Kief (regular)

Kief (regular) comes in two weights, 14 g and 28 g. It is loose kief, the fine powder of resin glands, or trichomes, that builds up wherever cannabis flowers are ground or sifted.

Resin glands that fall as golden dust

As Leafly describes it, kief is trichomes that have dropped off the buds, usually a golden or brown powder with the look of dust. Sensi Seeds calls these trichomes the resinous crystals the plant uses to defend itself against pests, and says that under a microscope each one is a mushroom-shaped resin gland with a stalk and a head.

Grinders, catchers and scrapers

Most kief, according to Leafly, is collected in a grinder fitted with a kief catcher, a chamber that slowly gathers the powder from ground buds; some grinders also come with a small spatula-like scraper for getting it out. Sensi Seeds calls a three-part grinder the easiest way to collect it, since a few turns drop the kief into the bottom section, though building up any volume takes a lot of plant material. Our grinder cleaning guide covers metal and plastic grinders and how to save the kief while cleaning.

Five ways kief gets used

Leafly lists five uses for kief:

• Sprinkled over flower in a pipe or bong.
• Pressed into hash, which Leafly sums up as kief packed into dense pieces.
• Used as the coating on moon rocks: buds dipped in cannabis oil, then covered in kief.
• Pressed into rosin, a solventless extract, with heat and pressure.
• Added to the cannabis oil that goes into edibles; our guide to decarbing kief covers temperature, timing and method.

Starting slowly with kief

Health Canada’s lower-risk page names kief outright as a high-THC extract and suggests beginners and occasional users steer clear. For smoking or vaping, Health Canada starts people at 1 or 2 puffs, with 10% THC or less as the benchmark; the first effects show in seconds to minutes, and the peak can take 30 minutes to arrive.