Hemp Wick 101

By now, you’ve probably heard your friends or budtenders talking about using hemp wick instead of traditional lighters to ignite your flower, but you may not fully understand what hemp wick is or why/how it is being used. Fortunately for you, we’re hemp wick experts here at Twisted Bee! That’s why we’ve decided to spend some time giving you a crash course and answering your most frequently asked questions on the subject with our hemp wick 101 article. 

Is Hemp Wick Actually Better?

Hemp wick is better in a lot of senses. First and foremost, using hemp wick to light your bud helps preserve much of the flavor and experience of your flower. This is because hemp wick burns at a much lower temperature than traditional lighter sources. Terpenes and flavonoids are the naturally occurring compounds responsible for your flower’s taste, scent, and even some effects. The problem with traditional lighters is that their flames burn at insanely high temperatures. Terps and flavs are incredibly sensitive to temperature with some that begin evaporating at temperatures below 200 degrees Fahrenheit. So, when you hit that bowl of flower with a flame burning at 1000 degrees, it is easy to see how a lot of your bud’s flavor will evaporate instantaneously, leaving you with a burnt, charcoal taste in your mouth. On the other hand, hemp wick’s much lower burn temperature will provide you with an experience that you will find much “truer” to the flower’s taste profile. 

How is Hemp Wick Made?

While we can’t speak to everyone’s hemp wick, we can certainly describe the process that goes into ours. When we originally decided to provide a hemp wick product to consumers, our goal was to source the purest hemp fibers available. That’s why we only utilize certified organic hemp fibers that are grown in Europe. We chose our hemp wick based on consistency and quality of its burn, the fact that it is free of chemicals, and lastly because its production maintains a sustainable and organic presence in the marketplace. Typically, hemp wick is made by twisting together hemp fiber extract into a twine form factor. A final step involves coating the hemp wick with a thin layer of organic bee’s wax which not only slows the burn rate to a controllable level, but also provides waterproofing. 

How Long Does Hemp Wick Last?

Depends on how often you smoke! In all seriousness though, a spool of hemp wick will probably last a while. Hemp wick burns really slowly, usually at a rate of around three inches per minute. To put that into perspective, our spools contain 200 feet of hemp wick. At a burn rate of three inches per minute, this would give you over 13 hours of burn time from a single spool!

Is Hemp Wick Legal?

Of course, this shouldn’t be construed as legal advice, but hemp wick is completely legal in most jurisdictions, including all US states. Even though hemp wick comes from hemp plants (which is ultimately just a categorization given to the cannabis plant), any miniscule amounts of cannabinoids that may have been present in the original hemp fiber will be destroyed during processing. 

Is Hemp Wick Healthier Than a Lighter?

It would be disingenuous for us to sit here and try to build a case that smoking anything is “healthy”. That being said, we do feel that there are some potential advantages to lighting your bud with hemp wick over traditional lighters. Like many other aspects of the cannabis world, the failed “war on drugs” has created enormous roadblocks preventing clinically controlled research from being conducted. With more states getting on-board with cannabis legalization programs though, cannabis and cannabis-related research is being conducted at a faster pace now than ever before. We’re hopeful that we will have definitive guidance and data sooner than later around hemp wick serving as a better alternative to lighters. 

Until that day comes though, we’re forced to build our own opinions based on anecdotal reports and what data we actually do have available. The general hypothesis is that hemp wick is a naturally burning flame, in other words, it relies on the organic, natural fibers of the hemp as the fuel needed to feed the fire. On the other hand, traditional lighters utilize chemicals as a way to feed the flame. 

With that being said, consider the steps taken when lighting a bowl of flower. You bring the bowl to your mouth and begin inhaling right before you bring the flame to the flower. In the case of traditional lighters and matches, the chemical byproduct of the compounds used in the lighter (think butane and other accelerants) are likely pulled into the bowl and subsequently your lungs through the process of inhaling to get the bowl going. Some users even report tasting a chemical-esque flavor if their lighter stays on the flower too long or they inhale too intensely. 

If we look now at hemp wick, sure, you’re still combusting (natural) plant matter, but without the use of chemicals to create a flame. Most users report a cleaner, more flavorful taste when making the switch from lighters to hemp wick. It is suspected that this is partly due to the lower burning temperatures preserving those tasty terpenes and flavonoids, but also due to the lack of potentially bitter chemical byproducts mixing in with your smoke. 

Is Hemp Wick Right for me?

Naturally, we think that anyone who combusts their bud should have already made the switch to hemp wick, but we also understand that people can be skeptical of making changes in their routines. We’re so confident that you’ll give up ever touching your weed with a traditional lighter after trying hemp wick that we are willing to provide a free hemp wick sample to anyone interested. Our sample packs include six inches of our standard hemp wick and six inches of our thick hemp wick. Most people who request our hemp wick sample are converted before they even finish the sample packs! 

We want to hear from you too! How have your experiences been with hemp wick? Any tips or tricks that you’ve discovered? Drop us a line and let us know!