The list of live resin producers in Canada is small, but growing

Gone are the days where packing a bowl or rolling a joint were the few ways to use weed. Maybe if you were the Martha Stewart type you made infused butter and baked it into brownies. But with legalization 2.0 now into its second year in Canada, there are more products than ever that’ll get you high, from tonics to gummies to dabs.

And while cultivators, scientists, and, yup, even brewers, have been busy behind the scenes working to develop and stock new items on dispensary shelves, one of the most up-and-coming, but under-represented categories remains live resin.

Live resin is a tasty, fast-acting, and heavy-hitting product that’s derived from a fresh cannabis plant that’s been flash-frozen in its prime.

High in THC, high in terps

“If THC-based vape oil is like orange juice from concentrate, live resin is like freshly squeezed orange juice. It has more flavour, more aroma, and represents the whole plant better than its less costly alternatives,” explains Geoff Hoover, CEO at Greybeard, a craft cultivator in Ontario.

But extracting live resin requires skill, time, and patience. Where traditional distillates use dried flower, live resin uses cannabis that’s been harvested and then flash frozen before extraction. 

While each cultivator’s process differs slightly, and the finished product can vary in texture from slushy and honey-like to crumbly or crystalized, live resins typically have a much higher terpene content than a concentrate extracted from dried cannabis. This is because the drying step that’s used to create other types of concentrates causes a significant loss of terpenes, which equals flavour.

Dab this: 3 types of live resin to try in Canada

Premium 5 currently carries its Caviar Blend in certain parts of the country, including New Brunswick and Saskatchewan. It also has other new offerings, like its Lemon Skitz Crumble, in the works. Premium 5’s product can be used in a traditional dab rig or in its portable concentrate vape pen.

Another option: San Rafael ’71 recently launched OG Chemdawg live resin, a sticky and strong sativa-dominant concentrate that’s currently available across Ontario. They also have plans to expand further across the country soon. 

Currently, Greybeard products, including terp slush (which are dabs) and live resin vape cartridges (which thread onto 510 batteries) are available in stores in Ontario and Saskatchewan, with plans to expand into Alberta and other parts of the country to follow. Their vape carts contain between 79% to 89% THC and 11% to 16% terpene content. This is compared to the 1% to 3% terpenes you’d get from dried flower.

Like many of the new product types that received the green light last year, it’s taking longer than expected to see a variety of options come to market. Still, given what a clean, tasty, and fast-acting high live resin offers, it’s only a matter of time before more LPs toss their hat in the ring.