What is the chemical explanation for the Sativa/Indica dichtomy?

[shmalphy]

What is the reason that a sativa gives you an uplifting high and an indica gives you couchlock?

I have heard it was because of the THC/CBD ratio, but I have also heard that western bred cannabis contains very little CBD. I also know that both indicas and sativas can be high in THC, and still give a different effect. I assume it's the entourage effect of the cannabinoids and terpenes, but I was wondering if I could get more info on the compounds responsible for the different effects. This will help quantify test results to help produce a "more sativa- sativa" and the same with indicas.

 

[mad librettist]

don't forget set and setting, which play a huge role

 

[shmalphy]

 

[gloryoskie]

I like that, but I don't get it. ^

 

[Hydro-Soil]

There are over 400 identified, 'active' cannabinoid and turpene compounds in cannabis.

I'll go out on a limb here and say that it's differing mixes of all those that create such profoundly different effects.

 

[KiefSweat]

The latest studies show that "indica's" have the gene for THC-V.

i think a lot of sativas are more pure in terms of single cannabinoids then a mix.

 

[shmalphy]

http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/i-see-what-you-did-there
“I see what you did there” is a common phrase used in spoken English, text, and Image Macros, generally to convey a condescending or patronizing tone as a reponse to a banal joke. However, the phrase is sometimes also used to convey a genuine admiration for another person’s wit, or even as a threatening message akin to “I know what you did.”


Thanks Kief, I didn't know that. Other than that it seems that there is not much definitive info on the subject, which is strange because it is one of the best known effects of cannabis is the sativa "high" and it seems that no one can pinpoint the chemical responsible...

 

[softyellowlight]

It may be less that it's due to Sativa genes adding something than it is due to the Sativa genes not loading it with beta-myrcene, the narcotic terpenoid.

 

[shmalphy]

Interesting. I have a theory that the heavy beta myrcene content in hoppy beers is what leads to a stronger narcotic effect when mixed with cannabis. I have recently done a lot of reading on terpenes, and I suspected it was the limonene that is common to sativas, especially hazes that causes an uplifting effect..

I was afraid this might be a dumb question, but it seems that there are no definitive answers yet, only theories...

 

[Cannabologist]

What is the reason that a sativa gives you an uplifting high and an indica gives you couchlock?

- It doesn't. This is a common misconception in cannabis, brought about by lack of knowledge regarding the phytochemical nature of the plant and varying populations of it, ecotypes and selection over time, etc.

I have heard it was because of the THC/CBD ratio, but I have also heard that western bred cannabis contains very little CBD. I also know that both indicas and sativas can be high in THC, and still give a different effect. I assume it's the entourage effect of the cannabinoids and terpenes, but I was wondering if I could get more info on the compounds responsible for the different effects. This will help quantify test results to help produce a "more sativa- sativa" and the same with indicas.

- Cannabis is Cannabis sativa. Proposed species beyond sativa have been rejected for many various reasons.

- Sativas don't make you "up", and "indicas" don't make you "down/couchlocked", it's all about the phytochemical makeup of the individual plant and plant population that individual came from as a whole that you are imbibing, and somewhat your personal state of being at the time, that matters.

- If "sativas" just made you "up", and "indicas" "down", there wouldn't be all this hoopla about other phytochemicals within cannabis beyond a few cannabinoids. It isn't as simple as "up" and "down", "sativa/indica" as the editors of high times want to make it to be, and has nothing to do really with the THC/CBD ratio, a very misunderstood topic.

- Terpenoids have various physiological mechanisms via which they can modulate the effects of THC and other cannabinoids.

- Cannabis bred for fiber content can be high in THC (and can possess broad leaves). The general goal of hemp breeders is to select out plants containing THC and select plants for fiber.

- A "sativa sativa"... "Sativa indica"... "Indica indica"... Most people can't even comprehend how silly and ridiculous that actually sounds, about as bad as seed sellers/coffeeshops/dispensaries telling customers plants are 30%indica/70%sativa hybrids, 50%/50% sativa-indica hybrids, or 100%indica/100%sativa, and other pseudoscience regarding genetics

 

[mrcreosote]

Don't tell people that...

I'm marketing my new hybrid seeds as 114% Moe Kush and 56% Shemp Lemon.

Screw Larry...he's overdone.

 

[shmalphy]

So then essentially a Haze has a specific terpene profile that gives a "up" high, that is obviously not shared by all sativas, and therefore it's effects were falsley attributed to it being a different species from varieties like Afghani and Kush.

 

[mad librettist]

So then essentially a Haze has a specific terpene profile that gives a "up" high, that is obviously not shared by all sativas, and therefore it's effects were falsley attributed to it being a different species from varieties like Afghani and Kush.

exactly!


other than the actual plant, what I said earlier about set and setting applies, and explains why the dichotomy exists, false as it is.


still, I doubt we will ever stop talking about sativa vs indica high. it's useful nomenclature even if it is unscientific. if i tell I have an indica stone going on, you know what I mean.

 

[shmalphy]

I have always disagreed with the idea that "sativas" are inherently better. Haze is a mutant with a very special makeup, just like Kush. Just like a Rottweiler and poodle in the dog world, it is a product of artificial selection.

With that said, there are vast differences in the landrace strains around the world, and with the old paradigm of "sativa indica dichotomy" being replaced by a new concept of entourage effects, we can use artificial selection for genetic mutations of specific terpene profiles. This concept is being combined with strain symptom correlation, and the cannabis plant is becoming more useful in treating and preventing illness than ever imagined.

 

[shmalphy]

Don't tell people that...

I'm marketing my new hybrid seeds as 114% Moe Kush and 56% Shemp Lemon.

Screw Larry...he's overdone.

Don't forget Curly....

 

[purple_man]

to many to behold (at the current state of knowledge), as the high is a multivectoral experience like every other, and yet not all aspects (consumer, inducer, ...) sitewise have been assesed

blessss

 

[Jack Harer]

I'd have to disagree on the Taxonomy. To MY knowledge, the latest taxonomy suggests 3 distinct species of cannabis: Sativa, Indica, and Ruderalis:

Professors William Emboden, Loran Anderson, and Harvard botanist Richard E. Schultes and coworkers also conducted taxonomic studies of Cannabis in the 1970s, and concluded that stable morphological differences exist that support recognition of at least three species, C. sativa, C. indica, and C. ruderalis.[41][42][43][44] For Schultes, this was a reversal of his previous interpretation that Cannabis is monotypic, with only a single species.[45] According to Schultes' and Anderson's descriptions, C. sativa is tall and laxly branched with relatively narrow leaflets, C. indica is shorter, conical in shape, and has relatively wide leaflets, and C. ruderalis is short, branchless, and grows wild in central Asia. This taxonomic interpretation was embraced by Cannabis aficionados who commonly distinguish narrow-leafed "sativa" drug strains from wide-leafed "indica" drug strains.[4

While I hate citing "Wiki" for anything conclusive, it was the fastest and most expeditious.

JH

 

[Cannabologist]

- I hate to attack Wikipedia, which IS usually a resoundingly good offhand source for information, but their information on cannabis is largely a joke and should be taken with a grain of salt.

- I have considered doing large revisions myself of such sections but I don't really have the time and that is a book's worth of info to pine over that perhaps will be written some day and people can quote that and fix wikipedia.

- Schultes and Emboden at the time were trying to reclassify cannabis for a few reasons; one, taxonomists love to "discover" things that are already there, this happens all the time. Take paleontology and the naming of dinosaurs, bigger adults are named a different species from younger, smaller dinos of the same species. Something that is a bigger size or different color or shape is suddenly a new species; it's not, its simply a different morph, or at a different life stage, such as adolescent compared to adult, and so on and so forth. The second reason was a legal one, getting Cannabis sativa classified as Cannabis indica would be a legal loophole that would get a lot of people out of trouble. But, the government fixed that loophole quickly anyway when they saw what scientists were trying to do, so making new species out of old ones wouldn't help.

- Ecotypes/biotypes are not new species, and no good taxonomist would classify plants in such a way. This is why their taxonomy, and subsequent taxonomies, have all been rejected, and the primary taxon is Cannabis sativa, with no noted subspecies thereafter. There is good reason for this, the biological species concept, which all cannabis populations adhere to.

- If you could point out non-freely interbreeding cannabis populations, you would indeed prove cannabis is comprised of different species. To my knowledge, no one has done this, but if they did, there would be more in prizes and grants than just lauding and praise from High Times.

- I am not opposed to the idea that cannabis could be a ring species, there just isn't any evidence for it. A cannabis "hybrid" population is not a "true" hybrid species, where a hybrid speciation event occurs forming a new species that cannot breed with either parent, it is the result of 2 true breeding inbred populations (ie. populations that will be homozygous for those traits) breeding, the resultant F1 population will be heteozygous (but still readily able to breed with either parent). Selfing the F1, taking a male and female from that population and breeding them together, will make an F2 population, which will segregate into 3 types, 2 homozygous types, and 1 heterozygous type. The population of this F2 will be in a 1:2:1 ratio of homo:hetero:homo, and the homozygous types will obviously follow the respective homozygous genotypes (true breeding phenotypes) of either parent and the heterozygous will be hetero blend you got in the F1 population. The 1:2:1 is simply a ratio of numbers within the sample, meaning if you sampled say 100 individuals in the F2 population, roughly 25 individuals would be homozygous according to one parent, 25 to the other, and 50 to the hetero population. Make sense? It's genetics and ecology 101, and makes me wonder how doctors writing scientific articles get their crap past the editors and publishers, trying to say differing cannabis pops are a new species, or trying to use chemotaxonomy on simply inherited traits that bear no real taxonomic significance, particularly in the way they are being used. Chemotaxonomy could be good for elucidating population relationships, but the studies being done in my opinion are poor, and focus on the taxonomist(s) trying to discover a new species and make a name for themselves through the use of jargon and bullshit, harping on any of the tiniest morphological or genetic difference they can find in 2 individuals to try and claim "oh look now, this is a new species!" (yeah no it isn't), not discover real relationships between cannabis populations, ones that have been inbred for, and hybrid populations, and wild populations, and other ecological and evolutionary relationships therein.

- Why would thin and wide leaves have anything to do with species? Are black and asian people different species? Are kale and broccoli? Are fat and thin people different species? Blue and green eyes? General morphology is not a sound basis upon which to base a taxonomy, taxonomic significance of what you are measuring is what is important; and while that significance is arbitrarily assigned, it makes all the difference when used logically and in an unbiased manner.

- I could get very technical with problems I've found described in various cannabis taxonomies, with quite a few large contradictory descriptions given between taxons (morphological traits some describe as "sativa" say, and others describe as "indica", and so on..). It gets veryyyy jargon-y and taxing to work through, even for someone who is familiar with botanical nomenclature, taxonomic keys, and so on.

I'd have to disagree on the Taxonomy. To MY knowledge, the latest taxonomy suggests 3 distinct species of cannabis: Sativa, Indica, and Ruderalis:

Professors William Emboden, Loran Anderson, and Harvard botanist Richard E. Schultes and coworkers also conducted taxonomic studies of Cannabis in the 1970s, and concluded that stable morphological differences exist that support recognition of at least three species, C. sativa, C. indica, and C. ruderalis.[41][42][43][44] For Schultes, this was a reversal of his previous interpretation that Cannabis is monotypic, with only a single species.[45] According to Schultes' and Anderson's descriptions, C. sativa is tall and laxly branched with relatively narrow leaflets, C. indica is shorter, conical in shape, and has relatively wide leaflets, and C. ruderalis is short, branchless, and grows wild in central Asia. This taxonomic interpretation was embraced by Cannabis aficionados who commonly distinguish narrow-leafed "sativa" drug strains from wide-leafed "indica" drug strains.[4

While I hate citing "Wiki" for anything conclusive, it was the fastest and most expeditious.

JH

 

[mad librettist]

I think there is a simple comparison we can make.

Broccoli, brussels sprouts, kohlrabi, cauliflower, and kale are all the same species.

How different are they from each other, compared to cannabis varieties?

I would be happy with "cannabis sativa var. indica"

 

[Green and Gold]

- It doesn't. This is a common misconception in cannabis, brought about by lack of knowledge regarding the phytochemical nature of the plant and varying populations of it, ecotypes and selection over time, etc.



- Cannabis is Cannabis sativa. Proposed species beyond sativa have been rejected for many various reasons.

- Sativas don't make you "up", and "indicas" don't make you "down/couchlocked", it's all about the phytochemical makeup of the individual plant and plant population that individual came from as a whole that you are imbibing, and somewhat your personal state of being at the time, that matters.

- If "sativas" just made you "up", and "indicas" "down", there wouldn't be all this hoopla about other phytochemicals within cannabis beyond a few cannabinoids. It isn't as simple as "up" and "down", "sativa/indica" as the editors of high times want to make it to be, and has nothing to do really with the THC/CBD ratio, a very misunderstood topic.

- Terpenoids have various physiological mechanisms via which they can modulate the effects of THC and other cannabinoids.

- Cannabis bred for fiber content can be high in THC (and can possess broad leaves). The general goal of hemp breeders is to select out plants containing THC and select plants for fiber.

- A "sativa sativa"... "Sativa indica"... "Indica indica"... Most people can't even comprehend how silly and ridiculous that actually sounds, about as bad as seed sellers/coffeeshops/dispensaries telling customers plants are 30%indica/70%sativa hybrids, 50%/50% sativa-indica hybrids, or 100%indica/100%sativa, and other pseudoscience regarding genetics

I can agree with a lot of this, especially the last paragraph, but not the first. When I started using cannabis in the late '60s. what we got in NorCal came from Mexico, then later Colombia. This "sativa" had very narrow leaves and if grown in NorCal outdoors ran out of season before it really matured. It also got you "high" in an energetic, cerebral manner. I still grow some for my own use, and harvest outdoors after Thanksgiving.

In the early '70s what we called "indica" showed up from Afghanistan and Pakistan (when "kush" meant "from the Hindu Kush") and changed everything. The plants were smaller in stature with broader leaves with less fingers. It matured much earlier outdoors and enabled NorCal cultivation to take off. The effect of smoking this "indica" was much different, it got you "stoned" instead of "high", couchlock, if you will. Less laughter, less conversation, less physical activity. Less fun......

Domestic dogs are all the same species, but a black lab is different from a toy poodle. The same species, but not the same type of dog. Sure they can interbreed, and the puppies will range in type in between the parents. It seems a shame that so much of this has gone on with cannabis. I rarely see "sativa" or "indica" like we did in say, 1974. What I see mostly are hybrids that have come about that are like "partly poodles". People refer to these as "indica", "sativa", or "indica dominant", or "sativa dominant", but I think few of these folks have ever seen the kind of strains that were around in those years. Precious little of what is being called "sativa" these days looks like how it used to.......