| What’s your preferred THC percentage?
I asked that question Saturday to my 65-year-old aunt—one of Ohio’s first medical cannabis cardholders—who has never once complained to me about the multiple sclerosis that has slowed down her daily activities for as long as I can remember.
My aunt’s answer: 21% or 22% THC for the flower at the dispensary she frequents twice a month. Visiting her local retailer’s website, I found the average THC was 24.9% for the 50 flower products listed on the first page of the menu, including three products at 35% THC.
While some brands listed the primary terpenes upon clicking the product, many brands didn’t. Minor cannabinoid content was absent entirely.
Perhaps that’s because a large portion of cannabis shoppers today continue to make purchases based solely on product THC percentage, Cannabis Business Times columnist Kenneth Morrow wrote in our July issue.
While many producers list alternative cannabinoids and terpenes—and their respective percentages—contained in a given product via their certificates of analysis, doing so is not yet an industry-wide standard.
“To make a purchasing decision based on mere THC percentage is to forsake all other magical qualities that differentiate one cultivar from another,” Morrow wrote.
However, many growers across the industry still make seed purchases solely based on THC percentages, according to a trends feature CBT Managing Editor Patrick Williams wrote in March.
Yet many of America’s most popular cannabis cultivars are not the most potent products on the market: Wedding Cake (24% THC), Gelato, (17%), OG Kush (18%), Blue Dream (18%) and Sour Diesel (19%). (The correlating THC percentages are according to Leafly but can vary based on growing conditions.)
Wedding Cake, in particular, includes a notable percentage of cannabigerol (CBG) and limonene as its primary terpene, according to Leafly.
Maybe I asked my aunt the wrong question.
THC or terpenes: What’s your preference?
-Tony Lange, Associate Editor | 
