Grow California

™

Cold Water Extraction a step by step instruction with a set of Boldtbags.

Centennial Seeds find out what it takes

to become the only certified seed company in Colorado

Supreme Beans Hawaiian Cannabis Genetics

Beneficial Bugs

Q & A with M & R Durango Insectary Owner, Lee Anne Merill

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Contents Features Published By COW MOUNTAIN MEDIA Publisher & Editor ERIC SLIGH

32: Cold Water Extraction step by step instruction

Co-Editor Alex Kardos John deiker Art Director Vanessa CHandler

44: Centennial Seeds find out what it takes to become the only certified seed company in Colorado

60: Supreme Beans Hawaiian Cannabis Genetics

Contributing Writers John Deiker Jesse Cretaro Mark Weinstein D. Bridges T.A. Sedlak K.Y. Shek Contributing Photographers Tom Green Advertising Alex Kardos - 720-448-0393 Email: akardos@humboldtgrow.com

76: Beneficial Bugs Q & A with M & R Durango Insectary Owner, Lee Anne Merill

Regulars 14 Marijuana in the news 20 Holder issues a stern warning 24 Getting the most out of your grow space 50 Strain reviews 58 Cypress Hill smokeout 60 Pot lucky chef 63 Prop 19 failed, so what?

74 Seattle Hempfest

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Grow California Magazine assumes no responsibility for any claims or representations contained in this magazine or in any advertisement nor do they encourage the illegal use of any of the products advertised within.

No portion of this magazine may be reproduced without the written consent of the publisher.

2010 © GROW CALIFORNIA MAGAZINE COW MOUNTAIN MEDIA

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Intelligence/marijuana in the news Around the World

London U.K.:

A new study has shown that cannabis and its proposed links to short-term memory loss could be less pronounced, or understood, than we think. The results did not rule out a relationship-correlation between smoking cannabis and short-term memory loss, but did find that it was only in one particular strain of marijuana tested—“skunk-type strains”— that participants in the experiment exhibited marked impairment; whereas people who smoked hashish or blended (hybrid) strains did just as well, either stoned or sober.

Michigan:

There are Tons of Patients—But where is the Pot? As a state with over 28,000 registered medical marijuana patients, Michigan is only behind California and Colorado in cardcarrying-cannabis-enthused citizens. However, the burgeoning bud scene in Michigan has one massive logistical concern: Where are these patients supposed to get their medicine? There are not nearly enough marijuana dispensaries within the state to supply the demand for meds, with ambiguous regulations and irregular lawenforcement practices limiting the number of potential business-collective owners. As Keith Stroup, founder of Michigan’s NORML Chapter has said, “Running a dispensary in Michigan, under current law, is very risky, and I would advice against it.”

Colorado Springs, CO:

The Department of Homeland Security has an eye in your sky Colorado Springs. It’s

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been revealed that on April 9th of this past spring, Metro Vice, Narcotics and Intelligence Task Force launched—literally, launched—an investigation into a series of buildings in the city that were suspected of housing large cannabis grow operations. To facilitate their efforts in uncovering the truth behind their hunch the Task Force brought in the aide of a Department of Homeland Security plane, which, with heatsensor technology on-board flew from Canada to Colorado Springs in order to investigate the buildings from high above. The plane was a Swiss-produced Pilatus PC-12 Specter that cost 7 million dollars to build. As for the outcome of this investigation? After the excessive show of force and complete waste of time and tax dollars, the results, well, they hardly turned out to be spy-plane worthy: the Task Force arrested a resounding six people, who were later charged with cultivation.

Sacramento, CA:

On October 1st, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed Senate Bill 1449 into effect, reducing the punishment for adultpossession of less than one-ounce of marijuana in the state from a misdemeanor to an infraction with a maximum punishment of a $100 fine.

Though he doesn’t support legalization of marijuana, the Governator does believe that Bill 1449 will save the courts money and time, stating: “Prosecutors, defense attorneys, law enforcement and the courts can’t afford to expend limited resources prosecuting a crime that carries the same punishment as a traffic ticket.”

San Francisco, CA:

Beer VS. Buds! The battle against Prop 19 rages on. The CBBD—California Beer and Beverage Distributors—have been actively spending money (campaigning, that is) to stop Proposition 19, California’s November 2nd marijuana-legalization legislation.

As reported by the Huffington Post, the CBBD donated $10,000 to Public Safety First, a group opposing legalization. However, there are those within the beer community who do not agree with the CBBD. California-based micro brewing companies Sierra Nevada and Stone Brewing Co. have both been outspoken about their opposing position—they are fine with the idea of finely crafted brews and buds coexisting. For their courage to go against the frothy tide, Grow recommends you go out a buy yourself a six-pack of Sierra’s Pale Ale or Stone Brewery’s fine lager to support these righteous brewers.

Aurora, CO:

State officials are developing, or proposing to develop, a system to be implemented that could enable the state to track medical marijuana sales more precisely. There are a growing number of officials in state and local governments who fear that some patients are buying large quantities of marijuana from local dispensaries and then re-distributing it on the green-black market. In light of these concerns, Big Brother could be poking his invasive head into our kind, new industry in the form of computer placement and video monitoring within all dispensaries, as well as by maintaining a record of all the state’s medical

marijuana patients by keeping their fingerprints in a database!

Los Angeles, CA:

Leaders of the SEIU—Service Employees International Union—the largest labor union in the state, have given their support to Proposition 19, believing that the revenue streams brought in from marijuana taxation could help the state of California avoid making more cost cuts to programs such as education, employment, health care, home care, and elderly care programs.

Seattle, WA:

In early September, Canada’s Prince of Pot, Mr. Marc Emery, seed bank-extraordinaire, finally had to face the music. After fighting extradition from Canada to the US for nearly five years, U.S. District Judge Ricardo Martinez threw the book at Emery, sentencing him to five years in a Federal Prison after being charged and convicted of selling millions of cannabis seeds via phone and internet purchase orders.

We wish Mr. Emery the best and hope his stint in the big house is as short, and harmless, as possible.

USA:

A new report has shown that the war on marijuana seems to be somewhat of a war exclusively enforced against minorities. The report’s findings, which were collected by the Marijuana Arrest Research for the Drug Policy Alliance and the N. A.A. C. P., found that minorities are, and have been, more prone to being arrested for possession of marijuana.

“In the last 20 years, California made 850,000 arrests for possession of small amounts of marijuana, and half-a-million of those arrests (have occurred) in the last 10 years. The people arrested were disproportionately African-American and Latinos, overwhelmingly young people, especially men.” In the city of Los Angeles, for example, the report claims that law enforcement has, “arrested blacks for marijuana at seven times the rate of whites.”

Santa Rosa, CA:

A budding artistic community is emerging in the hills of Sonoma County. On a 120-acre site, two nonprofit organizations—American Medicinals and the Life is Art Foundation— have established the first cannabis-artist colony—a pastoral piece of heaven where pot grows beside paintings underneath pergolas.

On the grounds, medical marijuana is grown in compliance with Prop 215 to enable the colony a modest subsistence. This nonprofit haven was founded by Kirsha Kaechele and her partner, John Orgon with the goal of sharing art with the public while also providing solace and creative peace for artists seeking both sublime scenery and safe access.

Washington, D.C.:

Federal intervention is imminent! On October 18th, in what seemed to be a fear-tactic to dissuade the voters of California from passing Proposition 19, U.S. Attorney General-Drug Czar Eric Holder Jr. outlined his attack on

legalized marijuana, if the state were to vote in favor of it come November 2nd. Holder, under orders from the Obama administration, has been delightfully laissez-faire about the proliferation of medical marijuana, particularly when compared to the Draconian cannabis code enforced under the Bush administration.

However, Holder is defiantly against marijuana legalization, and if the Golden State passes Proposition 19, Holder has vowed to bring the federal government to California. “We will vigorously enforce the Federal Controlled Substances Act (Federal Law) against those individuals and organizations that posses, manufacture or distribute marijuana for recreational use, even if such activities are permitted under state law.”

Colorado Springs, CO:

The coffers of Colorado Springs are being filled by cannabis revenue. As reported by the Gazette, “sales tax revenues from medical marijuana have risen to about $50,000 a month, allowing the city to mow grass medians and consider restoring some Saturday bus service.” And most ironically, the Colorado Spring’s Police Department, those men in blue who have been so embittered by the presence of marijuana in their town, will now be re-vamping their poorly funded force. “After years of budget cuts, the Police Department’s rebuilding efforts appear to be starting with medical marijuana money.” Therefore, whether you are for or against medical marijuana Mr. and Mrs. Colorado, there is empirical data that cannot be denied—it can be a money maker for your fledgling city, county, and state economies.

British Columbia, Canada:

Black bears and Bud? This is a first. There are many ways to guard your garden, and at Grow we have seen and heard about nearly every one: trip wire; electric wire; dogs; barbwire and the fully loaded all-night lookout. But never have we come across a garden being guarded by gigantic Black bears, which, is exactly what Canadian Mounted police conducting a raid on a marijuana farm found—And they were alarmed, to say the least. Yet these bears were docile, calm and not hostile, almost amicable...

All ten of them! “They were tame, they just sat around watching. At one point one of the bears climbed onto the hood of a police car, sat there for a bit and then jumped off,” said Mounted Police sergeant Fred Mansveld.

Boston, MA:

On September 19th, thousands of beadyeyed Bostonians converged upon the Boston Commons (large park in the middle of the city) to participate in a pro-marijuana legalization rally. MassCann, the state’s NORML chapter, hosted the 21st Annual Boston Freedom Rally.

Boston police were on the scene and their presence resulted in the issuing of 34 civil citations for possession of marijuana.

Intelligence Trenton, NJ

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renton, NJ: Medical cannabis advocates are criticizing draft regulations circulated by the Department of Health that seek to implement the New Jersey Compassionate Medical Marijuana Act. Advocates, including the act’s chief legislative sponsor, believe that the proposed measures are unduly restrictive and are not responsive to patients needs.

The proposed regulations call for the state to begin overseeing the distribution of medical marijuana to state-authorized patients by July 2011. The manufacturing of medical cannabis would be limited to two licensed facilities. The proposed rules also restrict the percentage to THC that may be present in the plant to no more than ten percent, and limit the varieties of cannabis that may be produced to no more than three strains.

Four additional state licensed facilities would be permitted to dispense cannabis.

Patients would be authorized to possess no more than two ounces of cannabis per month, and would not be permitted to grow their own marijuana or share it with other registered patients.

Patients who possess unauthorized amounts or strains of marijuana will still be subject to arrest and criminal prosecution under the law.

Democratic Senator Nick Scutari, who sponsored the Compassionate Medical Marijuana Act, said that the regulations significantly alter state law, which mandate a total of six marijuana cultivation and distribution centers to be licensed throughout the state.

Chris Goldstein of NORML New Jersey and the Coalition for Medical Marijuana – New Jersey also criticized the draft regulations. “Rather than create a reasonable set of regulations, the Christie Administration is playing politics with the lives of New Jersey’s most severely ill residents,” he said in a prepared statement.

“Instead of opening a pathway to safe marijuana access these draft regulations only create more barriers.”

Health regulators have 60 days to review the regulations and accept public comment.

According to the Department of Health’s website, patients may begin applying in November to participate in the program.

Speaking at a town hall meeting on Tuesday, Republican Gov. Chris Christie said that he “would not have signed the law,” which was approved by former Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine.

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Intelligence/vs.

Cooley vs Harris

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ith all the hype surrounding Prop 19, possibly the most important thing regarding medical marijuana to be decided by the November election is unfortunately being somewhat overlooked.

The State Attorney General position is currently being occupied by Jerry Brown, who is once again running for Governor, so this position will then be vacated. The campaign for this position now pits LA County’s borderline conservative-shitkicking District Attorney Steve Cooley versus the more progressive Democratic candidate Kamala Harris. Now, do I feel that either is truly great on marijuana policy? No, they both helped write the official opinion against Prop 19 and got the chance to showcase their more conservative, law enforcement-oriented side. But one does show a much better public record than the other on medical marijuana policy. The truth is, just about any shmuck you can think of has a better record on medical marijuana than Steve Cooley.

For a good two years now, Cooley has been speaking out against the idea of collectives existing in LA County, period. Basically, he feels that all collectives are plagued by corruption and that they are more in business of profiting from marijuana than serving their patients. He has stated that collectives attract crime and has repeatedly accused them of dispensing marijuana to those who are not medically qualified. He has taken the conservative, shit-kicking approach of accusing collectives of such things without ever showing any data to prove his point. Obviously, this is because these statistics do not exist. Cooley and his shit-kicking comrades, the City of LA’s rambling wreck of a city attorney Carmen Trutanich and LA County Sheriff Lee Baca, love to create the illusion that collectives are unsafe places that often get robbed and draw other criminal behavior.

However, the statistics that do exist, prove otherwise. Far more armed robberies and murders have taken place at convenience stores and liquor stores in the City of LA and all over LA County in the past 3 years than at medical marijuana collectives. This is even true during the last half of 2009 and first half of 2010 when it was estimated that well-over 800 collectives were operating in the City of LA

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alone. Even when you break it down by ratio of the number of collectives vs. the number of liquor stores and convenience stores, collectives are still much safer. Yet, I do not see politicians and those in law enforcement lobbying to get convenience stores closed down. Heck, banks have more armed robberies than collectives, and I’m sure no one’s going to suggest closing bank branches down. So all of this goes to say, that even if politicians say that they support the use of medical marijuana and want sick patients to be able to have access to it, they are full of crap. If you are against physical, brick-and-mortar collectives, you are clearly against medical marijuana period.

The make-believe stat that Steve Cooley has been using for 2 years now is that supposedly more than 70% of all medical marijuana patients that are members of collectives are under the age of 40—and that this is according to a study done by law enforcement. Yet, he has never stated what law enforcement agency did this mysterious study, how this confidential data was taken from collectives, or how many collectives did this study entail. Essentially, Cooley is full of B.S. and he knows it. He’s just needed something to mobilize his Republicanbase and drawing on the apparent threat of “reefer madness” has been one way to do this. This is also because, with his political aspirations of becoming State Attorney General, he has needed to create some type of notoriety for himself, and if you study his office’s record since he’s been LA County’s District Attorney, they have botched just about every high-profile case that they’ve had, including Robert Blake and Deborah Peagler. As a matter of fact, his office was removed from the Peagler case by a California Superior Court judge because of reported misconduct.

Cooley has shown that he is more of a politician than anything else—who else files bunk mail fraud charges against his political opponent during his re-election campaign (How bunk were the charges? Cooley’s opponent in the District Attorney race, Albert Robles, was acquitted of all charges after the jury deliberated for only 20 minutes. This, of course, occurred months after Cooley beat him in the election.).

So will Cooley still be so adamantly against medical marijuana now that he has the City

of Bell corruption scandal to help make him famous? I honestly don’t know and can’t say.

However, as members of the medical marijuana community, let’s make sure he does not get elected as our next Attorney General so we do not have to find out. As Attorney General, he might not be able to shut down every collective in the state. However, his record demonstrates that he would try to make it as difficult as possible to run a medical marijuana collective.

And with all these conservative local politicians making it hard enough already, do we need to have an Attorney General who is going to make it even more difficult?

Cooley’s opponent Kamala Harris might not be the ideal candidate for Attorney General.

She, after all, helped write the official argument against Prop 19 and clearly does not support the use of marijuana recreationally. However, she is much better than Cooley on medical marijuana policy and has made statements again and again voicing her support for the use of medical marijuana and patients being able to safely access it. After the 2005 Supreme Court Ruling which essentially said that federal law trumps California’s Compassionate Use Act, Ms. Harris’ office released a statement which included: “In the wake of the ruling, the position of the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office remains consistent: We will not prosecute people who use or sell marijuana for medicinal purposes. The most important goals to me on this issue are ensuring the rights of patients to access treatments they need for serious medical conditions, and protecting the safety of our community.” I suggest that you go to the San Francisco District Attorney’s website and read the full statement written by Kamala Harris (Link: www.sfdistrictattorney.org/News. asp?id=160). That should definitely help you decide who to vote for Attorney General on November 2. Ms. Harris’ statement should also motivate you to vote, even if you previously weren’t planning to do so, and encouraging your family and friends to do the same. As a matter of fact, her statement is so well-written that you may even decide to take to all the social networks and blast everyone you know, even friends of friends, and telling them to tell their friends, to vote for her.

Intelligence The O’Reilly Factor

Intelligence/colorado Bob Kinsey Green Party Candidate for US Senate, Colorado

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his morning I stood in front of the Federal Court House in Denver in support of Christopher Bartkowicz. He was arrested by Federal Officers and charged with the offense of growing medical marijuana. He could be sentenced by a Federal Judge to 60 years if found guilty. I don’t know Christopher. I understand that this is not his first conviction on drug related charges. Personally I don’t use his product but..... But I do know that this trial is certifiably insane. I went back to my blog, page 4, on www.kinseyforsenate.org <http://www. kinseyforsenate.org/> written in March of this year to review what I wrote! I said:

militarized force a blank check to override civil liberties and carry out “missions” that actually make us and innocent people elsewhere less safe. Just the fact that the DEA also carries out a war on the industrial Hemp plant makes this obvious. Here we are eliminating a cash crop from our Agricultural sector that could provide many green products--clothing, paper, and oils that I could even use to fuel my diesel car, decreasing our dependence on fossil fuels from abroad. And as I have pointed out above, the arrest and trial of Christopher Bartkowicz, is using taxpayer money: -To contradict Article 10 of the Bill of Rights of the Constitution of the United States, -Destroying a useful product that, used recreationally, is far less harmful than alcohol and certainly produces no violent behavior on the users part, destroying a product grown safely and openly taxed that helps our Colorado economy, (I need only say that the increased revenue Colorado Springs has received --primarily from MMJ Dispensaries --has enabled the city to restore public services cut earlier this year.)

-Destroying a product that has been shown to help even people suffering PTSD in that other great war on a noun in Afghanistan, Iraq and beyond, -Possibly adding one more incarcerated person to our prisons already filled at higher percentages than most countries on earth at taxpayer expense, -Destroying respect for the rule of law, as people who believe they need this drug are intimidated by their own government.

-Protecting the market share of criminal gangs who import unsafe product from other countries.

“Marijuana has been shown to be a very useful drug that has multiple therapeutic applications.

Several States, including our own Colorado, have legalized its use as Medical Marijuana.

This is not only beneficial but entirely within the power of the State. The only power the US Constitution gives the Federal government is to regulate interstate commerce. The States have the reserved power to regulate the growing and distribution of drugs created in the State. Or so I maintain.

The so called “War on Drugs” has damaged American society and has massively contributed to the national deficit. It has filled our prisons with non violent offenders (mostly young black men) to their detriment and the enrichment of the prison-industrial complex. In its name we have escalated our role as the major arms dealer in the world. This “War” adds to world militarization and raises levels of violence everywhere. It has overridden the Constitutional separation of powers between Federal and State. We must end this bogus war on drugs and federal “law” enforcement interference that threatens the individual states’ As the Green Party candidate for US Senate rights to include the production and use of in Colorado I pledge if elected to submit a bill marijuana as a helpful medical application. requiring that the Government take marijuana Certainly misuse of any chemical is bad for off the list of Schedule I drugs and to legalize the individual and can present costs to any the growing of Hemp throughout the US. society. Tobacco and Alcohol have risks but we have learned that prohibition does not work I am not pandering for your vote. This has and undermines respect for law. They are far been a stand of the Green Party for 20 years. more harmful and have less positive uses than It would take the big “Stupid” sign off our back marijuana but we don’t carry out war against that goes next to the “War Crime” sign with them. They are legal and taxed. Good idea. “ regard to the War on Terror. Dude!

Whether its “War on Drugs” or “War on Terror” www.kinseyforsenate.org when you declare “war” on a noun you trod “Unlimited Growth is the down a crazy making path to certifiably insane Ideology of a Cancer Cell behavior. These bogus wars give Federal 303-949-4073

On “The O’Reilly Factor” Tuesday night, host Bill O’Reilly bet John Stossel $10,000 that Prop 19 won’t pass in California.

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ince O’Reilly is so clueless about cannabis-related issues, this is a good thing; it means Prop 19 is destined to pass.

In another poor and puzzling attempt to defend our failed status quo, O’Reilly tried to compare marijuana to tobacco, by saying “marijuana is exactly as addictive as tobacco.”

Once again, he’s wrong. From TIME magazine yesterday: “Estimates vary, but compared with tobacco, which hooks about 20% to 30% of smokers, marijuana is much less addictive, coming in at 9% to 10%.” According a 1999 report from the federal government’s Institute of Medicine, “Compared to most other drugs … dependence among marijuana users is relatively rare … [A]lthough few marijuana users develop dependence, some do. But they appear to be less likely to do so than users of other drugs (including alcohol and tobacco), and marijuana dependence appears to be less severe than dependence on other drugs.”

Yet another great reason to vote for Prop 19; make Bill O’Reilly cough up $10,000 to the charity of John Stossel’s choice. He would never believe it, but Bill O’Reilly may have just put cannabis legalization in CA over the top.

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Intelligence/GARDEN Spirit Gardening with Ol’ Swampy

Bringing Heart and Soul to the Art of Farming Fine Cannabis

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ow to Speak to Plants

Welcome to the second installment of Spirit Gardening.

Last issue we discussed the key concept of Spirit Gardening: That your plants are listening to and interacting with you on many different levels. If you need to get caught up on the basics, refer to Volume 1, Issue 3 of Grow Colorado Magazine available free online. As promised, in this issue you will learn some basic techniques on how to communicate directly with your plants.

These techniques are fun and easy to use.

However, before you get started you should make a few preparations. Set aside plenty of time to practice. This way you and your plants will not feel rushed. Your garden should be generally well kept, tidy, and pleasant to work in. Some nice tunes and a pipe packed with some of your finest flowers will help set the proper ambiance. And now, Spirit Gardeners, you are ready to go to work.

When you enter your garden, take it in with a fresh set of eyes, a renewed awareness, a clear mind, and a few deep breaths (air or ganja works well). Resist the temptation to let your mind race ahead to all of the day’s garden chores… just take it all in. No need to pull that one dying leaf off, start checking soil moisture, clicking through timers and thermometers, or thinking about nutrient needs. Slow down and simply be with your plants. Have a puff and let the smoke roll out over the canopy of green leaves, watching the shadow and light dance as the plants sway in the breeze. Notice how incredible they really are. Admire their beauty.

Realize your plants carry out their own lives while you are off living yours. Absorb the overall character and vibe of your garden. At the same time, take note of your own state of being as

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you relate to your garden. Approaching the garden in this way is a great start to your daily work. It will help you to be more relaxed and more perceptive to the state of affairs in your garden. It also opens up the doorway to a direct Q&A with everything from a single plant to an entire crop. This practice is really the beginning of fostering an energetic connection with your plants.

As you may find, this process is mostly about getting your own mind out of the way of the clear conversation between human and plant.

This conversation is simply between one life form and another life form. Remember, matter is energy and energy is matter. Our concepts of separateness, of plant and animal, of verbal and nonverbal communication, are just that; they are concepts. We made up these rules and then forgot that we made them up to begin with. To speak to your plants, I suggest letting go of what you assume is possible. Now it is time to turn awareness into action.

Here is my straightforward method of how to talk to and listen to plants. Begin by trying this with a single plant, and as you become more familiar with the techniques you can involve more plants in the process. This method can be used for plants at any stage of growth and any type of growing system or environment.

Step 1. Focus in on one plant, if possible take it aside so it can be near to you. Vibe the plant the same way you did with your whole garden.

Simply be with this life form. Relax your mind by letting your eyes be soft, and allowing them to roam over the leaves, stems, and flowers.

Let the palms of your hands be soft, open, and facing towards the plant. As you take the plant in, remember that half of its life force is in the roots. Bring the whole root zone into your awareness as well.

Call up a feeling inside of partnership with this life form. For some it is a feeling of love,

compassion, wonder, beauty, or qi/prana/life force/spirit. It does not matter what internal message you use, what matters is that you feel a shift in your body to greater openness towards this plant. The one that works for me is to say in my mind to myself and to the plant, “We are doing this together.” A strong sensation will enter your body, especially your hands, as the plant’s energy comes into focus. Like tuning in a radio station; out of the fuzziness, static, and jumbled sounds comes clarity. This is the feeling you are going for. The conduit is now open.

Step 2. Now you may ask most anything you desire to know from your plant. Asking the question in the proper way is the trick. Start as simply as possible, with yes or no style questions. “Would you like water today?” “Are you too hot?” “Do you have enough food?”

“Are you ready to be re potted?” Whether or not you actually speak the words is irrelevant.

Intention is everything. Ask the question clearly whether you speak or just send an energetic message. As you get better at listening for the plant’s reply, you can ask more open-ended questions, and collect information much more varied than yes and no.

Step 3. Listen for the reply. The reply comes in the form of a clear body sensation. I can be sure that you will experience this sensation because you experience it all the time. A yes or no from your plant will feel similar to the yes and no we receive from other people on a daily basis. Recall, through sensations in your body, the feeling when someone really agrees with you and supports you. It is the feeling of being boosted, lifted up, inspired. Your energy will rise upwards as if you could float off the ground. This is “yes.”

Your plant’s “no” will, likewise, feel like the no’s you experience on a regular basis. Recall the feeling you have inside when someone opposes or disagrees with you, or simply says

“No thank you.” No does not imply something bad, it just has a very distinct feel from yes.

The body sensation of no is generally a sinking energy, it can also feel deflating, and is much more reserved and still than the exciting call to action of yes.

One other possibility in the yes/no scenario is ambivalence. This response feels very much like “I’m not sure.” Recall a time when you have felt indecisive or confused; this is ambivalence.

This reply [happens far less often than you may think. Though we may feel confused sometimes, the plants rarely are. If you get this response try asking another time.

Step 4. When you have the reply, act. For example, let’s use the question “Would you like water today?” If you get a no, thank your plant, close communication with it, and know that non-action is just as valuable as action. If the reply is yes, then water, but always notice the plant’s reaction. Always notice the “thank you.” Notice how your plant responds to being communicated with, listened to, and then tended to, versus you telling the plant what to do. You will find it is quite satisfying for all happy life forms involved.

What are the benefits to this art of crossspecies speak?

You will now be able to communicate directly with your plants on a daily basis as well as around their most important life events. Use these techniques to prepare your plants for cloning, repotting, bending, pruning, staking, and harvesting. You may notice certain varieties vibing you quite strongly. Take this into account. I have taken garden tours with different growers, and been able to almost psychedelically “see” the energy flowing between a grower and their favorite variety.

This is a sign of plant-human soul mates, which have finally found one another.

Cannabis plants have many stories to share with us. I have had certain plants practically jump up and shout at me that they should be selected as a new mother plant. I have had certain plants tell me when they were ready to be retired. I have also received powerful energetic messages, which could not even be grasped by my logical mind, from the shimmering resinous peaks of cannabis flowers. These exchanges go far beyond a simple yes or no. The possibilities for communication are limitless.

Gardening in this way will improve your health as well. We are entering a meditative, self-induced hypnotic state so that we can communicate directly with a vastly different life form. Spending time working in this way will encourage relaxation, clarity, and a deep sense of soul and spirit. You may even find yourself having more effective communication with all the other beings you encounter in your life as well. And, of course, you will produce healthy, energetically balanced, sensuous medicine of the highest possible quality.

Grow with your spirit. Partner with your plants.

Ol’ Swampy out.

Intelligence/Henry C. Levy, CPA/ABV, CFF Levy-Barr Group, LLP CPA’s & Business Consultants Oakland, Los Angeles, Ukiah, Long Beach, Las Vegas

Grow Some Pot for Uncle!

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Here’s an unpopular thought: As the marijuana movement becomes more legitimate and regulated, those who grow need to treat their activity like a legitimate business. The bottom line is that caregivers and growers need to keep accounting records and pay income taxes on their “profits.”

The word “profits” and the term “net income” are central to the ongoing debate in and around the legitimacy of Medicinal Marijuana and the supply and regulation of medicine to patients, whether you’re a caregiver collective or a caregiver grower. We’ll get into that more as we develop this L.B.G., LLP “Op-ED.” Keeping accounting records is not difficult to do on a basic level. Any bookkeeper or accountant can explain all the multiple ways in which income and expenses can be counted and categorized.

It is a lot easier if transactions are handled with checks and credit cards and deposited into a bank account. If transactions are handled this way, a bookkeeper can go back and retroactively enter transactions into accounting software, such as QuickBooks or Peachtree. But even if transactions are handled with the other type of “green stuff” (CASH), it is not difficult to set up a system to keep track of the inflows and the outflows.

While there may be complexities down the line, a system of keeping track of sales (as they are received) and expenses (as they are paid and/or charged) can form the basis of a simple “cashbasis of accounting.”

The net income, or “profit,” will be the basis for an assessment of income tax. Depending on the type of legal status a grower can choose, the tax rate will be anywhere from 15% to 38% for federal taxes; income taxes for the state could add more, up to 10%. This may seem like a harsh penalty for legitimacy, especially in states where

growing marijuana may become legal and, as some predict, the price may drop like a rock.

In California, as many readers probably know, a grow operation which is operating legally under the Attorney General Guidelines, cannot make a “profit.” But, call it a “surplus” or whatever; tax still needs to be paid on this.

Are there things than can be done? Of course!!

Traditional tax planning strategies used for common businesses can be used to help: Establishing employee benefit plans and retirement plans are the most common, but there are many others.

But, just think about a part of the garden belonging to Uncle Sam!!

In future OP-Ed Pieces, we will explore some interesting questions relating to accounting and taxation for marijuana growers, such as: 1) Does growing marijuana have to be done within a certain type of legal entity?

2) Is marijuana growing considered a farm activity for tax purposes?

3) Can the accounting for marijuana be done on a different type of method other than “cash-basis”?

What would be the pros and cons of doing this?

4) In California, do marijuana growers have to operate as a farmers’ cooperative?

5) Can agricultural cooperatives get tax-exempt status?

6) Do marijuana growers have to be concerned with some expenses not being deductible for income tax purposes?

Advertise in

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Intelligence/SAN FRANCISCO HOLDER ISSUES STERN WARNING AGAINST LEGAL MARIJUANA

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ttorney General Eric Holder is warning that the federal government will not look the other way, as it has with medical marijuana, if voters next month make California the first state to legalize pot.

Marijuana is illegal under federal law, which drug agents will “vigorously enforce” against anyone carrying, growing or selling it, Holder said.

The comments in a letter to ex-federal drug enforcement chiefs were the attorney general’s most direct statement yet against Proposition 19 and set up another showdown with California over marijuana if the measure passes.

With Prop 19 leading in the polls, the letter also raised questions about the extent to which federal drug agents would go into communities across the state to catch small-time users and dealers, or whether they even had the resources to do it.

Medical marijuana users and experts were skeptical, saying there was little the federal government could do to slow the march to legalization.

“This will be the new industry,” said Chris Nelson, 24, who smokes pot to ease recurring back pain and was lined up outside a San Francisco dispensary. “It’s taxable new income.

So many tourists will flock here like they go to Napa. This will become the new Amsterdam.”

If the ballot measure passes, the state would regulate recreational pot use. Adults could possess up to one ounce of the drug and grow small gardens on private property. Local governments would decide whether to allow and tax sales.

The Justice Department remains committed to enforcing the Controlled Substances Act in all states, Holder said.

“We will vigorously enforce the CSA against those individuals and organizations that possess, manufacture or distribute marijuana for recreational use, even if such activities are permitted under state law,” he wrote.

The attorney general said the ballot measure’s passage would “significantly undermine” efforts to keep California cites and towns safe.

Officials in Los Angeles County, where authorities have aggressively moved to tamp down on an explosion of medical marijuana dispensaries, vowed that they would still assist the federal government in drug investigations.

County Sheriff Lee Baca and District Attorney Steve Cooley said at a news conference that the law would be unenforceable because it is trumped by federal laws that prohibit marijuana cultivation and possession.

“We will continue as we are today regardless of whether it passes or doesn’t pass,” Baca said.

His deputies don’t and won’t go after users in their homes, but public use of the drug will be targeted, he said.

Both gubernatorial candidates – Democrat Jerry Brown and Republican Meg Whitman – oppose Prop 19 and declined comment Friday.

The ex-Drug Enforcement Administration chiefs sent a letter to Holder in August calling on the Obama administration to sue California if Prop 19 passes. They said legalizing pot presented the same threat to federal authority as Arizona’s recent immigration law.

In that case, Justice Department lawyers filed a lawsuit to block the enforcement of the law, saying that it infringed on federal powers to regulate immigration and therefore violated the U.S. Constitution. The case is now before a federal appeals court.

Experts say the two situations are not the same.

If Arizona wants to crack down on illegal immigration more strictly than the federal government, the U.S. can act to prevent police in the state from enforcing the law, said Robert Mikos, a Vanderbilt University law professor who studies the conflicts between state and federal marijuana laws.

If California prevents police from enforcing the stricter federal ban on marijuana, the Supreme Court has ruled that the federal government cannot order local law enforcement to act, he said.

The letter was dated Wednesday and was obtained by The Associated Press.

It “is a very tough-sounding statement that the attorney general has issued, but it’s more bark than bite,” Mikos said.

Holder also said legalizing recreational marijuana would be a “significant impediment” to the government’s joint efforts with state and local law enforcement to target drug traffickers, who often distribute pot alongside cocaine and other drugs.

“The same factors that limited the federal government’s influence over medical marijuana would probably have an even bigger influence over its impact on recreational marijuana,” Mikos said, citing not enough agents to focus on small-time violators.

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Federal drug agents have long concentrated on big-time drug traffickers and left streetlevel dealers and users to local and state law enforcement. As police departments began enforcing California’s medical marijuana law, the DEA only sporadically jumped in to bust medical users and sellers that local law enforcement was no longer targeting.

Allen Hopper, a drug law reform expert at the American Civil Liberties Union in Northern California, predicted that federal agents would selectively crack down on marijuana growers and merchants instead of going after every Californian who uses pot.

“They don’t have the resources to flood the state with DEA agents to be drug cops,” he said.

Nearly all arrests for marijuana crimes are made at the state level. Of more than 847,000 marijuana-related arrests nationwide in 2008, for example, just over 6,300 suspects were booked by federal law enforcement, or fewer than 1 percent.

Consequently, the fight over legalization may end up the same way medical marijuana did, experts said.

When Californians approved their first-inthe-nation medical marijuana law in 1996, Clinton administration officials vowed a harsh crackdown. But nearly 15 years later, California’s billion-dollar medical marijuana industry is thriving.

During the Bush administration, retail pot dispensaries across the state faced regular raids from federal anti-drug agents. Their owners were sometimes sentenced to decades in prison for drug trafficking.

Yet the medical marijuana industry still grew, and it has expanded even more since Holder said last year that federal law enforcement would defer to state laws on using it for medicinal purposes.

Besides California, 13 other states and the District of Columbia have legalized medical marijuana in recent years.

At the San Francisco Medical Cannabis Club, where you can buy marijuana-filled carrot cake and lollipops, manager James Kyne said the federal government would just be continuing “an endless cycle” with little positive effect.

Holder “is opening a bigger can of worms,” Kyne said. “I really think the AG and the federal government could put our tax dollars to better use.”

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Intelligence/United States

When the Majority Says Marijuana Should Not Be a Crime, the Law Loses Its Legitimacy.

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It is hard to imagine that Eric Holder’s letter threatening to “vigorously enforce” federal law if California votes for legalization of marijuana is serious. It seems timed to manipulate voters in California, but in this year when political elites are hated it is likely to backfire and lead Californians to vote to end the failed marijuana war.

During one of the greatest failed experiments in American history, alcohol prohibition, a turning point was when New York told the federal government it would no longer enforce laws against alcohol. That left it to the federal government to enforce the law. Instantly “the feds,” as they were then and now derogatorily known, were hated in rural areas where alcohol was often produced and the feds came in and disrupted their commerce. Then, the biggest urban area refused to enforce the law. The result, alcohol prohibition ended a few years later.

Attorney General Eric Holder last week promised: “We will vigorously enforce the [Controlled Substances Act] against those individuals and organizations that possess, manufacture or distribute marijuana for recreational use, even if such activities are permitted under state law.”

Does he mean that the federal government will start enforcing laws against possession of marijuana? Or, be looking in people’s homes to see if they are growing or using marijuana? That they will be searching people’s backyards for their marijuana victory garden?

It is hard to believe that in a nation where half the murders go unsolved that the Department of Justice would make marijuana a priority after the people voted for legalization. It is hard to believe that an attorney general who decided not to enforce laws against torturers and lawyers who enabled torture would instead prosecute people for marijuana offenses.

The police and the courts depend on the cooperation of communities to keep order. If a majority of Californians vote for legalization of adult use and cultivation of marijuana what kind of legitimacy do the laws against marijuana have? Already, large numbers distrust law enforcement; the feds will have no legitimacy if they are enforcing a law the majority opposes.

I realize that Holder has the responsibility of enforcing federal law. But, continuing on autopilot with aggressive marijuana law enforcement is a

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disservice, indeed an injustice. Passage of Prop. 19 is an opportunity to begin a national discussion of how to better control marijuana. Prohibition has been a failure, the marijuana war has been expensive and damaging; there are better ways.

Proposition 19 is an opportunity for law enforcement officers to help lead the country in the direction of a more just and fair society. As long ago as 1972 a federal commission appointed by President Nixon, the National Commission on Marijuana and Drug Abuse, recommended decriminalization of marijuana. And, this was restated in 1982 by a commission of the National Academy of Science in their report “An Analysis of Marijuana Policy” which urged consideration of legalization.

Experts have continuously argued throughout the eighty year war on marijuana that our government has been taking the wrong approach; now the citizens, the voters, are showing they agree.

The U.S. criminal justice system is already seen by many as a system of injustice. Why? Because the United States with 5% of the world’s population has 25% of the world’s prisoners. One in 31 Americans is either behind bars, on probation or on parole; for African Americans it is one in 11 adults. This mass “criminal” population in “the land of the free” shows that something is terribly wrong. What drives a system that results in 7 million Americans behind bars, on probation or parole? No doubt, one of the driving forces is the war on drugs, and marijuana is the driving force of the drug war, with a marijuana an arrest taking place every 38 seconds, equaling approximately 840,000 annually.

Hopefully, Attorney General Holder will re-think his plan to escalate federal enforcement if a majority votes for ending criminal laws against marijuana. He should instead lead the nation to laws that are consistent with the essence of justice, i.e. being righteous and fair. Is it righteous or fair to enforce laws that the majority says should no longer exist?

Attorney General Holder - America needs real just leadership. We need a leader who will help the country face up to its mass incarceration problem and its misuse of law enforcement to incarcerate people who grow a plant or smoke an herb. Mr. Attorney General you can do better than just saying - we’re going to ignore the people and keep arresting people for something they think should no longer be illegal.

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Intelligence/grow Verticalponics

Getting the most out of your grow space

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he best ideas are always the ones that make you say, “why didn’t I think of that?!” Once invented, explained, or shown, they seem so obvious that you find yourself wondering, “how come this advancement took this long?” Well, that is precisely what everyone will be asking themselves when they hear about and see the new “Verticalponics” systems created by Supercloset, Inc. Supercloset, not content to be the best in cabinets alone, but to also be the trend setters for the newest advancements in design and technology pertaining to the hydroponics community, have used their industry experience and know how to bring you the greatest thing to happen to your grow room since…well... ever. The Research & Development crew at Supercloset, lead by Kip Andersen, CEO and inventor of the Supercloset, sought to find a way to maximize yields in a confined space.

The design of grow rooms were dissected down to the very basics and the questions finally arose, “How can we get more out of the same square footage of space?” “What if we took the grow space off of the ground?” “What if we grew on the walls?” This notion may sound ridiculous, but this simple, and somewhat silly, idea is what has lead to the greatest industry advancement in sq. ft. x sq. ft. yields since… well...ever.

Traditional grow rooms or setups have a few obvious norms; plants on the floor, lights on the ceiling. These fundamental design elements are not even thought about, but why would you place a light above your plants when half of the wattage is then just being reflected off of the ceiling? Why would you waste all of that energy!? Why would you position your lights in such a way that the entire bottom third of

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your plant gets little to no energy from them!?

This lower third gets virtually no light because it is shaded by the upper two thirds of the plant, making this portion of the plant a blatant waste.

“Well,” you may say, “you have to grow this way because plants grow up to the sky.” But is it a plant’s desire to grow straight up, or towards its energy source? Aha! Plants grow towards their light source, wherever it may be. So, what if we took that light source and instead of installing it horizontally above the plants, we took it and ran it vertically down the center of your grow space? What if we then made the four tiered walls of the grow room the location of the seated net cups? What you, in essence, will get is a space equivalent in square footage to your old room, but with 4x the growing space, and one that doesn’t waste a single bit of your bulbs output.

Welcome to Vertical Growing. Vertical growth systems are tiered hydroponics systems that contain 4 multi-shelved walls of net cups nested in horizontal basins situated around a centralized light column, which extends from floor to ceiling. The effect of this amazing set up is four lush walls of flora all growing towards the center of your space. Supercloset’s design, called the “Big Buddha Box,” takes these design elements and throws in their own twist.

Their unit employs “Verticalponics,” which combines vertical growing and “Superponics” (more on this in a minute), as well as providing everything that you need to start growing immediately, including the all important 4-sided net trellis, which hangs between your plants and the light they are eagerly reaching towards.

It gives you the ability to support, train, and tie down your plants, ultimately creating more robust, thick, and bushy plants. You will be the creator of four healthy, dense, floral walls that will not only hold the greatest yields you have

ever received from your space, guaranteed, but also the eye candy that will have you calling your friends and saying, “You have got to see this!!”

As if this concept alone wasn’t enough to have you already planning on how to convert your grow room, it gets even better. The “Big Buddha Box”” comes with Supercloset’s own “Superponics” system. All industry experts know that there are currently a few “best practices” in hydroponics growing. There are some time tested strategies and processes that are widely recognized as being the best in the business. Supercloset has quantified these, put them together, and dubbed the combination of them all as Superponics.

Superponics, put simply, is a synergy of hydroponics technology. It is the technical term that combines all of the best hydroponics growing methods into one system that grows plants up to 2x-5x faster than traditional methods. Superponics systems fuse different combinations of Top Feed, Deep Water Culture, Ebb N’ Flow, Bubble, and Aeroponics all into one automated system allowing you to grow the fastest, easiest, and most you possibly can in your allotted space. While everyone knows that plant roots need nutrients and water, average growers often neglect the most important element, the oxygen. In order to reach their full potential and completely thrive, plants need the nutrient rich water to also be rich in oxygen. The “Big Buddha Box” Superponics system utilizes two methods to achieve maximum oxygenation of the roots, Ebb n’ Flow and Bubble, Aeroponics. The fully automated pumps slowly raise and lower the water level in each lateral tank, which ensures that the roots achieve equal quantities of oxygen throughout the day. The

air diffusers that run along the floor of each tier also consistently shoot continuous streams of air bubbles towards the roots. The result is a tightly knit network of the silkiest white root clusters you have ever seen. Once again, you will be on the phone proclaiming to anyone who will listen, “You have got to see this!”

Supercloset currently has three product lines that feature the Verticalponics design: The “Buddha Box,” which measures 4’x4’ (6’x6’ with the complete tent package), the “Big Buddha Box” (6’x6’, 8’x8’ with tent), and the Super Grow Trailer.

The Super Grow Trailer is enough to make any grower start to drool. This marvel is proof of the adage, “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” This discreet towable trailer looks like any other from

the outside, but we all know that it is what is inside that counts. While these trailers are custom made to order and are capable of supporting a wide array of growth systems, the Verticalponics Systems, which we suggest, will give you the most bang for your buck. The 16ft. Super Grow Trailer can fit two full-sized Big Buddha Boxes allowing you to harvest up to 144 plants and up to 14 lbs. of most dried herbs and flowers. The clean and simple design provides the utmost stealth coupled with maximum yield. Now you can quite literally “Grow on the Go.” Utilizing both Verticalponics will literally turn a single, average grow room into an unprecedented four.

This cutting edge design will double to quadruple any yields per watt, per square foot,

than any traditional growing method as well as achieving perfect light distribution and quality from top to bottom. Achieving 3 – 7 lbs. of dried herbs or flowers in a space of this size is almost unheard of, but now entirely plausible. The Superponics system will also grow your plants 2x – 5x faster than current, standard systems. Supercloset has already begun to see the outrageous demand for these new systems. Commercial growers are contacting them looking to convert entire rooms over to this cutting edge design and system. Can you imagine your 6’ x 6’ room now producing the yield of a room with 144 square feet of space?! It certainly does sound too good to be true, but it is a reality thanks to the brains behind Supercloset.

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The Complete Big Buddha Box Grow Rooms Comes with All the Following: 1) Fully automated, turnkey Superponics/Verticalponics system 2) Discrete, simple, clean, and lightproof 3) Added air flow with inline vortex fans 4) Attach-anywhere internal circulation fans for added airflow 5) Reflective coating on the interior of the tent for

added light distribution.

6) A completely controlled light and dark environment.

7) An industrial grade carbon based air filtration system,

effectively reducing noise and odor.

8) The ability to add in optional CO2.

See your harvests increase by 30%!

In addition to all of these benefits, the SuperTent comes with everything you need to get started: A year supply of nutrients, pH testing kit, internal circulation fans for added airflow, TDS meter, rock wool cubes, clay rocks, temperature gauges, timers, surge protectors, and pumps. You can quite literally get started as soon as your portable

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room arrives. Once everyone gets a chance to see this system in action, they will all be asking themselves the question, “why didn’t I think of that?!”

Supercloset is a company based out of San Francisco that over the past ten years has

primarily been focused on creating the perfect “all-inclusive,” fully automated hydroponic grow cabinet. They have been largely successful in this endeavor, as evidenced by their numerous awards and accreditations given by such high profile publications as High Times. … As Kip would say, “Happy Growing.”

Intelligence/new jersey New Jersey Governor Chris Christie recently made an appearance at a school near Trenton where he took questions.

T marijuana.

“I lose an average of 2 pounds a week and if I continue on this path, I will not live to see the new regulations of medicinal marijuana take effect in July of 2011,” she said. She went on to accuse state officials of “a lack of compassion.”

“Thank you,” Christie began. “And — and — I don’t think — all I’m saying is this …”

“I’m not looking to deny this to anyone who is entitled to have it,” he concluded. “What I am trying to do is to make sure that no one who isn’t entitled to have it gets it.”

So this woman with a fatal disease must wait for her medicine until the politicians in New Jersey decide that the system is so air tight that no one who isn’t “entitled” to cannabis can get it?

This would seem to make sense if cannabis was a dangerous substance that people needed protection from. But it’s a non-toxic plant, so to deny patients their medicine because someone who isn’t a patient might get it is ludicrous and simply not fair to sick people.

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bout one-third of “unlikely” voters in Oregon said they were more enthusiastic and more likely to vote after learning that a medical marijuana initiative was on their state’s ballot this year, according to a new survey released today by the measure’s campaign. Measure 74 – which has been endorsed by the Oregon state Democratic Party – would add state-licensed dispensaries to Oregon’s existing medical marijuana law.

he final question was from a person in need of medical

The governor then went into a long explanation of the difficulties of setting up a system for the state to distribute the drug to those who truly need it for medical reasons.

Intelligence/Oregon

According to the survey, which polled a random sampling of under-40, Democratic and independent voters, 31% of respondents said they were more likely to vote after hearing that Measure 74 was on the ballot, while only 18% were more enthusiastic after hearing about the contest between their state’s candidates for governor.

But the main problem with the Governor’s thought process – and the thought process of many politicians – is this notion that only certain people are “entitled” to cannabis. I understand the new law in New Jersey only covers medical marijuana, but until those in government realize they have no right to dictate what people do in their own homes to their own bodies, we will continue to have problems – even with medical marijuana laws. These delays and strict rules hurt patients while doing nothing to stop others from getting cannabis; they just buy it on the black market.

These findings add further merit to the argument many have made in the run-up to Nov. 2 – that marijuana initiatives could be the key to increasing youth voter turnout in this and future elections. Once mainstream political candidates acknowledge that there is a large and growing constituency of voters who want to see our marijuana laws change, it will hopefully be just a matter of time until they begin to embrace marijuana reform as a major issue that’s in their own best interests to endorse.

The government does not dictate what we are “entitled” to. We are a free people and don’t only deserve freedom when we are sick.

As Jon Walker points out, in Oregon’s 1998 election, more total votes were cast for Measure 67, the medical marijuana initiative, than for any other statewide candidate or ballot measure.

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Cold Water Extraction

A beginnerâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Guide to making hash with bags

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There is nothing new about bubble hash.

It kind of seems outdated when considering all of the new extraction techniques that are starting to gain momentum. Commercial CO2 extractors and butane extractors of all shapes and sizes have been running in Colorado for almost a year; oils and tinctures have made their way into the mainstream cannabis consumer’s conciousness. Unfortunately, these chemical extraction methods come at a high cost as well as a significant risk of bodily injury. More than one house explosion has been attributed to extracting with butane.

With that being said, one often turns to their set of cold water extraction bags, an ice-chest full of ice, small garbage can and a drill; total price: $400. Why not? It might not be as pure as the chemical extractors but its cheap and you won’t burn your face off.

I have dabbled in the art of cold water extraction for many years

with mixed results. My techniques came from a hodge-podge of sources. A few tips from friends, a little research on the internet , topped with a little intuition has usually ended in mediocre product.

At a recent cannabis convention, during an afternoon session, I was passed a bowl of amazing hash. It had a nice even consistency to it, not too hard, not too soft and it smelled amazing.

I had to ask, “who’s hash is this?”, and “how did you make it?” A well dressed gentleman in his late 30’s, early 40’s leaned forward. and replied, “Bags.” He politely introduced himself as Jerry and we started talking about his techniques but I eventually hinted at the idea that we should do a full on photo shoot + article. Jerry agreed, and a week later there we were with a garbagebag full of trim and all of the essentail supplies. I was committed to finally get the technique down so I could actually do something with all that trim at the end of the run. (Continued on next page)

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Cold Water

Extraction

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What you’ll need: A set of bags

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We used Boldtbags.

There arte a lot of companies producing bags right now, but Boldtbags has a few features that make them a better buy. Boldtbags come with an extremely strong stitching and grommetts so you can hang your bags up while they are draining. Boldtbags are made in the U.S.A. and they are readily available at hydro stores and head-shops all over the country.

Drill

- you want a drill with a cord that plugs in so you have a consistent power supply. If you have a lot of material you are going to need it!

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2 Garbage cans / buckets

- the size of the garbage cans needs to be the same as the sety of bags you have. If you decide you only need a 5 gal. set of bags, then all you need is two five gallon buckets.

Ice

lots of it, if you plan on doing more than a kitchen bag’s worth of trim.

Trim / plant material You can use anything from water leaves to trim to full on bud. Jerry’s reccomentation: You’ll get a much higher quality hash if you spend a little extra time pulling out all of the foreign matter that you dont want to run through your bags: pieces of stalk, stem and any other foreign object that don’t have many resin glands on it.

Water

the final ingredient. Colder is better. You’ll need at least a few gallons. See page 38 for Jerry’s kief recipe that doesn’t require water.

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6

We began by setting up all of the bags. Take your garbage can and put the purple bag in first.

This is your last and finest screen. Wrap the top of the bag around the edge like a trash bag and then move on to the next bag. Layer each one of the bags into your garbage can until you have all of the bags set up in the right order.

Time to Pour

Once you have all your bags set up, it’s time to pour all of your materials in the bags.Put the Dont mix it too fast. You dont want to over agitate, Just enough to break the trichomes off the plant material.

It’s O.K. to use a drill, but be careful. You run the risk of breaking a hole in your bag.

Once you get the material in there, Put your mixing bit onto a drill. You dont need anything fancy. A cheap, $20 drill from the local hardware store will be good enough for this job.

Begin mixing the ice, water and trim together. Move the mixer around in the bag as if you were making a margarita; up, down, all around. Continue mixing for at least 5 minutes. When a nice froth has formed on the surface and your arms are starting to get a little stiff, you’re probably done. I’ll reach in there and bring the stuff on the bottom to the top. Thats where the tennis racket can come in handy.

A Tennis Racket? Sure. A tennis racket is great for moving large chunks of material around. After working the drill for a full ten minutes, bob stops and takes a look inside the bag. “Beautiful”.

If you mix it for 30 minutes you can expect to have some green material in there. The more time you spend mixing, the lower the quality. I usually run the drill for ten to fifteen minutes.

I had learned the hard way that using a drill inside the bag can result in rips or tears. Give yourself a one inch safety zone on all sides. Don’t get too close to the bag.

When we finished mixing, it was time to do a little bit of heavy lifting. The first bag you are going to pull is the blue bag, this your first filter. When you lift it out. Let the water completely driain out into the other bags. This could take a few minutes, so you should really have

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Let it rip!

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a strong partner help you do the lifting if you want to prevent any back injury. Once the first bag has drained out, set it into your second garbage can/ bucket for later. Once you have completed the whole process, you can add more ice and water, and mix it up a second time.

The next two bags that come after the blue bag are the green and red bags. The screen on these bags is pretty still pretty pourous, so you are not going to get any good hash out of these.

Use the card that comes with the bags or any other credit card shaped piece of plastic to scrape out whats left in these two bags before moving on to the more productive set that comes next.

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Cold Water

Extraction

Here is what to expect from each bag

Orange Bag This first bag isnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t going to yield much quality, just some personal stash. It is debatable wether or not you even want to keep this stuff

Black Bag A huge difference from the orange bag. The black bag is where you start to see some quality.

Yellow Bag This was our highest yielding bags.

Some really creamy, nice hash came out of this one.

White Bag Here is where the quality starts to go up and the yield goes down. The quality was even better than the yellow bag, but the yield was much less.

Purple Bag The final bag, the highest quality. This is the stuff that is most likely to bubble when you light it.

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After scraping out the green and red bags, use the same scraping technique on the rest of the bags. After scraping out all of the contents, place the contents of each bag into a seperate pile on a glass plate.

Now what?

After you have scraped out all of your hash, it’s time to drain out that last bit of water. You want to seperate the different qualities so you don’t mix your best hash with your worst. As you scrape the hash out of each bag, put it in a seperate pile on a glass plate. If you can, add a label to each pile indicating what quality it is.

Kief Hash101 If going through the process of cold water extraction is still too much for you, there is amother option. Kief hash has been a staple of many growers while they wait for

the next crop to finish. The first time I tried this method, I used a metal bowl and a t-shirt; to surprisingly good results. While the cold ice helps the trichomes break

off the plant material, there are still a lot of trichomes that will gladly break off and fall through your screen completely dry.

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Take the hash that you have scraped out of the bag and place it onto the pressing screen.

Make sure you collect all the hash in the center of the screen

Fold the pressing screen into a teardrop shape, where all of the hash has collected.

Twist the screen so that the hash becomes tightly packed within the teardrop. If you twist correctly, water will begin to pour out.

Once you have drained some water out of the final pressing screen, open it up and scrape out the contents. There should be some moisture left in the hash. Start working it with your hands. Apply lots of pressure, rolling and kneading the hash. After just a few minutes you should have some quality hash. Only your last two bags are likely to qualify as bubble hash (hash that is so pure and oily, it bubbles long before it catches fire).

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No water? No problem! If you are in a hurry and want something quick, you don’t have to use the ice method. With a one gallon kit from Boldtbags we were able to make a nice ball of hash in less than a minute. Take the 25 micron bag and throw in a few handfulls of trim or shake. Agitate shake the bag around for about 30 seconds. As you shake, you can actually see the trichomes dropping out of the bottom. Collect the kief with a plastic card. Heat the kief with a lighter and use your hands to apply some pressure. As the kief starts to stick to itself, rollit in a ball and continue working it in your hands.

Moments later, voila! You have a nice little ball of hash.

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Intelligence A visit with Ben Holmes of Centennial Seed Company in Boulder, Colorado to find out what it takes to become the only certified seed company in Colorado.

By Amy Heiden

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It turns out that the cannabis seed falls under the same jurisdiction as any other fruit or vegetable seed, as far as getting certified goes.

In 1970, the Colorado Seed Act was put into place to prevent poor quality seed and to keep noxious weeds like thistle out of seed stock.

Under the Seed Act, seeds must be measured, sampled, and even scoped for contaminants.

Additionally, a brand must be registered for any seed company, which establishes an identity and makes the companies easier to track, since all items sold must be packaged with the brand name on it. Retail seeds are intended for home gardeners.

Also under the Act, seeds must be tested for germination, labeled properly as to type and species, and include a packaging date.

Ben pointed out that “Right now if you buy seeds from Amsterdam or from any of the seed houses off-shore, there’s no date on the packaging. A lot of the seed comes out of [original] packaging; it’s been opened up and put into some stealthy little packaging and been shipped, so we lose that certainty that what is in the package came from the manufacturer that you intended to purchase seed from.” This puts the consumer at a disadvantage because they no longer know the identity or the freshness of their seeds.

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Centennial Seed Company tackled three of the biggest problems attributed to purchasing seeds through the black market: identity, legality, and germination. Ben said, “I think we’ve managed to put together a seed that is known; it’s fresh, it’s certified by a laboratory, the germination is known, and we’ve mitigated the legal risk for a person who has the proper supervision of their doctor.” Holmes started the company to alleviate the discomfort of purchasing seed from foreign sources. Besides being illegal, patients had “no recourse” when buying overseas. “If your seeds don’t germinate and you call up a foreign seed company, they’re not going to be too keen on just giving you some [free] seeds because you said so,” Ben commented. He went on to say, “If our seed doesn’t germinate, and we get calls all the time because people kill a lot of seeds, we usually go through their method with them step by step.” By reviewing the grower’s germination methods, Ben is able to come up with a plan to improve technique and teach them how to sprout the seeds correctly.

Germinating a seed seems easy, and it can be if you follow a few simple steps.

The “Hail Mary Method”, as Ben calls it, when you just stick a seed in some dirt, water it, and hope for the best, is not the most reliable way to germinate your seeds. Ben told me that the best way to do it is to simply put seeds into a wet paper towel, then into a baggie, and set the baggie of seeds on top of a fluorescent light that is cycling 16 hours on and 8 hours off. “That heating and

Another plus: Centennial does not make any feminized seed. Why is that a good thing? Ben said, “I think feminization is basically copy protection. If you send me a pack of seeds that are all feminized, I can’t make any more. I can’t make the same seed because there’s no male. And if you fem a fem you get 3/4s hermies.” Ben also talked about auto-flowering strains: you can’t clone them. You can’t stop the plant from flowering, so if you clone it will just flower once it has roots. Ben pointed out something mind-blowing: “Now take a feminized seed that’s an auto-flower, they are selling these; you can’t clone it and you can’t make a copy of the seed. So what does that equate? One plant, one seed.” That’s definitely something to think about.

Centennial Seed Company is anything but a strain hoarder. “What’s magic about our business is that once that you have good propagating stock, you basically have infinity”, said Holmes. You can cut clones and make new seeds to your heart’s content off of their non-feminized seed, which will ensure that your breeding stock is always nice and fresh. Ben also added, “Clones are nice, though they’re fragile. If your power goes down, they’ll die. Seed can sit in a jar for quite awhile, unrefrigerated for years, and still be quite viable. So, it gives us a less fragile model for propagating than clone only.”

How can such a small company, with a staff of just three, be producing all these top quality seeds without skimping on standards? Ben gave ample credit to his only full-time employee Sam, who he hired straight out of the Business School at CU. With six strains currently on the market, the company was started with just one strain: Blueberry. His original plant was a female cut that came from Boulder. He grew out some Oregon Blueberry seed to get a male and crossed it with his Boulder Blueberry female for his Gnu-1 (first generation). Gnu-3 is now being packaged for sale as their Centennial Blueberry.

After crossing their Blueberry with two very different strains, they came up with two exciting varieties. First, their “21” is a cross between Sweet Tooth and the Centennial Blueberry. As the seed packet reads, “The result is a fast-growing, citrus-scented hybrid that delivers medium-to-heavy yields of the finest quality herb.”

Mostly indica, “21” is recommended for pain, anxiety, and appetite stimulation. Ben said that the “21” is their top selling strain due to its’ big yields, almost leafless buds, and the powerful effects.

cooling simulates day and night. Seeds require moisture and warmth to do their thing”, said Holmes. He added that after 24-48 hours, “once the tap root emerges, they’re going to require continuous moisture and air.” After you see the taproot, wait for it to pop out about 3/8” to a ½” in length, then carefully lift the sprouted seed off the paper towel and set it root side down into either rapid rooter plugs or rockwool cubes. Remember to adjust the pH of your rockwool to 5.5 prior to planting, since seeds are especially sensitive to pH. Ben mentioned that peat pots are their number once source of customer failure because the peat is pressed so hard that it doesn’t fully expand when wet and the root will hit that disc of peat and stop cold. Then the peat will actually draw the moisture out of the root and kill your seedling.

Centennial Seed Company makes every seed they sell the right way by stimulating females to seed from male pollination. Some people save seeds from a plant that has spontaneously turned hermaphrodite, which encourages a trait that we all fear. By taking a parent expressing this negative trait and using it for breeding stock by saving the seeds, the hermaphrodite trait can be passed on to the next generation. Ben illustrated, “Then you put them into your garden and try to grow them seedless and guess what happens, one of them pops another hermie and then the garden is no longer seedless.” Since the spontaneous hermaphrodite flowers usually show up during the seventh or eighth week, you’ll probably get stuck with those immature white seeds in your bud and they’re not viable because seeds need 3-5 weeks to fully develop. So instead of getting usable seed, you just lower the value of your finished product. Using a hermie for breeding stock is definitely risky business.

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The next Blueberry cross on the menu is one paired with Jack Flash to create Django, a Sativa-dominant hybrid.

The unusual name comes from a Romani word meaning “I awake”. This seed packet reads, “Our choice for this name is immediately obvious to those who try Django.”

This strain is recommended for pain, focus, energy, and mood elevation. The plant delivers heavy yields of “dense, tricome-packed floral clusters.”

And it gets even better, if you can believe it. Centennial just released an exclusive strain called Waipi’o Hapa, which comes from the Waipi’o Valley, the most fertile place in all of Hawaii. Accessible by canoe only, the valley has no electricity, but boy do they have some world-class sativa growing down there. I was fortunate enough to experience the Waipi’o Hapa before the seed was even released, during a full-out bud tasting with Centennial’s owner, Ben Holmes. I can tell you that if you’re going in for a taste of Waipi’o Hapa, you better hold onto your britches because you won’t be able to sit still for long.

This treat of a sativa has a bright and skunky, citrus-lime taste with a smooth and floral finish. This heirloom Hawaiian has indica looks with sativa effects that explain the “Hapa” part of the name, which means, “mixed blood.”

I can’t that say I’d ever been to a real bud tasting, complete with a smell kit until now. Ben impressed me thoroughly when he broke out the box containing small glass bottles, each one filled with a different aromatic, such as chilies, mushrooms, mango powder, peppercorns, and even sumac. These items are intended to provoke your sense of smell, in order to match words with the many subtle smells found within each bud variety. Just like at a wine tasting, only small “sips” of each bud sample are taken, to ensure the ability to differentiate between each strain. Additionally, Ben allowed ample time to pass between tasting each variety so that my brain got the chance to really soak it all in.

I was able to sample the Django, which had a nice and spicy, sandalwood

taste to it. The sativa characteristics were obvious indeed, as it was a very clear, cerebral high. At this point in the interview my recorder switched off and I was content in rapidly scribbling down every word Ben said without missing a beat. This strain is just perfect for getting work done. And as Ben put it, “If I can’t work on it, I don’t make the seed.”

Centennial Seed Company is truly a sativa lover’s paradise.

Next on our tasting agenda: Further. Named after the Merry Pranksters’ bus, the strain is a cross of their in-house PGP (Pretty Good Pot) and Purple Rhino, which is a White Rhino variation out of the Czech Republic that exhibits a purple coloration. With a taste of fake fruit, it reminded me of a Sweet Tart or perhaps a Pixie Stick. And man, oh man, is it heady. The sativa-dominance really shines through as it feeds your thoughts and gives you enough energy to bring your newly dreamed ideas to fruition. Ben called the three stops on our tasting tour, “different flavors for your head.” And all the flavors I experienced there were quite delicious indeed.

After the tasting, it was time to buzz around the facility. I got to check out Ben’s hoop house, which is the only pollen room of its kind in the entire state of Colorado. One large, uninterrupted sheet of plastic is draped over a hoop frame and on down to the floor to create an airtight space in which the male plants are allowed to pollinate the females. Ben attaches a string to the male and runs the string under the plastic and out of the pollen room, so by pulling on the string, males can be stimulated without breach of the airtight meniscus.

The pollen room is one of many special “one-of-a kind” elements at the Centennial Seed Company. Check out their sumptuous package art, hand-drawn with colored pencils, by local Boulder artist, Nathan Hutchinson. Nathan created this masterwork while seated outside of the Boulder-Dushambe Teahouse, and the beauty and Tajik influence of the café can be seen in the breathtaking, intricate designs. The artwork is printed on every seed package from Centennial. In fact, Ben reported that printing is the biggest cost associated with their business.

The next stop was the blooming area, where the plants were just starting to show their sex. Ben explained how to sex plants early by looking for the pre-flower, or pistils, on the female plants, which appear as small white hairs emerging from the petiole, where a small horn-shaped leaf attaches to the stem. When the time is right, the male pollen will slide down these pistils to pollinate the female and thus create the seeds.

Ben said that the earliest showing females weigh into his decision of which he will select to be used for breeding stock. He pointed out that the mother passes on more characteristics to the next generation than the father plant does. All females are flowered, but he will hold back tissue from the female of choice for further propagation. Holmes even has mother plants kept off site so he has back-ups, “just like software”, in case of any unforeseen mishap at his facility.

With the rising popularity of sensimillia, “seeds have become scarce”, as Ben put it. He noted that we used to throw seeds away, yet now we pay a premium for them. “That’s out of whack,” commented Holmes.

He believes that seeds should be readily accessible. Ben clarified that, “They shouldn’t be sold next to cucumber seeds. It’s not that kind of plant.” But, just as other medicinals are easily obtainable, cannabis should be no different.

Seemingly coming out of nowhere, Centennial Seeds has accomplished quite a feat and they say that they just can’t produce seeds fast enough to meet the demand. I have seen Centennial Seeds for sale in countless dispensaries, and in fact, the ornate packaging is what drew my attention to the company in the first place, when I picked up a business card just for the artwork alone. Ben noted, “Few companies have developed the reach we have.” Holmes takes pride in a connection with the re-seller, who is welcome to try his herb and discuss it over a casual yet informative Q & A with the knowledgeable owner.

Centennial Seeds come with a germination guarantee, which I put to the test by sprouting 18 seeds of three different varieties, supplied to me by both Centennial Seeds themselves and also a buddy of mine who owns Native Roots Apothecary. Join me next time for part two when I photo-document the entire process of sprouting seeds and take them all the way through bloom to show you the real deal and sum up performance from Centennial Seed Company’s 2010 Strain List.

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Genetics:

(Blueberry X Haze Plant) Sativa-dominate hybrid.

Grow Info:

Blue Dream is a sativa-dominant hybrid (70-80% sativa), which means in the right hands she can be a high-yielder outdoors, and can yield as much as one pound indoor, per plant, per 1000-watt light.

This strain produces dense, medium-sized buds (colas) tinted a light, limey green and blue, with flaming orange—not red—hairs interspersed throughout.

Taste/Smell:

Tropical, fruity taste and smell, similar to its Blueberry-tinged ancestors, but with a hint of the piney-menthol smell and taste akin to Haze plants.

Effect:

Blue Dream is becoming very popular because of its hybrid-high. Being a sativa-dominate lady, physiologically she is very cerebral, but, the Blueberry genetic ancestor adds a mellow, indic-ated, creeper-effect into the equation.

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Genetics:

F1 cross of a secret sativa strain selected from a garden in the vicinity of Durban, South Africa—hints, its name—and a Dutch-seed skunk plant.

Full-bodied sativa: 80-90%.

Grow Info:

Durban Poison’s flowering time is 8-9 weeks. She is a medium-to-high yielder, and is excellent for beginning/novice growers because of her resiliency.

Taste/Smell:

1stMarijuana Growers page describes the Poison’s taste perfectly: “Imagine drinking a minty-herbal tea from a glass that has a little bit of soap left in it.”

Effect:

Durban produces a very mellow sativa high. She is very similar in nature to the functional, cerebral, and studious buzz Sour Diesel and Snowcap has on the smoker.

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Genetics:

It is widely known that Trainwreck was proliferated in the Humboldt County coastal town Arcata, California, but what nobody seems to truly understand are the genetic ancestors of this plant. She has similar smell and after-effects of Snowcap, Jack Herer, and Haze plants, and based on these growing and smoking traits, it is generally agreed upon that Trainwreck is a full-bodied sativa plant.

Grow Info:

Trainwreck is a very high-yielding plant both indoor and outdoors, however, growers must not forget that she was given her namesake because of how gangly, and unpredictable, her growth patterns can be. The end result outdoors, though very fruitful, can often look like aâ&#x20AC;Ś Trainwreck.

Taste/Smell:

Falls somewhere between the extremely mentholated-sweetness of Jack Herer and the lemon pine-zing of stellar haze and skunk phenotypes

Effect:

Sativa-dominate: giddy, giggly, hungry.

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Genetics:

(California Indica Pheno X Kashmir Pheno) Indica-Dominate

Grow Info:

Hashberry is a low-to-medium yielding plant with large, dense, kush-like colas. (Kashmir is an indica-dominate landrace strain from Kashmir, India). She has an 8-9 week flowering time, and is usually grown indoors,

Taste/Smell:

Old school genetics equates to an old school flavorâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;skunky,, kushy earth tones. This is a funky smelling plant with slight floral notes.

Effect:

Indica-dominate: Sedative, sleepy, heady, excellent for pain relief and snow-ins.

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Genetics:

(1970s California Skunk #1 X Unknown Haze Variety) Sativa-dominate, this plant was given her name because she was originally grown and stabilized on Vancouver Island, and because she is the offspring of Skunk #1, which, back in the day, was commonly referred to as “Sweet skunk.” Alas: Island Sweet Skunk

Grow Info:

Very popular within grower circles, ISS is a high-yielding, manageable plant to grow indoors and outdoors, producing beautiful tall, long buds, often with extremely high THC contents. Flowering time: 8-9 weeks.

Taste/Smell:

Sweet-meets-skunk: An unbelievably strong smelling plant.

Effect:

One of the headiest, stoniest sativa plants on the market, ISS, though sativa-dominate, can easily be mistaken for an indica plant.

Couch-lock is imminent.

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Intelligence/Uncle rus

UNCLE RUS’s WEED-IQUETTE TIPS! VOL. 1, “HIGH-WAY 2 THE DOOBERZONE!”

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reetings nieces & nephews! It’s me, your Jewish weed smoking uncle, Uncle Rus Gutin! Not only am I here to let you in on little but well known secrets of the universe; I’m also here to teach you all the best weed etiquette tips I know.

Now, there are few things on Earth as old and great an invention as “the joint“. “The doober“, as it’s known in some circles, is literally one of the oldest and trustiest conveniences known to man. Before there was the wheel, irrigation, agriculture and Snookie from “The Jersey Shore”, there was... The Doob.

I declare that even when a caveman was done bludgeoning his chosen mate over the head with a club and dragging her ass into that cave…he then rolled up a spliff and took a minute to sit down on his favorite rock to take a few puffs to unwind.

Second only to the joint in being one of the world’s most timeless and awesome things is the road trip. We’ve all been on a few, some of them unforgettable, and some of them traumatic. However, in either case, there is one element a road trip MUST have to be undertaken correctly: the perfect number of pre-rolled fatties for your journey.

Think about it, even when those stoners Sam and Frodo and their whole posse set out for Mt. Doom, they seemed to clearly have a discussion regarding how much “Shire” Smoke they were gonna need beforehand. If you watch that movie, those dudes are puffing down every chance they get. And why? Because they were prepared!

But there’s no one way to do this kids, and every road trip is different. So I’ll give you an example of what I just did last weekend, and you can change the amount of ingredients depending on how many people you’re planning on serving.

Your Uncle Rus and three of his cohorts decided to go see the Phillies play the Padres down in San Diego for two days of baseball, puffin’ & boozing! We were scheduled to leave at 7am on Saturday, and I knew what had to be done. Like Abraham Lincoln, JFK or any other great leader before me, I took it upon myself to handle the marijuana situation before us.

We would roll ten joints total for the trip.

Why ten? You might be asking. Well each joint has a specific time and purpose.

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The staying-irie-on-road-trip-itinerary is as follows: We’ll need joint One for the drive down Highway 5 to get there; Two, for before the 1st game; Three, for after the 1st game; Four, for before dinner; Five, for after dinner, and Six to go with brunch before the 2nd game on the 2nd day. Joint number Seven is for after the 2nd game on the 2nd day and Eight, for the drive up the 5 back home to L.A. But... You’re probably saying: “Uncle Rus, you’re obviously not a math jew, cause that leaves 2 more joints doesn’t it?” Of course it does kids! These two joints are called “anomaly joints,” and we bring them along because as much as we like to plan our road trip ahead of time, the universe doesn’t always cooperate.

These “anomaly joints” can be used in any number of unexpected scenarios: What if you hit some bullshit traffic jam on your way there or home on the highway because some asshole is texting his baby mamma while driving?!

What if you get a call informing you that your beloved childhood dog, Chester Copperpot, died from a combination of cancer, Dog-Aids and being hit by a Vespa?

Or say you’re single, road-tripping, and you meet some sassy ladychick at the bar?

You may very well need to call upon one of these extra green hammers to further impair the sassy lady’s judgment; and the aphrodisiacal doob-session is always a good beginning to friendships that go much deeper than Facebook.

So remember, every road trip is different, and you’ll need to roll a plan that works for your particular adventure. And also, do it knowing that you are carrying on a great and timeless tradition. As far back as when my people walked through that desert for 40 days and 40 nights, I guarantee you, before the departure, they got a reasonable rate on some wholesale sized sacs of kosher dope and rolled up some spliffs for their trek to the promised land.

So until next time nieces & nephews...Mind your manners.

4 Mas Uncle Rus, go 2 WWW.RUSGUTIN.COM! SEE YOUR UNCLE RUS LIVE! EVERY FRIDAY @ “FRIDAY NITE LIVE!” @ THE COMEDY STORE on SUNSET BLVD.!

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Tag Archive for cypress hill Smokeout Festival 2010: Music, Politics, Higher Learning

By Cortney Wills The San Bernardino hills were alive with the sound of music (and the smell of some serious ganja) for the eleventh annual Cypress Hill Smokeout Festival, presented by Guerilla Union, this past Saturday. Forty thousand fans turned out for a day of food, music and of course—marijuana. This marked the first year that certified medical marijuana users were able to consume pot at the show in designated smoking areas. The festival featured a Medical Marijuana Expo that included voter registration booths, product samples and speaking panels on related issues like cultivation, Prop 19 and other relevant issues.

Authors Shirley Halperin and Steve Bloom led a discussion of their new book, Reefer Movie Madness, and hosted a day of stoner movies including Dazed and Confused, Friday and Pulp Fiction. Jeff Dowd, the real-life “The Dude” himself was on-hand to introduce The Big Lebowski.

Despite all the Prop 19 propaganda, the real attraction of the day was the music. Over 26 acts performed on three stages including MGMT, Los Rakas, Slightly Stoopid, Paul Oakenfold and Living Legends.

Nas showed no signs of stress from his current label feud when he joined Damian Marley for a high-energy performance on the main stage, looking and sounding better than he has in years. Damian’s floor-length dreads swung behind as he commanded the crowd to light up during his set, yelling, “I heard this was a smokeout…Everybody SMOKE-OUT!!”

Legendary hip hop group, and the festival’s hosts, Cypress Hill hit the stage with Travis Barker on the drums, delivering a power-packed set of their hits “I Wanna Get High” and “Stoned Is The Way. ” B-Real and Sen Dog

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sounded as good as they did when the group burst onto the scene almost 20 years ago. After a beat battle between Barker and DJ Muggz, the crowd went wild for a rendition of their classic, “Insane In The Brain.”

New Amerykah, Pt. 2: Return of the Ankh The real showstopper of the evening was Erykah Badu. The crowd waited with baited breath as Badu hit the stage in a blonde wig and plaid poncho that covered her from neck to knees, later revealing a seventies style shift dress. She opened her stellar set with her 2008 hit “The Healer”, emphasizing the politically peppered evening with a raised fist and animated delivery. After introducing her band, “The Cannabinoids”, she followed up with her throwback hit, “On And On” before performing mostly new material sprinkled with fan favorites like “Tyrone”.

By the end of the night, throngs of mellow music lovers gathered at the main stage to watch Incubus end their 18-month hiatus. Despite a lack of fresh material, save for the track “Surface To Air,” they wowed the crowd with classics like “Drive” and “Stellar” to close out the night on a high note.

As the first festival to formally blend fans’ love of music with their love of marijuana, only ten arrests were made (all misdemeanors such as public intoxication). Show sponsors and artists begged the question: Can pot smokers be united and assemble peacefully? Furthermore, is there a chance in hell Prop 19 supporters could see success on the November ballot? The answer, written across signs and t-shirts throughout the festival, was a resounding: “Yes We Cannabis.”

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What came First...the Plant or the Seed?

This is a story about Hawaii, Supreme Beans Seed Company, its founder Johnny Dope, and how they are collecting the past, to create the future.

Supreme Beans is a company founded upon a deep respect for Hawaiian cannabis genetics. Growing up in the islands has exposed us to what we consider some of the finest and most exotic herb from around the globe.

When you think of Hawaii, an image of mild weather, beaches, sun, surf and plenty of rainfall appears. Amazingly, Hawaii has 11 of the 13 major life zones that exist on earth, giving it the largest concentration of life zones in the smallest area on the entire globe. We have cold deserts like the crater of Mt Haleakala, hot deserts, grasslands, tropical rainforests, snow on Mauna Kea, etcetera. So, what does this meteorological mayhem mean? Well, when you take microclimates, add topography, then throw in some cannabis, you essentially have marijuana growing from all over the world. In Hawaii, marijuana is growing remarkably well on every island, with Hawaiian plants are surviving and thriving in nearly every life zone planet earth offers a plant to proliferate in, which, in turn, creates a plethora of extremely unique cannabis strains. Hawaiian growers were even said to have pioneered soil-less growing, by utilizing all of the airy volcanic rock that peppers the islands.

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i i a w ha

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Collecting the local strains has become a mission all its own. Being raised in Hawaii, we set off thinking it wouldn’t be too hard to track down all those strains legends of lore were made of: The Maui Wowie, Kauai Electric, Kona Gold etc. Yet we couldn’t have been more wrong. In the beginning, we mostly got a lot of “I know this guy.... Who knows this other dude.....Who used to date this girl... blah blah blah.” Eventually, with a great deal of patience, growing and testing, we were fortunate enough to have found some of those legendary strains.

This has led us to the Breeding projects.

The first three strains Supreme Beans will be releasing are Molokai Frost, Puna Blue, and True Blood. We have used a secret male to stabilize these strains as close as possible to their respective ancestry. Feminizing has also offered us a different way to provide Hawaiian genetics to the rest of the world.

Molokai Frost is a unique indica/sativa hybrid finishing in 8-10 weeks. Truly an heirloom strain from the remote island of Molokai, her genetics have been kept amongst a select few for over 30 years.

Puna Blue was gifted by a big island grower that Supreme Beans met in Amsterdam. It’s a beautiful plant that appears to have Moroccan ancestry.

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Typically growing in a single “foxtail”, Puna Blue is a fast paced grower with a super short flowering time of 7-8 weeks. In late flowering, she shows her colors, bright blue and indigo calyxes that glisten against her crystals.

The True Blood is a funky sativa from Maui.

Originally known as “blood weed”, True Blood exhibits a very strange trait: When a branch/stem is damaged or cut, the plant “bleeds” a mysterious red fluid. In addition to that, True Blood has this weird flavor and smell, the only thing you can think of to describe it is “hippy”. It’s a scent that really takes you back in time. This strain has an extremely long flowering period of 16-18 weeks, occasionally 20 weeks. They are currently breeding a faster finishing hybrid too.

Supreme Beans is continuing its quest to explore throughout the Hawaiian islands in search of the next lost treasure. We understand that this is just the beginning of our journey. The goal of Supreme Beans is to capture and share the heirloom Hawaiian gems hidden deep within each island.

Many of the strains that were once available locally in seed form, have now become clone-only due to hoarding and introduction of new alien strains.

In order to preserve the local gene pool for future generations, Supreme Beans finds, tests, and stabilizes these genetics. In doing so, Supreme Beans aims to produce quality Hawaiian cannabis seeds for the world.

Intelligence/the collective expert

Prop. 19 Failed. So What?

The collective expert takes a look on the bright side

So Prop 19 failed in its first attempt. Is it a big deal? No, not really. As most of us could agree, it was a far from perfect bill; although, I did support it and consider it progress as compared to our current state of prohibition. With the Governor signing Bill 1449 into effect, marijuana possession up to an ounce has officially been decriminalized, as it is now considered an infraction and carries a maximum fine of $100. So, yes, some progress has been made but Prop 19 would have been a step in the right direction.

a few months ago, they said that collectives and patients were not the target of their campaign, as the bill had nothing to do with medical marijuana.

I find this to be quite idiotic. In California, let’s be honest, it does not take much to get a medical marijuana recommendation. Whether you are truly using marijuana for a medical purpose or simply because you enjoy it recreationally, chances are you have a doctor’s rec and are a patient. This means that Prop 19’s core audience really was the medical marijuana community and the campaign really did itself a disservice by overlooking this fact.

The Yes on Prop 19 campaign’s main failure may have been their inability to energize the young voters. There were far too few 18-29 year-olds that voted on November 2nd. True, they did not have the money that the Obama Campaign had, but they should have gotten a much better young voter turn-out. However, another failure of the Yes on 19 campaign that should not be overlooked was their inability to unite the medical marijuana community. There was a tremendous amount of mis-education out there. A number of collective operators and doctor’s offices thought that Prop 19 would put an end to their business. Even beyond this, there was plenty of greed that manifested itself in the No on Prop 19 campaign. While people were busy pointing fingers at Richard Lee for trying cash-in on Prop 19, there were growers and collective operators alike who were worried about a potential significant drop in the price of marijuana that legalization would cause and the potential negative impact that this would have on their profit margin. Others in the industry were simply scared of change. They felt that things were working the way that they were and did not want to support anything that could have potentially shaken things up, although it would have been down-the-line.

To put this into perspective, let’s look at what Americans for Safe Access and others in the medical marijuana community (I hope I, myself, helped by trying to spread the word) accomplished in the State Attorney General election. Steve Cooley was, by all accounts, expected to win that election rather handily. He still may win as all votes have yet to be counted, but it will be extremely close. With ASA and others in the mmj community spreading the word to patients primarily via collectives about how much of a prick Steve Cooley really is and how patients needed to vote for his main opponent, Kamala Harris, they may have really had quite an impact on the election. This is particularly impressive considering ASA spent a fraction of the amount of money that the Yes on 19 campaign did. True, Cooley may have lost the election due to the motivation of many progressive groups-besides medical marijuana, Cooley also has a horrific record on environmental issues, equality for gays and lesbians, and women’s rights. However, this still illustrates the point that the mobilizing of the medical marijuana community can make a difference in an election and appears to have done so in the California Attorney General race.

Some of the businesses noted above would have still opposed Prop 19 had they been properly educated. However, had the Yes on Prop 19 campaign really reached out to and properly educated the medical marijuana community on what the bill would and would not affect, the results may have been substantially different. In politics, reaching out to motivate your core audience is generally referred to as “mobilizing your base.” The Yes on Prop 19 campaign completely struck-out when it came to this concept. Having spoken to a few people at the Prop 19 campaign headquarters

Despite Prop 19’s failure at the ballot box, it seems as though it just being on the ballot has helped to move legalization forward. It seems to be a matter of “when” we will be putting an end marijuana prohibition, rather than “if.“ It really increased the dialogue about marijuana period, and across many mediums. Leading up to election day, it was talked about on the local news throughout California as well as on all of the cable news networks. It made the front page of just about every major newspaper in California. As far as public policy goes, it also had a profound impact. Ten cities across California had

a measure on their local ballot proposing to impose a gross-receipts tax on medical marijuana sales.

All of these local measures passed, but we will have to see whether these municipalities can lawfully enforce this, as under Prop 215 all collectives have to be run as a non-profit organization. Medical marijuana sales can be assessed sales tax due to the fact that it is considered a recommendation and not a true prescription; but further taxing a nonprofit is something that will most likely be legally challenged. Taking into consideration that Oakland has had a small tax on medical marijuana sales for years now, these additional taxes may just fly.

Either way, progress is amongst us and Prop 19 had something to do with it.

Imagine what can happen when there is a ballot measure that the medical marijuana community is united in support of (such as the Jack Herer initiative that is supposed to be on the ballot for 2012, possibly?). Imagine that.

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Intelligence/cooking

7 questions with pot lucky chef Danyael Williams A “Pot Lucky” dinner. Let’s just say, I was delightfully surprised after I met our chef, Daniel Laughing Bear and feasted on a gourmet dinner which became a catalyst for one of the most euphoric cannabis experiences I’ve ever had.

1.

The hosts, Shawn & Veronica told me you’re, “an interesting cat, a Sioux Native American who was trained at Julliard, but plays in death metal bands & creates artisan jewelry.” I was intrigued, can you give us a little background...

(Danyael) Yes, Oglala Lakota Sioux I was born on the Rosebud Sioux Reservation in South Dakota and lived there until I was 12 when my mom moved us to Los Angeles for us to grow up and have a better life off the rez.

(Or was it. Ha HA) I am still very spiritual in the Lakota beliefs and ceremonial in all the art I make and create. I do make authentic Sioux artwork in the tribal ways and have done many special talismans for everyone from friends to others that needed the medicine healing properties of Shamans. Oh yea I also make silver and stones in jewelry in the native fashion but I do stray and do other custom silver work. I have been making jewelry for about five years but have been doing tribal artwork for quite sometime.

I grew up in the L. A. School district and went to school in a few different places in and around L. A. I did manage to make a few friends that were into bands back in the day and that’s kind of how I got started in the music scene.

I was friends with the guys in Slayer, Megadeath, Savage Grace from back in the early stages of what is known as Thrash Metal in L.A. I toured the world with a lot of these guys and started playing from being around them and just watching so I started playing guitar and getting pointers from them. As all bass players might add: Bass players are frustrated guitarists.

I have Majors in Professional Music and Performance from Berkeley College of Music 1992. I play Four & Five string, Fretless and Upright basses. Acoustic and Electric Guitars, Drums, blah blah blah, by that time I was already touring and playing worldwide with metal and punk rock bands and was recording and performing around the world.

I produced and engineered several artists albums for major & Independent record labels world-wide and worked in A&R and music business development for IRS records back in the day.

I also have extensive music business knowledge working and touring with major recording artists such as: Motorhead, Slayer, Megadeth, Death, Ziggy Marley, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Iron Maiden, Kiss, Black Sabbath and many more to list I was in The Legendary Thrash metal Band called Dark Angel and also in some other bands from time to time

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Dark Fucking Angel recorded the song in Bob Kulick (Kiss, Meatloaf) studio “Creeping Death” for the Grammy Award Winning CD “Metallic Attack” in 2005 and the song was released as a single from Big Deal Records, and I did get a Grammy award so that means that I got some recognition for being a musician. Dammit!

DFA was in the studio working on new music and set to tour the world once more until our singer was forced to retire from music. We recorded several tracks but never got to do any vocals and the project was scrapped and the Mighty Dark Fucking Angel Reunion was nevermore.

I have also been active in the Punk Rawk Scene Recording and Touring world-wide with such artists as: ZYKLON-B, Glue Gun, Ten Foot Pole, Inhale, Don’t NO, RaSh and Savage Tree Frogs on Smacks to name just a few and have been an active studio session player and touring bass player from time to time throughout the years.

When I first saw the menu, I was quite surprised. It was an interesting mix of down home favorites, but gourmet. How did you develop the menu?

2.

(Danyael) This whole thing really came about from one of my friends that mentioned that since I was really good at cooking, and have been baking for some time, I prepared a whole dinner made with Cannabis, and that started my thoughts about it. It was too bad too cause she didn’t make it to the dinner (Flake) .

As for the menu: Well I basically asked a bunch of my friends what they thought would be good and went from there. They were actually easy to prepare and since I love to cook I tried it and thought out my plan of attack.

HA HA

3.

Was the cannabis you used during the cooking process home grown or purchased at a special dispensary?

(Danyael) It was grown by me and my friend. I have been growing for some time: Blueberry Kush and Headband and I’d just been growing the natural sunlight way. I make the tinctures from my shake and Kief but I also use the buds for the special occasions. Like this one was.

4.

How long did it take you to prepare for the dinner?

7.

The cake was pretty special, any tips for home chefs baking with cannabis?

(Danyael) Well after I finalized the menu and got other responses about the dishes I just went shopping for the dishes the day before and started the preparation three days before making the tinctures for the dinner except for the Olive oil and the Rum. That process takes 30 days to infuse.

(Danyael) Yes, the cake was made sugar free and fat free as much as I can make it, so being cake, I wanted to make that the killer so I purposely made it as strong as I could and from everyone that had a piece of that testified that it kicked ass.

Everything was organic and I never use sugar or fats as I keep a healthy lifestyle and being a Diabetic have to watch out for that. But don’t tell everyone at the dinner that it was healthy. (Laughing)

There are so many things you can find about cooking with cannabis from the web as I did and experimenting is more fun so just go with it and share with others and it will be all good. You don’t have to use sugars and fats for so much of cooking now days so if you want to do cooking for diabetics or sweet tooth treats the possibilities are endless.

5.

There were about 20 people at the dinner, how much cannabis was used for the dinner?

(Danyael) I used about 2 ounces for everything: 1 ounce of each strain. From the RSVP list I had enough to feed 24 people only cause I always make more than enough.

6.

For at home chefs cooking with cannabis, would you recommend X grams as sufficient for a dinner of 2 or 4?

(Danyael) That’s hard to say because of the different strains and grade. I have been using my plants for awhile so I kind of know what the strength of the tinctures will be. When I do baking I usually use about a 1/8 per batch say for brownies. But also the leafs and shake are less potent than the buds but I’m sure everyone knows that. I experiment alot so that’s the fun in that and the not knowing is a plus..

I’m no chef just someone that really likes to cook and experiment with different dishes but I do share everything and ask a lot of questions on peoples tastes and just keep trying to come up with new things I like and if I get outside ideas I take them and flow with it.

Its so good to share with people and that being the circle of life for me, I’m just so happy I have good friends and meeting new friends so being able to cook and bake and everyone liking it (hopefully) that all the positive energy keeps me cooking and baking.

P.S. Wait till you try my Red Velvet Cupcakes with Rum Cream Cheese Frosting.... :-)

humboldtgrow.com • 67

best of the summer With the fall in full-swing, winter nearly upon us, and summer now all but a distant memory, the staff at Grow Magazine would like to take a trip down nostalgic sunshine lane by highlighting some of this past summer’s strongest album releases.

Each summer music fans are privy to some of the year’s best releases. It’s the time of the year when weather permits bands to tour upon albums they’ve recently released, trecking the globe so their record label can cash in on this season of commerce, when parents and their home-from-school children are most apt to find themselves avoiding the heat and each other’s company by spending unthinkable amounts of hard-earned money on unnecessary expenses they purchase under the air-conditioned conduits of conglomerates like Best Buy, Target, Wal Mart, Costco, Walgreens and Ticketmaster.

This past summer was a fruitful one for all music fans— across the entire spectrum of musical genres were a plethora of potential masterpieces. Here’s a rundown of what this critic found to be the most impressive albums of the past summer.

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Arcade Fire: The Suburbs

(Best Alternative-Indie Rock Album) No band in 2010 faced more follow-up pressure than the Arcade Fire, the critical darlings who live and create in the evolving musical mecca that is Montreal, Canada. The band’s first album, Funeral, is now an official landmark, a turning point in indie-music history; an album that was so universally acclaimed and super-music-fan-adorned its impact on the shape of music to come can still be felt now, almost six years past its 2005 release.

The band’s second album, Neon Bible, though a massive success, was a darker, more brooding album—which, when one considers the title of their first album (Funeral) would seem hard to do. But they did: Arcade Fire went dangerously dark on Neon Bible, going beyond family dysfunction and teenage angst and moving into politics, worldaffairs, and other real messy big picture issues that artists tend to stay away for sales and marketing reasons. Nonetheless, in the end, though it was not as popular as their eponymous debut, Neon Bible was another total success, going 2x platinum and ending up on many musical press 2008 best-of-album lists.

So for their third album, the whole indie world, Arcade Fire fans and critics alike, were waiting for the failure, the flop, or, at least, for a disappointing affair. But, when the album dropped this past summer, none of the aforementioned adjectives could apply: The Suburbs is an album that one-ups almost everything the Fire have done to this point.

Depending on the day and your mood, it will rival, or exceed, any personal emotive out pours inspired by Funeral.

The Suburbs is a scathing take on life in Levittown; on growing up in those treelined, church filled, fringe cities Americans have come to know, love, and loathe, as the suburbs. Lead singer Win Butler, and his multi-instrumental brother-band mate, William Butler, are both from a suburb twenty-miles north of Houston, Texas known as The Woodlands. The Woodlands is a corporate owned entity, and is one of the largest master-planned suburban communities in the United States. After finishing high-school in this uber-bubble-burb, the Butler brothers quickly evacuated the place in favor of art-school in Montreal, where, Win soon met his future wife and band mate, Regine Chassagne, and where Arcade Fire, the band, was born. But Montreal music scene aside, I believe it’s worth noting that though they live and work in Montreal, this is not an urban Canadian band, as their sound, the critics, and your psyche may have led you to believe—Arcade Fire’s key song writing component is a product of the suburbs, and on this album he takes dead aim at everything he and his brother disagree with regarding their master-planned upbringing.

Sonically speaking, the sound on The Suburbs is great-- large but warm. With the aid of more money from the label, the Fire invested in a bottomless bucket of vintage instruments, and the band’s sound has gotten noticeably larger, more fleshed out, even arena-rockish in certain areas (But not too arenarockish; this isn’t the Kings of Leon). Primarily, The Suburbs is a quiet, mellow, hunky-dory album. Even when the lyrics are brooding, the sound and feel of the album is quite relaxed, and with the exception of a few tracks, most the sonic structures are not dead-on rockers, but low-key affairs with a lot of subtle, unfolding layers of exceptional art.

Standout Tracks: Modern Man; City With No Children; Suburban War

Flying Lotus: Cosmogramma

(Best Electronic-Experimental Album) Flying Lotus is the brainchild of electronic auteur Steven Ellison. Ellison lives in the border zone between Silver Lake and Echo Park, two of Los Angeles’ most musically colorful neighborhoods. On his debut album, Los Angeles, Ellison—aka Flying Lotus— took the sounds, feels and textures of his neighborhood-locale and translated the angstriddled, smog-filled contemporary urban zeitgeist in to an electronic sound collage that perfectly encapsulated the mood of the city by deftly creating an electronic union between Tinseltown’s darkest and brightest ethos. On Cosmogramma, Flying Lotus has put together his definitive opus, to date. Only two albums into his career as proper studio musician, it’s hard to believe the albums weight: Cosmogramma is an album so dense and intrinsic it commands multiple headphone listens before truly revealing the depths of its vast aural layers. Within its sonic landscape the album hits on a bit of everything, nearly every genre is employed at one point on the album, with Flying Lotus carefully crafting his creations between an army of organic instrumentation and digitally transferred samples. On paper, if it had to be genre-defined, it couldn’t be, but for starters, the album is part electro-pop, noise pop, part avant garde experimentation, jazz fusion, Detroit techno, industrial, part kraut rock, part IDM, and there is even something for the kids, as Cosmogramma has splices from a number of video game sequence patches in its production as well. The album features some high-profile guest collaborations, one with Thom Yorke of Radiohead who takes vocals on one track, and the other with Ravi Coltrane, who peppers his saxophone-genius throughout. Both guest appearances are welcomed, and good, yet, in hindsight, their contributions, though great for sales, seem slight in scope when seen from within the total package— superfluous, even—only tiny pieces out of the millions that seem to unfold themselves from within the massive electronic empire that is Cosmogramma.

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The Black Keys: Brothers

(Best Bluesy-Rock n Roll Album) The Black Keys are the new The White Stripes! There: I said it. I’m not one for comparison.

I know it’s foolish and it’s all a matter of taste. And I know that both groups have their own sound and unique individual merits. But, I also know that both these bands were ascending towards the same Delta-blues moonlight, at the exact same time, and know today, very unfortunately, that though it was great to have them both around, one of them seems to be fading away.

Yes, indeed. Where once we looked towards Jack and Meg—the canonized candy cane duo from Detroit—for consistently, face melting bluesy garage rock, today, with that twosome all but dissolved, the new forerunners of the fuzz-toned, garage-moaned, white-rhythm-and-blues-group-circuit are, unequivocally, The Black Keys.

Over the course of six albums, aforementioned Keys have austerely stuck to a rock-solid, rudimentary formula of minimal, catchy, blues inspired tunes.

And after seven albums, the duo is only getting better.

Because, Brothers, the band’s seventh LP, is their finest effort to date; a fifteen-song classic of an album which Rolling Stone instantly declared a “masterpiece.” (Which, technically, in today’s world, doesn’t say much, but even the Rolling Stone still gets it right occasionally; and here, they did.)

For the production of Brothers, the Akron, Ohio based two-piece took their vintage sound to the most vintage studio left in the country: Muscle Shoals Recording Studio, a place where, in the past, on any given day, you could find heavyweights the likes of Willie Dixon and Aretha Franklin honing their craft. It was within the confines of this boggy backdrop that The Black Keys would create this dirty, romantic, almost sloppy, Exile-In-Alabama-Sort-of-Album.

Brothers is, like most great blues albums, written in the shadow of relationship discontent. (The drummer had just suffered a rough breakup) The albums central theme is love and loss, with lead songwriter/guitarist Dan Auerbach writing a cannon of poignant love-hate songs under the broken-hearted spell of his band mate, and, probably, his own personal demons to some degree. The record’s primary recurring lyrical themes navigate this ship like a love-sick compass over the rugged waters of jealousy, longing, love, lust, and betrayal—see song titles: “Next Girl;” “The Only One;” “Too Afraid to Love You;” “I’m Not the One;” “Never Gonna Give You Up.” Yes, it’s apparent, down at Muscle Schoals heartbreak was in the air, and thankfully for the fans, there was a lot of it: fifteen tracks worth!

Which, when compared to contemporary-album-recording-time-standards should, technically, make Brothers a bloated mess; it is, almost a double-album of material released all at once. But, to be releasing this amount and type of music in the age of ten-track, thirty-minute albums packaged in cheap plastic cases and produced on cheaper Pro-Tools budgets, actually, makes Brothers.... A bloated blessing.

Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti: Before Today

(Best Psychedelic-Pop Album)

Ariel Pink is currently gaining some real public notoriety, but he is hardly a newcomer to making music: the mysterious analog-man has been prolifically producing music for over twenty years now, and since 1996 he’s released a slew of underground CD-R albums and analog cassette tidbits. His music is, to say the least, an acquired taste. In many sections, Pink’s vast, sprawling catalogue of warped freak-folk experimentation is damn near unlistenable, and I’m a fan of his music, and unlistenable music, so that’s saying a lot. But the introverted, bedroom-tape-extraordinaire from Beverly Hills has continued to gain steam over the years—his fan base has grown considerably as his music’s listenabilty has evolved from its formerly acutely schizophrenic psychedelic lo-fi stages, to the current, less pronounced, only severely manic-depressive psychedelic lo-fi stage its in today.

But, evolving music aside, things really began to turn in Pink’s favor three years ago when he was signed to the small indie label, Paw Tracks, which is owned by the equally challenging band, Animal Collective—who, had handpicked Pink as the first musician to be signed to their label, and who are huge fans of his tunes. He released one album on Paw Tracks in 2007 that was noted, if still challenging and primarily undiscovered.

And then on June 8th, direct in the middle of this past summer’s high tide, Mr. Pink and his newly minted band mates dropped a near perfect piece of sun-soaked, sandy psychedelic music on the indie music underground with the release of Before Today.

Before Today is Ariel Pink’s first real attempt at making a sort-of-proper-album: It captures Pink’s innate knack for writing catchy, melodic pop-songs, but, unlike its predecessors, the album was not produced to fail, i.e. Before Today does not sound so ill-or-under produced as to be intentionally non-commercial. (On prior albums, critics, even those who lauded Ariel Pink’s musical chops, had been split over what to call his production sound: some labeled it under super Lo-fi, others preferred to call it no-fi.)

Regardless, whatever you wish to label his fashion and look (cowboy-junkie-hipster-New-York-Doll?), and however you choose to label his music (lo-fi, nofi), today, what matters most is that his sound is being discovered— Before Today was a bona fide underground success. The album was received well by most of the open-minded music press and midsummer Mr. Pink even found himself gracing the cover of Fader magazine opposite another colorful, oddball genre-defying talent, MIA. 70 • humboldtgrow.com

Wavves: King of the Beach

(Best Psych-Punk Rock Album) Wavves is a three-piece punk outfit that writes catchy, two-minute, sunshine-psychepunk anthems for the apathetically inclined cannabis cretins of the world. The band, only two albums in, is still very much in its nascent phase, and only recently have they truly became a band—previous tours and recordings were centered on Nathan Williams, singer and primary songwriter, and whatever two musicians he could find to play with, and put up with, his oft-erratic on stage antics. (See his: “I’m on Ecstasy,” Barcelona Primavera Festival freak out footage on Youtube for a glimpse at the darker side of this young showman) Williams created Wavves at his home in San Diego; it initially began only as a series of analog four-tracks recordings Williams did alone for himself, but since the indie-hyped release of his first self-titled debut album, and the more recent, King of the Beach, almost overnight, the 23 year old has gained an underground audience, and in this critic’s eyes has earned himself the title of SoCal’s stoner-punk-laureate.

For his latest LP, King of the Beach, after having gained some notoriety in the indie-press, Williams had the option of cleaning up his sound and image; luckily for his fans, he didn’t.

King of the Beach was written and produced under the same spirit of abrasive, DIY punk aesthetics that all of William’s recordings have had, so the record, though released by a substantial indie label—Fat Possum—still resides in the barren soundstage of his early, raw demo tapes, minus some slight EQ work done to his vocals (On certain tracks, you can even understand what he’s saying). As for the song writing here, it remains the same as well, continuing to traverse across the catchy-as-hell, who-gives-a-fuck, three-chordprogressions that have made him into a unique, contemporary punk novelty.

LCD Soundsystem: This is Happening (Best Dance-Electro Pop Album)

For his third outing as ringleader and head songwriter of the electro-pop band, LCD Soundsystem, James Murphy packed up his microphone, record crates, mixing boards, computers and that elephantine musical brain of his, departed from his longtime DFA base in New York City, and headed for the hedonistic sunshine and sand of the far west. Murphy and his band relocated, or moved into, the sprawling, sunshine imbued, paradisiacal-studio-Xanadu that is the estate of famed producer Rick Rubin. “The Mansion,” as Los Angeles music-lore has come to know it, is located at the crest of Laurel Canyon Road, a daunting and beautiful pass running over the Santa Monica Mountains linking West Hollywood to the Valley. Over the course of nine months the mansion served as LCD base camp, the home and studio where Murphy and company would produce whatever electric debauchery they were cooking up.

And!... This time around, after the critical and commercial success of his sophomore album, Sounds of Silver, on this record, Murphy—the successful artist, the proven hit— had gained the two most valuable commodity chips an artist can obtain from their label: Murphy had more money; and he had more time.

Which, in many ways, could have been disastrous, it could have resulted in a 360 degree turn towards the indulgent and over-compensating album, towards the hot mess of too much: too much fun, too much money, too many outside influences, too many drugs, too many hanger-ons, too many sounds; too much sunshine, too little vision. After all, Los Angeles is, like no other city on this planet, littered with tales about the ruinous toll Hollywood hedonism has taken on the relocated artist; and on the album they inevitably produced loaded or stung-out, and then the career that ended shortly thereafter. This city can be dangerous, creatively toxic, for newcomers and Murphy came here knowing that on this album he had more to lose than ever before (Every critics undying respect and a worldwide audience of hard core fans, for starters). So, the point being made: It was a bold move on Murphy’s behalf to choose to produce in LA and leave NYC, and it very easily could have ended in a sleek, glittery disaster.

But it didn’t.

Yet, again, Murphy proves too smart, too witty to ever become a cliché, to be, even for a instant... Lame. He embraces his lame side on stage; he rediscovers old clichés and makes them sound new again, and remixes new cliches to make them sound old again, in the studio. He is analog-hip, the guy with the thin black mobster tie and five o’ clock beard. And after this summer’s release, he became the unequivocal electro-pop king. On his third album LCD prevails yet again: This is Happening is a masterpiece. For fans it is everything you had been waiting for; an album that transcends the most perfectly synchronized heights of either its predecessors.

Released on May 18th, this album of future upbeat electro-dance pop standards sounds like a party at Rick Rubin’s mansion—This is Happening is a truly fun album, and even when the lyrics are bleak, Murphy’s wry delivery seems to trivialize and assuage the resonance of any darker implications. At the beginning of a contemptuous summer, on the oil slicked streets of LA, This is Happening set the perfect tone for creating a warped, careless summertime vibe. It is an album so enticing many white males were, and still are, seriously trying to dance to it. humboldtgrow.com • 71

Cannabis Culture/Essential Reading

5

Essential Reads for the Marijuana Enthused

Marijuana Horticulture: The Indoor/ Outdoor Medical Grower’s Bible

The Psychedelic Reader

All growers, from the first-timers burning a single bulb in their closet, to the commercial grower pulling off a generator, should have in their garden, an accessible version of this book. In cannabis cultivation circles across the green lands it is referred to as the bible—the absolute best bud book on the planet. Jorge Cervantes, master-grower and book author, has been growing cannabis for over thirty years, as well as scavenging the globe for new and evolving strains and growing techniques.

Inside this five-hundred page fifth edition the seeking stoner can find any piece of information they desire regarding growing: seeds, clones, lights, indoor, outdoor, soil, vegetative growth, flowering, nutrition, grow rooms, case studies, and harvesting, it’s all here.

Marijuana is a psychotropic drug, and though I cannot openly advocate the use of more acute psychotropic agents—synthesized or organic—I can point out to those who do take “the road less traveled” this hidden gem of literature from “the other side.” The Psychedelic Reader is the ultimate book for all psychedelic, psychotropic explorers.

Edited by some of the most knowledgeable names in the world regarding psychedelic and psychotropic agents, this book is a compilation of the finest writings from the golden era of consciousness, featuring contributions from all three heavyweight editors as well as Sir Julian Huxley, Alan Watts, Roy Bates and R. Gordon Wassen, among many others.

By. Jorge Cervantes

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Edited By. Timothy Leary, Ralph Metzner, and Gunter M. Weil

Reefer Movie Madness The Ultimate Stoner Film Guide

By. Shirley Halperin and Steve Bloom

Marijuana and movies is a match made in heaven. Marijuana can make the best feature film more poignant and the worst big-budget disaster a laughing riot. Like putting jam on your toast, once you’ve had a smatter of marijuana with your movie, you can’t image the experience without it. With that being said, this is every stoner cinephile’s golden guide to movies with a marijuana bend. Inside there are 420 movie reviews—quite fitting— covering nearly every genre of film: sci-fi, horror, B movies, pot comedies, action-packed adventures, dramadies, musicals and more.

Pot Culture The A-Z Guide to Stoner Language & Life By. Shirley Halperin and Steve Bloom

Just as the title could lead you to believe, Pot Culture is a complete literary guide regarding everything cannabis and cannabis culture. For the avid cannabis culture vulture, it’s an absolute must buy; perfect for the coffee table. Inside you get everything that there ever was to know about marijuana terminology, marijuana movies, history, lifestyle, clothing, music, etiquette, strains, pop icons, festivals, you name it, these two authors have discovered and covered every green fascination you could have, and put it all in one beautifully packaged product.

Orange Sunshine The Brotherhood of Eternal Love And Its Quest To Spread Peace, Love And ACID To The World By. Nicholas Schou

The history of the American counterculture movement in the 1960s is full of insane tales of drug dealing, drug taking, and mind-bending madness.

Orange Sunshine, the latest offering from author Nicholas Schou, takes us into the world of one of the most notorious, and infamous band of rebels that existed during those strange days—a group of Southern California surfers who would come to be known as “The Hippie Mafia.” What once began in the mid-sixties as a peace-seeking brotherhood evolved into something entirely more far out once the small group was introduced to the decades biggest drug: LSD. Orange Sunshine outlines the turbulent years that followed the drug’s introduction as “The Hippie Mafia” grew into a worldwide smuggling ring of surfers, who, by decades end, were importing and selling more hashish and acid than any other criminal organization in the country. It’s a wild ride, and a great read.

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Q&A: Beneficial Bugs Q & A with M & R Durango Insectary Owner, Lee Anne Merill

By Amy Heiden

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One question has haunted cannabis growers since the dawn of time: “What’s up with beneficial bugs?”

Amy Heiden made a visit with M&R Durango Insectary owner Lee Ann Merill for the answer.

Grow: Primarily, I would like to focus on spider mites in an indoor setting and how to get rid of them in an organic way by using beneficial insects.

Lee Anne: One of the most important things for people to consider is the spider mites’ habitat. They love it hot and dry. And, light intensity can also be a big factor in their behavior. They’re super stimulated by strong light intensity, heat, and dry conditions. Breezes can exacerbate their reproduction, too. Different greenhouses have different settings. Some of them have totally enclosed conditions and they have artificial lighting. Others have intake vents, fans, and natural light with air moving in and out of the greenhouse. In those cases, the spider mites will be moved around a lot by the breeze because they’ll let out a thin webbing and float on the breeze from plant to plant. Mites can also be moved around on worker’s clothing, without them even knowing it, as they’re moving through the plant material because they’re just so minute and so adept at getting where they need to be.

Growers can look at watching their lower leaf canopies first because those are the areas that spider mites will begin to colonize and build up before they move into upper canopies. So, many times what you will hear from growers is, “Wow, I’ve been watching my plants and I haven’t seen a single thing. All of a sudden I have webbing all over the place and I have spider mites up in the tops of my canopies.”

Usually, that is because they got started down low, underneath the leaves in the really protected areas where they just weren’t noticeable and then they moved up.

Depending on the growing situation, if growers can move susceptible plants to cooler spots in the greenhouse, areas that have a little higher humidity, or a little more shade, then they will find that they will reduce the mites’ ability to reproduce as effectively. It’s not going to stop them but it will certainly help.

As far as biological control goes, getting started early is easier; performing routine maintenance level releases rather than trying to fight a fire once you do have webbing and a major outbreak.

Grow: What would you recommend for biological control considering that there are so many options out there?

Lee Anne: There are quite a few options. The one that I would the least recommend would be ladybugs. And it’s not because they’re not good predators. They will feed on spider mites, but ladybugs are wild field collected during hibernation.

They’re cool-weather loving insects and in natural conditions when the spider mites are prolific, the ladybugs are going to hate the conditions because they don’t like it hot and dry. They like it cool and damp. So, people turn to ladybugs because they’re easy to see and they’re large-bodied animals. Everybody loves ladybugs, but to be honest they can wind up really stressing the ladybugs out and having them just die, or try to get out of there, or go back into hibernation, thinking that they shouldn’t be awake. They spend about thirteen months of their life cycle asleep. In my opinion, it’s super unpredictable for a grower to depend on ladybugs as a biological control.

Depending on the grower’s situation, the question that needs to be answered to determine the right beneficial insect to use is: what are their environmental conditions?

The first things I would ask a grower are: Are you running on natural or artificial light?

What is your day length?

What is you light intensity?

What is your temperature and humidity range in a twenty-four hour period for a high and low?

When they can give me those kinds of answers, I can tell them what would be the

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most likely beneficial choice to use.

As far as the best options for spider mite control, there are two that I primarily rely on, assuming we are talking about Colorado greenhouses. The backbone of most of my programs revolves around a specific species of green lacewing.

It’s a generalist predator. In the crawler stage for about eighteen days, it scours up down and all around plants. It’s also a nocturnal predator, and that’s a helpful thing because spider mites are daytime movers and at night they are sitting ducks. Green lacewing larvae, the species Chrysoperla rufilabris, are phenomenal predators against spider mites as well as about 250 different pest species, including a lot of the same pests that would be associated with most crops that have spider mites. Most of those crops also tend to have everything from aphids to mealy bugs to thrips. Thrips are also a real common one when spider mites are prevalent because they also like hot, dry conditions. Lacewing will prey on a wide variety of those pest species. I usually go in with them as the backbone of most programs and supplement if I need to with host-specific predators that only prey on spider mites. In Colorado, because of the variation in a greenhouse setting, usually you have fairly variable temperature and humidity from morning to night. In some cases it’s very controlled; with the greenhouses that are all enclosed and use artificial light, temperature control, and humidity control settings, then it’s not quite such a wide range. But, a lot of greenhouses will range from 40-50% humidity at night or in the early morning and then by late afternoon it may have dropped down to 15% and it jumps all over the place. There are a couple of species of predator mite that are really useful. One is N. californicus. It’s a little predator mite that will prey on a wide variety of pest mites. In Colorado, the most common pest mite species is the two-spot spider mite. Almost everybody knows about those and wants to turn to something called P. persimilis because it’s the most widely known predator mite. But, it’s probably the least useful in Colorado. It needs high humidity and moderate to low temperatures to successfully reproduce, meaning if a persimilis had it’s way it would have 7090% humidity 24 hours a day and it’s temperature range would be between 70-80 degrees F, never higher than 80, seldom much lower than 70. And they’re also very specific to just two-spot spider mites and there’s one other species of a Pacific mite that they’ll attack.

They’re really not what I use in Colorado much.

Californicus I use quite a bit because they can take a range of humidity from 40-60%, temperature from 50 all the way up to 100 degrees F. And then there is another species that is really good for spider mites in greenhouses here. It’s called N. occidentalis. It’s super and takes temperature ranging from 50 to 115 degrees F and humidity from 30 to 60%. That’s another one that I really like and I actually like it better in Colorado, when I can get it. It’s just that the commercial availability fluctuates. They’re a little more finicky to raise, and it seems that the population availability varies. So, I tend to use both [californicus and occidentalis] quite a bit. There are others that will also do well; M. longipes is another one that can take a fair range of humidity, but it’s only for higher temperatures. Depending on the setting, some people that have very controlled environments don’t have really hot temperatures, so they’re not dealing with the spider mites ability to aggressively reproduce. But, they can still have pretty intense problems. If their temperature is below 80 degrees F, then I wouldn’t use longipes at all. It just doesn’t like cool temperatures. And the same goes for N. fallacies, which is another predator mite that’s commercially available and commonly recommended. But again, both of those need 80 to 100 degree temps to really be aggressively reproducing and feeding.

“If growers can move susceptible plants to cooler spots in the greenhouse, areas that have a little higher humidity, or a little more shade, then they will find that they will reduce the mites’ ability to reproduce as effectively.”

Hairy and sticky plant material slows the predator activity because they constantly have to preen themselves and clean that sticky residue off of themselves while they are also out there looking for prey. When dealing with plant material like that, growers are going to need to go in with heavier release amounts per release and fairly frequent release timing. It seems like one of the most common mistakes people make is: “I’m going to release a few and see how they work.” And the truth of the matter is that I know they need to be considering routine introductions on a regular basis during their growing cycle to keep pest populations level rather than trying something once, and then when the pest 78 • growcoloradomag.com

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manages to out reproduce them [the predator], finding they have a problem and saying, “It just didn’t work.”

Grow: Would the lacewings also eat the predator mites and can you use them together?

Lee Anne: That’s a good question. There could be some incidence of crosspredation. However, it’s interesting in that the predator mites are also a daytime predator. I have used them in conjunction with each other. There have been times I have felt that the predation potential was indicated and I backed off and just used the lacewing. There have been other times when it’s appeared that we’ve had a symbiotic relationship going on, and it’s been in cases where there have been heavy spider mite populations that we needed to actually innovatively go in and knock back. The benefit of having them both in there at that point in time is that you get 24-hour activity against that one pest species.

You have the lacewing preying at night and you have the daytime predators as well. But, to be honest with you, it is a good question and it is something to consider. It partially depends on the host availability. When times get tough and they’re both competing for the same food source and the food source starts running low, then there’s more chance of cross-predation. The lacewing truly won’t necessarily be able to tell the difference between a pest and a predator spider mite. Typically the predator spider mites move so much more rapidly; though, I think that is one factor that maybe weighs in for a lower incidence of cross-predation between them. They just get out of the lacewings’ way quickly.

A pest mite is a slow mover; they crawl around and don’t really move fast, and if you’ve ever seen predator mite activity they are just moving quickly. I think that helps. Interestingly, if a grower also has pests like whiteflies or thrips, a lacewing can actually feel the whitefly’s immature stage with its mouthparts.

The lacewing can determine if a whitefly has been parasitized by a whitefly parasite and if it has they don’t feed on that one. Therefore, the lacewing is very compatible with some other beneficial insects in a greenhouse setting where you would release both them and a parasite.

Grow: I have used lacewings before and I felt like they might be cannibalizing each other. I used the egg cards and it seems like when they hatch and see the other eggs there they eat them.

Lee Anne: You’re right in one regard. They will cannibalize each other if they don’t have a food source. On the egg cards, one thing to be aware of is that for every one lacewing egg on those cards there are 10 host food source eggs as well. They do stop and feed on that card and we have it that way on purpose because in the first 12 hours after they hatch they have to find food or they die.

They would also be capable of feeding on another egg that’s a lacewing egg, but we do put ten to one. So, you start out with 5,000 lacewing eggs on an egg card and you have 50,000 prey host eggs as well. They are feeding before they ever crawl off of that card, but chances are they’re going to end up nailing one of those food source eggs that we put on there.

Grow: I know that you can get the lacewing in different life stages. I thought it would have been better if my lacewings were hatched and ready to prey. In what situation would it be best to use eggs, larvae, or even adult lacewings?

Lee Anne: The way to look at it is: when you use the egg cards, you plan to use those only when you’re going in for maintenance level releases, just to supplement a situation that’s already under control, because it takes three to five days for the eggs to hatch. They get their first feeding right there on that card and then they move off the card to go scour the plants and look for hosts. But, in that first week they’re preying on the smallest of host availability that there is, which would be eggs of other pests like spider mites and also the very young nymphs or larvae of the pest species that they’re looking for.

They’re not going to be out there feeding on massive numbers per individual yet because they’re tiny and they’re not going to be feeding on large prey, like adult winged aphids for instance. I always figure if I’m releasing eggs, I want to have about a seven to ten day window of opportunity for them to develop when I’m not worried about the pest getting ahead of them. In a case like that, they are the cheapest approach because they can be shipped by FedEx second-day air instead of overnight. And, they are also easy to use because you can separate those cards into tabs and hang them from the plants, so they’re easy to disperse. But, you do need that window; you need the three to five day hatch time frame and you need another three to five days for them to get big enough to really be aggressively preying. You need to know you’re confident that you’re not going to loose ground during that time if you wait for them. Often I will use both [the egg cards and the pre-hatched larvae]. I’ll use the larvae in any hot spot areas because often it’s a localized outbreak. I’ll go in

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with the live crawlers [pre-hatched larvae] in a case like that, and 1,000 of those live crawlers are enough to successfully treat 250 square feet of area where you need to get an immediate knock down. And they’re great because they are already hatched, they’ve already received their first critical feedings, they’ve already molted, and even though they’re still minute when you get them, they’re preying aggressively by that point. When you shake that bottle out over your plants or tap that larval frame and release the little larvae out onto the plants, they go to work the second they get out, and that’s really a convenient quick activity product to put out. In my experience, I’ve had very few times when I’ve felt like adult releases were warranted. The main reason is that in the adult stage of their life they are really finicky. If they’re in captivity, where you don’t have the natural pheromone activity of the outdoors to stimulate them, they are very touchy about temperature and humidity fluctuations. To give you a feel, an egg-laying adult, if their temperature is disrupted more than five degrees in 24 hours or the humidity more than 2% in 24 hours in a captive setting, it can disrupt the egg laying up to 80%. What’s really bizarre is that if you get them out in an alfalfa field in Eastern Colorado and the wind is howling and the temperature is all over the board, when it’s cold at night and it’s hot during the day like almost desert conditions, they’ll proliferate. And the only thing I can attribute to that is pheromone activity. They have all these different stimuli. They have native Chrysoperla rufilabris, the same genus and species of lacewing, out there. They also have native brown lacewing out there they have all these different pheromones stimulating them. As well as in alfalfa, they would have a nectar and pollen source for the adults and they proliferate.

I don’t often release adults indoors because I know their variability in a captive setting.

Grow: As for as shipping the larvae, is that an overnight or an expensive process?

set it down and let it be still, it will be crawling with lacewing and they’re moving out from where they’ve been clinging and hiding. Then after 24 hours, you can just take a look and it would be pretty obvious that they’re all gone and you can get rid of the cardboard unit.

Grow: Is the larval frame the best option for plants with trichomes, since there is no carrier material to get stuck on your plants?

Lee Anne: Right. Yes, people really do prefer that. With any hairy-leafed crop or any plant that has sticky residue, it’s really helpful to not have carrier material in your way.

Grow: Can you tell me a little about M& R Durango?

Lee Anne: We’ve been in business 21 years. I’ve been in this industry over 25 years. We’re a family owned, woman owned and operated business and we’re very small but we have a pretty large outreach. We work with everyone from home gardeners and geodesic dome owners to large greenhouses and large agricultures. We’ve released lacewings on 18,000 acres of wheat and in a 10 x 10 foot garden, so no job is too big or too small. The goal of our business is providing non-hazardous, non-toxic, sustainable, environmentally responsible control options for growers.

“There is another species that is really good for spider mites in greenhouses here. It’s called N. occidentalis. It’s super and takes temperature ranging from 50 to 115 degrees F and humidity from 30 to 60%. “

Grow: That is why I wanted to get this information out to the growers. I know so many people that are using pesticides because they just don’t know that they can choose a natural control option by using beneficial bugs. I wanted to educate people on an organic and safe choice, rather than have growers continually assuming that they must buy dangerous chemicals.

Lee Anne: Yes, the prehatched are sent by FedEx priority overnight and that is expensive. One of the reasons is that I’m not shipping them from this insectary right now. We all have limited rearing rooms and so we all collaborate with each other at different times of year and depending on who’s raising what, that’s where we get it. I have them shipped directly to you from a producer that I am collaborating with. I still guarantee them and that’s partly because I know the quality control they have in-house. I used to be the chair for the quality control for our industry association, and that gives you an inside handle on everybody’s rearing practices; I worked with this company for over 25 years, so I’m confident that I can guarantee the product. It goes by Fed-Ex overnight and it comes out from California straight to you and that shipping is expensive.

I’ve seen it run between $55 and $65 for an overnight shipment. When people are really able to maintain things with the eggs, then that’s great. But if they have a high-dollar crop, it’s like insurance; it’s almost not worth risking the investment of raising that crop and then releasing eggs when you may have the stage set for a real outbreak. And then you’re trying to fight a fire.

Lee Anne: It’s a learning curve. It’s a paradigm shift in thinking in a many ways. I remember 21 years ago when we first started this business, people would tell me they had an insect problem and I’d explain that they need to be considering releasing insects and they’d think I was from Mars. I’ve gone through the whole quarter century of people calling this industry voodoo and it’s like the way people feel about homeopathics and herbal medicine; they just don’t understand when they’ve always thought about antibiotics. They don’t understand that God has created tools that are right here that are very effective and we just need to consider our thinking a little bit. One thing that I think would be helpful is if people quit expecting aesthetically perfect looking plasticized food. It’s OK if you buy spinach and it has a few chew marks in it or a few wound sites where a thrip has fed a little bit; it’s not going to kill you and it’s a healthier plant. People have come to expect something that looks like it’s not even real and will never rot in the refrigerator while they dink around and don’t use it. We’ve got to broaden our view again and get back to reality.

Grow: How can you expect to receive the pre-hatched larvae?

Grow: I’m hoping that this article will help this process along.

Lee Anne: There are two ways to get the pre-hatched larvae. Different people like different ways. Some people like them in the bottle, which is an opaque plastic quart-sized bottle that has rice hulls and food source in with the lacewing and the lacewing hide in those rice hulls during shipment. They’re reclusive in the light, so they’re down in those rice hulls and they literally just have to take the lid off and shake the contents out over the plants and the lacewings fall out with the rice hulls onto the plants and disperse from there once the vibration is stilled and they calm down. Another really popular method is called larval frames. Those frames are verticell units; they’re cardboard units and they have organza cloth on each side and little tiny hex cell holes that have the lacewings in there, separated from each other so they won’t eat each other. And they have a food source in with them too, but there are no rice hulls or anything, so there’s no carrier material that gets on the plants when you distribute them.

The way you distribute them is you just pull the organza cloth off one side a little at a time, turn the unit upside down and tap on the back and the lacewings fall out onto the plants. Then, when you are completely through one side, then peel it off the other side, tap out any that you missed that you can see, and then and then leave that frame in the plant material for 24 hours or so, to allow the rest of them to crawl out. One behavior lacewings have is when there is vibration they cling. They will wedge themselves in the cracks and crevasses of those little hex cells and they’re so tiny and they can flatten themselves out and just cling. You’ll think that you got everything out of there, and then if you

Lee Anne: Well, I think that a lot of people do want to use alternative measures and they just don’t know about them. I’ve spent more time trying to help educate people than any other thing I do. It’s because I can’t handle having somebody just call and say, “I think I’ll order this and try it.” I would rather talk about what the situation is to determine whether this is what you really want to do and determine what you can expect and how soon. I like to set the stage so that you walk into this eyes wide open and you’re understanding your part in the whole scheme of things, know what to expect, and can make a wise decision about what you need to do.

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Grow: Where can people get these beneficial bugs?

Lee Anne: They can get them from us; that’s a really easy source. There are also other places in Colorado, but not insectaries, since we are the only one other than the state insectary that is a research facility up in Palisade and not a commercial insectary. There are suppliers in Colorado that also have beneficial insects. People can go on-line to The Association of Natural Biocontrol Producers website, which is the industry resource for information, at: HYPERLINK “http://www.anbp.org” www.anbp.org. It’s our industry association where you can find a list of suppliers of beneficial insects and organisms and their phone numbers and web sites.

Grow: What is your company’s web site?

Lee Anne: Our web site is: HYPERLINK “http://www.goodbug.com” www. goodbug.com. If people do a search on-line and start perusing the different options, they’ll find different retail sites that will offer a wide range of natural controls and organic gardening options. If they plan to order, I would encourage people to ask questions and if one of the suppliers that they’re talking to has an issue with answering questions or tries to evade being specific with their answers, especially regarding species, shipping methods, or exact numbers of insects that people are paying for, then think twice.

When they say this is enough to treat X number of square feet, ask if they can tell you exactly how many you are purchasing. Those kinds of questions will help purchasers make a decision about whether they feel confident about ordering from that supplier or not. They should be able to ask questions and have them answered in a clear, concise way without anybody having issue with that so they will know what to expect and not have a bunch of surprises.

I can’t tell you how many calls I end up fielding when people call and say, “Well, no one ever told me that,” or “No one ever explained this to me.” That can’t be; there are a number of good suppliers out there that will answer questions in detail and if they’re not willing to do so, then people should consider whether they’re confident enough about their own knowledge base to just simply make the purchase and hope for the best.

Grow: Can beneficial insects be purchased directly from your web site?

Lee Anne: We don’t have an on-line shopping cart, but they can call our 800 number (800-526-4075). They can look at the web site and see what they’d like to consider purchasing and give us a ring and we can take the order over the phone.

Grow: You supply to many of the grow stores in the Denver area, so would that be a good way to save on shipping costs?

Lee Anne: Yes, if they have them in stock. But, I would ask questions whenever you buy any insects in stock from any retail store. Find out first if there is an expiration date. For instance, these lacewing larvae that we’re talking about (the live crawlers), whether they’re in the bottle or in the frame, they will have a use by date. They don’t have a very big window. For most retail stores, I encourage them to get their customers to place the orders and tell them they will arrive on Tuesdays and they need to pick them up and release them by Wednesday. If they place their orders that way, I have every degree of confidence that those insects will still be viable and healthy.

If they order them in on speculation, and they get them in on a Tuesday and haven’t moved them by the following week, then there may still be one or two fat happy crawlers in there, but there’s going to be a number of them that were eaten or are dead. And it’s the same with the lacewing eggs; from the day that we collect the lacewing eggs and prepare an egg card to ship to someone, that lacewing egg will hatch even in a 50 degree cooler, within 10 days. If it’s been more than 10 days, then they’re going to be dead or have all cannibalized each other and all the people will be buying will be a card that has leftover host food eggs and egg shells. People need to find out when the store got them in, how old they are, how soon hatching can be expected, and how to tell when or if they have hatched. I’m not saying that retail stores are not trying to do a good job. I just think that it adds an element there that can be difficult even for a retailer to manage. Another way to save on shipping is to get together with neighbors or other growers and order in volume to one delivery address and then they all split the cost.

Grow: I know many growers who are using pesticides and I encourage them to make sure they cycle that stuff out before they switch to beneficial bugs or their bugs are just going to die soon after release.

Lee Anne: Yes, and it varies depending on what pesticide too. Pyrethrums, if it’s low humidity in their growing environment, will take seven to ten days to clear out enough to release a lacewing and longer than that before they can release a predator mite. If it’s something stronger than a pyrethrum, depending on what it is, it can take two to six weeks before that residue won’t kill a beneficial insect. If people have been using chemicals, often it’s a good idea for them to give a ring and just let me look up the field trial information to tell them what the average time frame is that they need to wait. And e-mail is a really great way I can consult for people too and that’s: HYPERLINK “mailto:info@goodbug.com” info@goodbug.com.

I would like to thank Lee Anne for sharing all of this valuable information and look forward to a follow-up interview with M & R insectary as new and exciting discoveries are made in the biological control industry. –Amy Heiden

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