Like the two previously reviewed offerings of CannTrust’s Warlock, this pre-roll product contains a large portion of seeds.
For this review, the rolling paper was removed from the pre-roll and a filter box was used to separate the dried cannabis material from the unwanted material. Both sets of separated material were weighed before being subjected to 120 seconds in a Volcano vaporizer at maximum heat, and were weighed again. The separated seed and stem lost 17% of the original mass while the filtered material lost 24% of its original mass. The stem and seed portion weighed 0.41 grams initially and 0.34 grams after 120 seconds in a vaporizer.
Today we’re looking at CannTrust’s Warlock. They sell this cultivar under two of their brands, Xscape where they call it Walk the Dog and Synr.g where they call it Fantasy Island. I’ve reviewed them both in whole flower form and found seeds in both. We’ll look at the Fantasy Island Pre-Roll product today, it is the first CannTrust pre-roll we’ve reviewed, and we’ll see that it includes a large number of smaller seeds.
Check the reviews for full info on Warlock, short description is this is a Magnus cultivar, but now it is available from Serious Seeds in both a THC dominant and a 1:1 chemotype. If you like Warlock (like I do), I would consider growing it yourself.
At the time of writing, I’ve completed reviews for 7 CannTrust products, 4 of those reviews were affected by seeds, 3 of them were for their Warlock. Most of the seeds I’ve found in their product are small an immature, very difficult to see with the naked eye. I also found seeds in their White Widow product, ranging from small and immature, to viable.
In this review, the question I’m trying to answer is; what amount of the cannabis in this pre-roll is compromised by seed and stem? We make this determination by comparing the weight of the seed and stem with the weight of the material we filtered out.
Secondly, we’re going to run both sets through a vaporizer for equal time and weigh them again. Weight loss is expected from both sets of separated material, with minimum weight loss from the seed and stem material.
We’ll look at some pictures first, here is a wider view of the cannabis. Again, it was nearly impossible to see these seeds with the naked eye, you really have to look for them. They are so numerous however, that they are quite easy to pick out in the photo below.
Let’s zoom in on a couple. You can see them mixed in with the dried flower, they’re small and easy to miss. We’ll have a better look at the seeds once we remove all the flower material.
The above is a cropped photo of a larger view, it is really easy to zoom into this cannabis and spot several seeds within the frame.
A small piece of card stock was used to grind the cannabis slightly and a 3″ x 5″ sift box was used to filter the pulverized material. The box was shaken gently intermittently to filter the material. Once the cannabis reached the point where I noticed seeds in the filtered material, I stopped and both separated sections were weighed.
Below, we see a wide shot of the material after filtration. With the usable cannabis material mostly removed, the seeds and stems are much easier to see.
And looking closer now, this is a cropped version of the image above. You can see that there is still some flower material still present in this group but the amount of stem and seed is clearly visible.
And one more, also a cropped image of the one above. Smaller sized particles will naturally fall to the bottom of the mix while the larger stems sit on top. Important to notice, the seeds are mixed with the rest of the smaller, granulized material.
This was a one gram pre-roll. I found that 0.5g of that material fell through the screen and was viewed as usable material.
We’ll look at that material up close below, you’ll see it’s more granular.
And another shot of the material that fell through the filter, I think there are a few seed shards in here but most of what was filtered appears to be green flower tissue and trichomes.
Like I said above, of the total one gram contents of the pre-roll, about half the material that filtered through the screen (0.50g). The stem and seed group weighed 0.41 grams and 0.09 grams were lost during transfer or can be attributed to the scale’s accuracy.
After 120 seconds in the vaporizer, both groups had lost weight. The stem and seed group lost 17% of its weight (final weight was 0.34 grams) and the filtered material lost 24% of the original weight (final, 0.38 grams).
Some of the weight lost from both groups was due to water content being evaporated, another component of the lost mass is cannabinoid and terpene content. One gram of this material has 130 mg of THC, which is 13%, both groups lost more % mass than this value. The filtered material containing the trichomes and flower tissue lost mass at the greatest rate (24% over 120 seconds) while the seed/stem group lost the least (17% over 120 second), suggesting that the flower tissue group had more cannabinoid/terpene content.
If I were to do this again, I would do several trials of 60 seconds in the vaporizer and would except that the filtered material continue to lose mass as the seed and stem group tapers off on weight loss. In reality, you’d test the cannabis in both sets before and after vaporization, to determine the actual amount of cannabinoids present in the initial samples and lost when they were vaporized. For the purposes of this review, a rough estimate will suffice; welcome to pancakenap everyone.
Here’s my logic, smoking anything is absolutely bad for you. Smoke from cannabis isn’t good for your lungs, you’re taking a huge risk with your longevity. Think about a bank robbery, like any risk, you want the most reward possible for the least amount of exposure. Seeds are full of nutrients, but contain very little usable cannabinoid content, so consumers maintain the same risk, but the reward is decreased. Cannabis flower is variable, it will never be perfect but there are things you can do to mitigate the extra risks, like trimming properly, removing the stems and choosing not to smoke seedy cannabis. This is the reason that I suggest using a vaporizer, it boils the cannabinoid/terpene molecules, cleaving weak bonds within them, but largely, leaves everything else intact.
If the final weight of the stem and seed group (0.34 grams) is an accurate estimate for the amount of unwanted material in this cannabis (material containing little to no THC/CBD), about 34% of the material received in the pre-roll included little of the content I paid for.
The stem and seed group likely has some cannabinoid content, but let’s assume this seed and stem has 0% THC/CBD for a moment. Let’s also assume the weight at the lower mass, after the material was vaporized (0.34 grams). We paid for 1 gram of material and received 0.66 grams of material. The cannabinoid content was 130.4 mg THC/CBD over 1000mg of total material, applying the assumption to both measurements, we get 89.98 mg THC/CBD over 690mg of total usable material.
Perhaps not a popular point right now, but this is $11.00 per gram. Applying our ratio to usable to unusable from above, the price is $7.26 for the stuff you can use and $3.74 for the stems and seeds. I can find these pre-rolls in two provincial web stores around the $11.00 per gram mark.
Alright, there is another offering from CannTrust. By this point, you can trust that there is some amount of seeds in their product. I’ve had a few good purchases from them, I even recommend their Gold Kush, but most of what I have received (especially lately) has been this seed laden quality.
CannTrust does have a pretty decent genetic offering, although many are just renamed Paradise cultivars they note as proprietary or unique, I’d still consider it worth a look. These new phenotypes could be something interesting, or could be commonly available cannabis, with desperate marketing. I’m down to find out but, as most of their product has been compromised by seed, I’m afraid it won’t be without disappointment.
This offering was purchased via the Alberta Cannabis online store, check out this summary of all my purchases from the store with some highlights from each review.
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