Every last bit of weed is made to be enjoyed. When you get down to the end of your joint or your blunt and you can’t hold it without burning your figures, it still feels like sacrilege to discard that small amount of weed. You don’t have to. Salvaging a roach is like eating leftovers instead of getting takeout. It’s still going to be good the next day, and there’s no reason to waste anything.
You can utilize an impromptu solution with things you probably have around the house, or you can buy something like a one-hitter to use for this specific purpose. It’s all up to you.
What is a weed roach?
A weed roach is a term for the short end of a joint or a blunt that’s packed full of weed, but too small to be held or smoked without burning your fingers or lips. It isn’t a significant amount of weed all by itself, but if you smoke frequently, it adds up. Regular smokers who don’t use their roaches could be discarding a few joints’ worth of weed every month. That’s why it makes sense to save or reuse your roaches.
Whose idea was it to call it a “roach?”
Nobody really knows for sure and the original tale seems to be lost through time. Many people have theories, and some are more convincing than others.
The most commonly supported theory about why a roach is called a roach stems from the Mexican folk song “La Cucaracha,” which literally translates to “the cockroach.” While a more family-friendly version of this song is the one people are most familiar with, the version sung by Mexican revolutionaries was riddled with drug references.
The chorus of the original version of the song translates to:
“The cockroach, the cockroach, cannot walk anymore. Because it hasn’t, because it lacks, marijuana to smoke.” The lyrics are weird without context, but they make perfect sense for the time.
One way to interpret the cockroach metaphor is as a disdainful term for the dictator. The Mexican Revolutionaries were angry at the dictator for sitting around and getting high all day instead of doing anything productive for his people. Another theory is that revolutionary soldiers called themselves cockroaches because of their living conditions, shifting the meaning to suggest that the soldiers were tired and just wanted to get high.
Due to pot’s gray areas of legality around the world since its official ban in 1925, people started talking about pot in code. It’s not too far of a jump to think that a roach is called a roach because it’s hard to smoke what little weed remains in it.
Now you know the history. Here’s what to do with your modern-day roach.
Do not ever dispose of roaches in public or throw it on the ground.
If you toss a roach out in public, you run the risk of an animal eating it or a child finding it. Although cannabis and most hemp rolling papers are both biodegradable, they require a significant amount of time to fully decompose.
Even worse, you can start a fire. California’s wildfire situation is gravely serious. If your roach wasn’t fully put out before you tossed it, you can start a chain reaction that leads to a massive burn.
It may sound like a farfetched butterfly effect theory, but cigarettes have been declared the causes of destructive fires on numerous occasions. A roach isn’t any different in its capacity to cause the same level of damage.
You can also entirely avoid roaches
If you don’t want to deal with roaches, start rolling filters into your joint. The filter will give you enough space between the heat, your fingers, and your mouth to eliminate the potential of wasting any weed. You can smoke the joint all the way down, and you don’t have to worry about any weed getting in your mouth due to the filter’s barrier.
Another bonus to using a filter is that your joint will hit much smoother. It’s not going to be the same level of perfect smoothness as a bong, but it’s undoubtedly less harsh.
Collect them for a little while
If you’re constantly generating roaches, start collecting them. If you accumulate one for every day of the week, you can unroll the roaches during the weekend and pour their contents into a bowl. Just don’t accumulate them for too long. The longer your heated weed sits, the higher the chance becomes that the THC will convert to a non-intoxicating cannabinoid called CBN.
If your roaches are still relatively fresh, you’re in for a treat. As you smoke your joint or blunt, the resin from the weed begins to accumulate at the end. Your roaches turn brown and start to get sticky as you reach the bottom. When you smoke a roach, you’re getting a lot of that accumulated resin, which might get you higher than the weed alone. In that regard, a roach is a little treasure worth cherishing.
Store your roaches in an airtight container where they won’t be exposed to excessive heat or direct sunlight. They’ll keep well for up to a week until you’re ready to use them.
Drop the whole roach in a bowl
You can put the entire roach into the bowl of your hand pipe or bong. It might be easier to use your thumbnail to rip down one side of the paper, exposing the weed inside the roach. You’ll finish it off in one or two solid bong hits or three or four solid pipe hits.
This is the easiest and most convenient way to reuse a roach. Other methods involve being very careful and finding new ways to hold the roach. If you’re already pretty high or aware that you’re clumsy, putting the roach into a bowl is the safest way to go.
Get a designated one-hitter
If you smoke joints or blunts simply because they’re your preferred smoking method, you can supplement them with a one-hitter. A one-hitter is a very compact smoking device that’s designed to hold — you guessed it — one hit. They’re designed to feel like blunts when you hold them, and they’re effortless to maintain. They’re usually compact and discrete devices.
A one-time investment in a one-hitter means that you can quickly and easily load up and use roaches as they occur. All you need to do is periodically swab them with a cotton swab dipped in rubbing alcohol to prevent them from clogging or gumming up. Since you’re only smoking roaches, the cleanup won’t be as intensive or as frequent as it would be for something like a hand pipe.
Smoke it with a clip
You don’t necessarily need to have some kind of specially designated roach clip. Any small-sized clip will do. You can use a bobby pin, a hair clip, or the clip from your work badge to pinch the roach and keep it going. If the only clip you can find is a paper clip, that works just as well. You can (literally) MacGuyver a paperclip into a roach clip simply by folding it.
Use tweezers
Tweezers work in a pinch. Pun intended. Yeah, we’re talking about the good tweezers, and you need them to pluck stray eyebrow hairs, but they were expensive tweezers. Get your money’s worth by allowing them to work double duty.
Pinch your roach with tweezers to hold it securely while you smoke it. Tweezers with flat, tapered ends work the best.
Do not use sharp objects
The internet will tell you to stab the roach with a safety pin, a sewing pin, or some kind of needle. Yes, this will work. No, you should not do that. Be a responsible stoner. If you’re high, it’s probably not a good idea to put fire and needles in your face. Don’t even act like you’re wondering what can go wrong — it’s pretty self-explanatory. We all do dumb stuff when we’re high, but this isn’t one worth trying.
The takeaway
Wasting perfectly good weed is a shame. Thankfully, you can do tons of things with a roach to avoid losing all those cumulative bits and pieces.
If you’re smoking roaches because you’re out of weed, Emjay can fix that really quickly. We have tons of flower available for delivery, and we can get it to you in half an hour.
You don’t need to mess around with clips or tweezers if you’re willing to wait just a minute. Just place your order, and we’ll be right there.
