Identification: Small to large plant. Potent hybrids are smaller. Leaves are 5-bladed, serrated (toothed) leaflets. Plant has a tough fibrous stem. Green female flower buds are the sought after part.Habitat: Subtropical and High-potency hybrid marijuana buds temperate; wild strain is drought tolerant and will grow equally well on drained and marshy wet soils. In Michigan, before the legalization of medical marijuana in 2008, it was typically grown in canvas or coarse fiber grain sacks or flour bags stuffed with compost, and then placed atop rich wetland earth (or any other somewhat inaccessible area where plants are hidden).
Toxins/Drugs: Cannabinoids to include 1-THC and sixty-one other cannabinoids and numerous volatile oils to include humules, caryophyllene, alpha-pinenes, beta-pinenes, beta-ocimene, limonene, myrcene, and numerous flavonoids. Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) extracted in oil is an illegal psychoactive condiment used in homemade brownie and cookie mixes to provide a “high.” THC is lipophyllic, fat loving, and is contained in flower heads (female buds) and smoked or processed into concentrated doses such as blond and black hashish.
Symptoms: May cause either clear (apparent) or confused thinking (all at the same time equals the psychedelic effect). These effects, after repeated use, may lead to anxiety, paranoia, confusion, and unclear thinking, but not typically. Empathy may be affected, and disassociation manifested. In a few people effects go to a higher level; in others effects are less. Psychotropic effects include “buzz,” euphoria (“stoned”), lost incentive (temporary), lost drive, diluted inhibition, and acute sensitivity to stimuli (sensory stimulant) including increased sensitivity to taste (craving), color, sound, heat, and cold. Potent dose alters spatial and time perception. Symptoms are transitory and short term (up to 6 hours). New hybrids are more intense and cultivated for particular traits: analgesic, euphoric, sedative. The effect of the drug is dependent on the individual, the environment, and the quality and quantity of drug: that is, being with friends in a natural, safe setting often leads to either a robust experience or meditative relaxation.
First Aid: Self-limiting: User may need physical help when walking. He or she may become disoriented and unable to move for a period of time, in some cases 2–3 hours. Typically they are in a very sedate condition, seemingly engrossed (trancelike) with sensory stimuli enhanced (music, nature, food, etc.). Physical and emotional support will carry the day. Keep in mind that the individual may not be able to rise for a restroom excursion.
Note: Marijuana may treat contact dermatitis, poison ivy. The Cherokee used marijuana as a stimulant, improving mental attitude in sick patients, giving them the will to go on and get well. This mild sedative appeared to help soldiers deal with the Vietnam War; Vietnam protesters used the drug for the same reason. While working with the Department of Defense in Asia and Europe the drug (typically blond and black hashish from Turkey) was readily available and openly used by officers and enlisted men. Herbal and culinary preparations of flower heads are antiemetic, antinausea, analgesic, a bronchial dilator, somewhat anti-asthmatic, and are used traditionally to treat gout, malaria, forgetfulness, beriberi, constipation, and anxiety. In Europe, it is used externally in balms and as a poultice for wounds, pain, soreness, infections. Also smoked or eaten to treat insomnia, arthritis, epilepsy, asthma, bronchitis, whooping cough, polyneuropathy. Eating the prepared drug circumvents the rasping, irritating effect of inhaling the hot smoke.
In modern medical practice, marijuana is used to treat pain and symptoms of cancer, ulcers, emphysema, bronchitis, anxiety, hysteria, neurasthenia. Marinol (dronabinol) is a commercial cannabis derivative used as an appetite stimulant for anorexia, loss of appetite due to cancer, and as an antiemetic caused by cancer treatments. Also a favored drug for AIDS patients. Chronic use may cause symptoms similar to chronic cigarette smoking such as bronchitis and laryngitis. Although marijuana research suggests that smoking the drug is less deleterious than smoking cigarettes, it is a health hazard. Like most drugs, pregnant and nursing mothers should avoid the drug.