’t have to do that. You can heat the sample and stop it anywhere you want and get the Delta 9 concentration that you want.
F: Is there already Delta 9 in a sample?
P: There’s a little bit of Delta 9 in cannabis, about one percent. Then I’ll see 20% THC acid. When you heat the sample, that THC acid, that 20% will go to 20% Delta 9. If you’re making muffins or brownies, you heat it at 300 º for say 40 minutes to make your brownies. When the temperature gets about 60 º C. the THC acid starts to convert to Delta 9. When you get above 200 º C. the THC starts to evaporate, to blow off, to go skyward. You’ve got to keep your temperature somewhere in between because you want to convert the acid to the Delta 9 so you get your psychoactive compound when you eat it but you don’t want to evaporate it all. I’ve looked at baked cannabis products and they’re maybe putting out 10% THC acids with no Delta 9 at all because they haven’t converted it, they haven’t heated it long enough or they’ve heated it too hard and blown it all off. When you’re baking baked products you got to be real careful to convert your acid to your Delta 9 without blowing it off.
F: Do you have a schedule for cooking Cannabis?
P: That’s something I’d like to publish. I think it would be really useful to a lot of people trying to make edible cannabis products. I prefer eating it myself
F: Anything that you would like to share that we’ve haven’t covered yet?
P: Just that my driving force behind all of this is really discovery. It’s such an opportunity for exploration. It’s like being in the mouth of the Amazon in the 1900s. You’ve got a canoe and a paddle and that whole river up ahead for you to explore. That’s what natural product cannabis is like for me. It’s unexplored territory and it’s a lot of fun. Any fool can see that there’s money to be made from this but it’s not my driving force. More my interest is the unexplored properties of these compounds called cannabanoids peculiar only to the cannabis plant. My driving force with cannabis is discovery because there’s really nothing that’s done on it. Nothing credible is done on natural product cannabis in terms of medicinal value and that’s been my driving force since day one.
This article was written for the magazine Cannabis Culture in 2004.
I recently had the pleasure of talking to one of the world’s leading cannabis research scientist, Dr. Hornby. For the last five years he has been helping the Vancouver Compassion Club to better understand how cannabis helps their patients. He had been identifying cannabin profiles that will help specific ailments. This means that some day patients will be able to get the cannabis that works best for them. Perhaps in the future doctors, who prescribe cannabis for their patients, will be able to choose from specific strains that will help specific problems.
Dr. Hornby had been collaborating with Advance Nutrients and together they have been able to come up with many products designed specifically for growing cannabis. Dr. Hornby has four products with his name on them. You may have seen them at your local hydroponics store. Right now he’s working on perfecting a new product called Scorpion Juice which is suppose to make the plant produce more oils and be more frost tolerant.
I called Dr. Hornby at his home in Richmond, B.C., late on a Saturday morning. He was very open about many things and then there were a few things that he didn’t really want to share but he did share a lot of new exciting discoveries. We talked for hours and I’m looking forward to meeting him in the future. This is a portion of the conversation we had.
Dr. Paul Hornby
April 17, 2004.
F: Hi Paul, What type of doctor are you?
P: I have a PhD in Human Pathology. During my masters degree in Biochemistry I worked with compounds that altered human physiology and in my masters degree I worked with anaesthetics.
F: Until a few days ago I had no idea who Dr. Hornby was. I’ve seen the products around but I never paid too much attention to them. I’m just a regular old backyard gardener. How did you come to be as deeply involved in marijuana as you are?
P: Through hemp.
F: You started in the hemp business?
P: Well industrial hemp. A fellow called me years ago at a lab that I was working in and asked me if I could measure THC in hemp. So, that kind of struck me, for reasons of my own, being interesting because I’ve known for years how useful the cannabis plant is. You could make 35 hundred different products from it.
F: So you actually originally started out in the fibre part of it all.
P: Yeah, after a lot of hassle I got a license to analyse hemp for its THC level. So I started analysing hemp and looking at the profiles and I just got more and more involved in it. What happened is, I guess I ran into people like Hilary Black of the Vancouver Compassion Club and she was telling me about strange and specific symptom relief. This is people with certain ailments will keep going back to the same strain over and over again.
F: When did that research start?
P: That was 5 years ago. But, at the same time as that as I was looking at these hemp samples and noticing the profiles from them and also talking to Hilary realizing that these profiles could give an explanation to why people went back to the same strain over and over again. Because I was noting the difference with the cannabanoid profile in the different strains. It didn’t surprise me that she was observing this.
F: What strains have you seen that keeping popping to the top of the list?
P: Well, I’ve look at many different strains over the years and from what I’ve been looking at, the ones that can be affective at the Compassionate Club. So if they get people who need relief from epileptic seizure smoking a specific strain, then I will look at the cannabanoid profile of that strain.
F: And have you bee able to narrow it down to…
P: Well we’re building data on it, you know. This is all brand new! What’s so exciting to me about it all, this research, is that it’s all brand new; no one has done it before. Now, years ago when I started getting interested in the medicinal aspect of cannabanoids, I went on my research network and searched all my data bases for any valid scientific work that’s been done on cannabis. In clinical trials on natural product cannabis, not synthetic dronabinol or marinol made by the pharmaceutical companies.
F: I didn’t know that most clinical trials used synthetic forms.
P: Well look at the research. Look at the data that is out there. It’s not done on natural product cannabis. In smoking experiments done on natural product cannabis there’s not been a lot of the research results, but clinical trials done on synthetic dronabanol, the results are sort of scattered and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.
F: OK. Like I was asking before, can you pick a certain case where there’s a patient with a particular problem and this particular strain works well for them?
P: No we have not because we haven’t found that strain that work well for them and to get a better idea as to which cannabanoids are relieving symptoms.
Nobody knows yet. We’re not allowed to do this research but we have to reach for it and we have to do it kind of clandestinely and move slowly. We’re learning. What’s, too, exciting about it is there is so much stuff on this topic, so much to learn.
F: I’ve heard of some new products, strain specific nutrients for Indica and Sativa.
P: Who’s done that?
F: Advance Nutrients.
P: Oh, yeah. Advance Nutrients is, umm, I have to give them a lot of credit because they are pushing the envelope in cannabis research and I think that there is no one else quite like them in this field. Michael is a scientist. He has a scientific mind, he is a visionary and he’s helped us a lot, in move with research because we couldn’t do without them. You see with Advance stuff they run files on certain strains and give them certain nutrients and I analyse the nutrients they’re giving to the plants at specific stages in the growth cycle. So, we know the nutrients the plant’s getting and we know the cannabanoid profile that’s coming out in the bud as a result of those nutrients. And no one else is doing this research.
F: Is anybody doing research like this, in other plants like in tobacco or wheat?
P: I’m sure similar research is done in other plants but no one has done this in cannabis. And I’m interested in what can be done with certain fertilizing regimes to the cannabanoid profiles that they want to be put into the Compassion Club.
F: Is higher THC always the goal?
P: No. CBD and THC ratios are very important.
F: I recently heard about a sample that was at 36.8%. THC (Laughter) Do you know anything else about that profile?
P: Yeah, I did the analysis.
F: What plant was that?
P: I watched the thing come out. My mouth was hanging down around to my knees. I couldn’t believe it. It was amazing. It was just an incredible sound.
F: And was it mature?
P: It peaks….I don’t know if I should be talking about this. Well I guess it’s ok.
We’ve recently discovered a phenomenon in growing an eight week plant. The THC peaks between weeks six and seven and it’s about two or three points less at week eight as it is at week seven.
F: Why?
P: Well that’s because you’re flushing: And when you flush, you stop your nutrient flow into your plant; it quits producing the cannabanoids, these resinous cannabanoids, your leaf weight increases into the last week but you don’t see the cannabanoids increase and you’re diluting your cannabanoids in the leaf weight. But if you cut it at week seven you’re going to get nutrient piece in your bud. There’s a catch 22 there. We’re trying to sort out which nutrients are required to keep the THC coming while the flush in continuing, if that’s possible. So, this is news for all growers. We discovered this phenomenon about a month ago. We’ve seen it before but hadn’t really come clear in our minds but it does appear to be a definitely happening.
F: For a very long time, I’m infamous for cutting early. When the plant is completely in full bloom and all the flowers all at once kind of turn from white to a creamy colour. Bang, that’s where I go.
P: What week would that be at?
F: Depending on the variety but, yeah, somewhere around week seven.
P: And do you get the nutrient taste in the bud?
F: I’m completely satisfied with it. I’m not using any Advance Nutrients. I’m pretty much still stone axes and bare skins. (Laughter)
P: You should be ashamed.
F: Alright. This strain with the 30% plus THC, what was that?
P: It was a Northern Lights strain.
F: A pure Northern Lights strain?
P: As far as I know a Northern Lights strain number 1 and it’s grown in Calgary.
F: I know that Advance Nutrients has a lot of medical patients with exemptions and that’s how they get their data from rooms and things. Over the years, have you recognized a certain strain as the one that just keeps on coming out in front? That meets most people’s requirements and needs?
P: I’ve seen magic strains from time to time. These past two weeks have been bizarre. A fellow brought me a strain called Salmon Creek and Big Bud. It’s kind of two names. It’s a B.C. bud strain. It was 21% cannabadial CBD. Now getting 21% THC is fair enough but this was 21% CBD and 8% THC. That could be a very useful strain medicinally because CBD is important. It’s things like that that blow me away rather than the strain that I’m focused on for medicinal value. I look at different properties from different strains for medicinal value and rather than focusing on a strain.
F: And have you reached any conclusions about strains and any particular disease.
P: I’ve seen the more wild type of strain to have a more balanced cannabanoid ratio. With B.C. bud the THC is through the roof and all the other cannabanoids have more or less stuck it out.
F: They’re suppressed a little.
P: The true medicine I believe has more cannabanoids in it than just THC. THC does one job and the other cannabanoids are important for modulating the affect of the Delta 9.
F: Are they working with any breeders to develop strains.
P: Yeah, sure.
F: Any breeders in particular?
P: Yeah, I work with two, I don’t know if I can give their names.
F: Is there a particular direction that you are going with the breeders and a certain type of strain? Is there a goal?
P: My own research, most definitely. We’re looking for, like I just told you, the strain with the right profile, the most medicinal benefit. Because I know what will help epileptics, what will help a person with multiple sclerosis, what will help a person with glaucoma, what is the right THC, Delta 9, CBN, CBD ratio.
F: Would you name something for each one of those?
P: A natural product cannabis medicine for those specific ailments, we’re looking for strains to fill that hole.
F: Have you chosen any yet?
P: Yeah, we’ve got them lined up.
F: Well you’re not telling?
P: No. But I’ll tell you that for an epileptic, you want a lot of CBD there. A higher CBD to Delta 9 ratio is better for epileptics as a general rule. So, if I find a strain with a high CBD level to a Delta 9 ratio, then I’ll put that into my epileptic group as a potential for epileptic treatment.
F: But you still haven’t told me anything.
P: I haven’t told which strains are specifically working on certain ailments?
F: Right.
P: No because those things will change. The cannabanoid profiles don’t. I’m looking for specific cannabanoid profiles rather than specific strains. These strains may have the same profiles that I want.
F: But of them all you must be able to know that that one there fits the profile the closest and it does time after time after time. You won’t step on that one will you?
P: I told you the profile for epilepsy had higher CBDs Delta 9 ratio. That’s the epileptic profile but strain names, I really don’t know. One called Hero is an excellent strain. It goes to 25% Delta 9 and has 2% CBD. It’s very effective in treating people with pain and it’s a Sativa like strain
F: It sounds like something that would make me paranoid if I smoke just a little too much.
P: It’s the high Delta 9.
F: Yeah and the low CBD.
P: CBN is an interesting one. I understand that CBNs are destroyed when you smoke but not when you eat it.
F: Could you clear this up a little bit for me? Could you explain Delta 9 to me? What is Delta 9, how many compounds are we’re talking about?
P: Delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol is a psychoactive cannabanoid. It’s what gets you high . In B.C. bud there’s only five compounds there in any great quantity. There’s tetrahydrocannabitriol acid, THCA it’s abbreviated. Then there’s Delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol, then there’s cannabinol, then there’s cannabidiolic cacid, and then there’s cannabidiol. Those are the five compounds you see in any sort of quantity in B.C. bud. This is the way they have been bred and environmentally manipulated to produce these five compounds by the breeders over the years to push up the THC level. Now, when I look at a B.C. sample, the compound that you see in the most abundance is THCA because when you heat THCA it converts directly one to one to Delta 9-tetrahydrocannabinol, the compound that gets you high. The way I analyse cannabis is by HPLC, high pressure liquid chromatography. Ninety- nine percent of the world analysing cannabanoids use gas chromatins. Liquid chromatography works at near room temperature. Gas chromatography, you have to heat the sample to vaporize it, to put it in the gaseous state. When you heat cannabis you change its whole structure, you change its properties. Because I’m not heating it I see the way it is in nature with the THC acid unconverted to the Delta 9. When you see the way it is in nature, you get an idea of how to make the medicine. If you burn the sample, if you do a gas chromatography, you miss all that because the THC acid is not psychoactive and you’re converting it one to one, to a compound that is, you don’t have to do that. You can heat the sample and stop it anywhere you want and get the Delta 9 concentration that you want.
F: Is there already Delta 9 in a sample?
P: There’s a little bit of Delta 9 in cannabis, about one percent. Then I’ll see 20% THC acid. When you heat the sample, that THC acid, that 20% will go to 20% Delta 9. If you’re making muffins or brownies, you heat it at 300 º for say 40 minutes to make your brownies. When the temperature gets about 60 º C. the THC acid starts to convert to Delta 9. When you get above 200 º C. the THC starts to evaporate, to blow off, to go skyward. You’ve got to keep your temperature somewhere in between because you want to convert the acid to the Delta 9 so you get your psychoactive compound when you eat it but you don’t want to evaporate it all. I’ve looked at baked cannabis products and they’re maybe putting out 10% THC acids with no Delta 9 at all because they haven’t converted it, they haven’t heated it long enough or they’ve heated it too hard and blown it all off. When you’re baking baked products you got to be real careful to convert your acid to your Delta 9 without blowing it off.
F: Do you have a schedule for cooking Cannabis?
P: That’s something I’d like to publish. I think it would be really useful to a lot of people trying to make edible cannabis products. I prefer eating it myself
F: Anything that you would like to share that we’ve haven’t covered yet?
P: Just that my driving force behind all of this is really discovery. It’s such an opportunity for exploration. It’s like being in the mouth of the Amazon in the 1900s. You’ve got a canoe and a paddle and that whole river up ahead for you to explore. That’s what natural product cannabis is like for me. It’s unexplored territory and it’s a lot of fun. Any fool can see that there’s money to be made from this but it’s not my driving force. More my interest is the unexplored properties of these compounds called cannabanoids peculiar only to the cannabis plant. My driving force with cannabis is discovery because there’s really nothing that’s done on it. Nothing credible is done on natural product cannabis in terms of medicinal value and that’s been my driving force since day one.
This article was written for the magazine Cannabis Culture in 2004.