We all know that not all buds are created equal. I’ve come to realize a certain marijuana hierarchy that people use to describe the range of cannabis available to them.

Before the golden days of medical marijuana, my friends and I were limited to some pretty low-quality herb. We called this stuff “regs” and it cost 10 bucks a gram. This brownish, dried out dope was the junk I smoked when I first started smoking cannabis, but now looking back I can hardly call that weed anymore.

I’ve lived in many different places, and over time I became more aware of a certain “chain of command” in regards to the quality of the bud available where I’ve lived. This marijuana hierarchy varied slightly depending on the area.

Here was my local hierarchy, from best to worst:

1. Kush – The best of the best, this stuff ran anywhere upwards of $20 per gram.

2. Hydro – Another high quality, but I’m not sure if we called it hydro because it was grown hydroponically or if for some other reason.

3. Dro – This was one of the most cost-effective to get; went for $20 bucks a gram, and was a staple during college.

4. Mids – This is what we called the stuff that wasn’t as bad as regs, but not as good as dro. We could pick this up for $10 to $15 a gram.

5. Regs/regatrons – If kush is to a shark, regs would be the shitty bottom feeders. At $10 bucks a gram you couldn’t really complain, until after you picked out all the seeds and stems and tasted the stale, musty smoke and wondered why you wanted to get high in the first place.

The top three were excellent quality, named strains that you’d expect to get at any medical marijuana dispensary. Mids and regs were low quality, cheap, and tasted like ass. For me this hierarchy is all but obliterated as I can now get kush quality dank at my dispensary for around $10 bucks a gram.

While I hardly have to worry about this hierarchy anymore, it’s still fun to reminisce of my early pot-smoking days.

What about you? What’s your marijuana hierarchy?