In light of recent media attention, calling CBD a “trendy supplement” would be something of an understatement. CBD has become popular with mainstream consumers to an extent that few other health food store staples could possibly match. When was the last time you walked down the book aisle at your local supermarket and saw a magazine, for example, about goji berries? Recently, though, a magazine entirely about CBD flooded America’s supermarket chains and was displayed prominently in stores ranging from Safeway to Walmart. You find CBD in gas stations and convenience stores. You can find it in vape shops. You can even find it at Vitamin Shoppe and GNC. Before you grab some CBD oil or CBD vape gear and try the world’s most fashionable supplement for yourself, though, here are 5 key CBD facts that you should know.
CBD Is Legal Almost Everywhere
CBD is an extract of the cannabis plant, and in the United States, cannabis easily has the murkiest and most complicated legal history of anything in the plant kingdom. The U.S. government recognizes two forms of cannabis from a legal standpoint. The first type – industrial hemp – is legal to grow everywhere in the United States. It’s grown for its seeds and oils, for textile production, for biodiesel fuel and more. The second type of cannabis is marijuana. Marijuana is illegal federally, but many states have instituted laws that make the plant legal for medicinal and/or recreational uses. The complicated legal landscape makes CBD a confusing product for the uninitiated.
Take some time to do your research, especially if you will be traveling with cbd, to make sure you don’t get busted! The only thing you really need to know, though, is that CBD extracted from industrial hemp – as almost all CBD is – is legal nationwide as long as companies don’t attempt to market it as a medication.
If you live in a green state, your local dispensary may also stock CBD-rich products that contain THC. The attendants at the dispensary can help you choose the product that’s right for you.
CBD Has No Euphoric Properties
There’s a reason why industrial hemp has become legal across the United States after decades of social and political stigmatization. It’s because smoking it will do absolutely nothing for you. The United States government legally defines industrial hemp as cannabis that contains less than 0.3 percent THC after drying. That’s practically nothing. Industrial hemp has no ability to intoxicate you or to make you feel euphoric or high. It can’t impair your ability to go about your daily business, it isn’t a drug of abuse, and it has no recreational purpose. An extract of industrial hemp, likewise, will not change your mental state in a way that causes you to become unproductive. Because a few people have reported drowsiness after using CBD, it’s recommended that you avoid driving after trying CBD for the first time. Otherwise, you can feel confident about making CBD part of your supplement regimen without altering your daily habits.
CBD Comes in an Enormous Variety of Forms
When you begin looking for the CBD product that’s right for you, you’ll quickly notice that the most popular form of CBD is an oral tincture that you hold under your tongue and then swallow. CBD oil is popular in part because it undergoes minimal processing and is slightly less expensive than some other types of CBD products. You shouldn’t, however, let your experiments with CBD begin and end with CBD oil because there are many, many other types of CBD products on the market. You can buy a topical product and apply CBD directly to your skin. You can buy flavorless CBD capsules or sweet CBD gummies. You can find CBD products for hair and skin care. You can even vaporize and inhale CBD for super-fast absorption. Don’t stop experimenting until you find the CBD product that’s perfect for you; it’s out there.
CBD Is Incredibly Costly to Produce
Have you ever wondered why CBD is so expensive to buy even though you can find it almost everywhere? The high prices for CBD products are the direct result of how incredibly costly those products are to produce. You already know that CBD is a natural extract from the industrial hemp plant. What you may not know, though, is that it requires an investment of thousands of dollars just to buy the seeds for a good-sized crop of CBD hemp because seeds guaranteed to grow into plants that are rich in CBD while meeting federal guidelines for THC content can cost more than $1.00 each. The problems only continue from there. A single male plant, if not found and pulled promptly, can fertilize an entire crop of female plants, reducing the CBD content of those plants and making the crop essentially worthless. When it’s time to process a hemp crop and extract its CBD oil, yields can be disappointing because it takes a high volume of plant material to make a relatively low volume of CBD oil. For companies that attempt to produce CBD oil from their own hemp crops, it can be difficult just to break even – let alone to turn a profit. CBD might be expensive for consumers, but it’s equally expensive for growers and producers.
CBD Was One of the First Cannabinoids Isolated From Cannabis
Roger Adams, working in collaboration with the United States government and Cornell University, first isolated CBD from wild hemp and documented his discovery in a 1940 publication. CBD was just the second cannabinoid identified and isolated from hemp; the first was cannabinol (CBN). To isolate CBD, Adams began by creating a full-spectrum extract of wild hemp using ethanol. He then subjected the extract to several stages of purification before he finally arrived at a product of pure crystalline CBD – much the same as the CBD isolate that you can buy from many CBD companies today. It would be many years before scientists would begin to identify some of the potential uses of CBD, of course, but it’s interesting to note that researchers actually discovered and isolated CBD before they isolated the much more famous cannabinoid THC.