The Hemp Connoisseur, October 2015 - Issue #34

OCTOBER 2015

COUPONS INSIDE

COLORADO’S PREMIER GUIDE TO CANNABIS

*This

magazine is intended for individuals over 21 years of age. thcmag.com 1

2 October 2015

DON’T BE THIS GUY! 955 E 58TH AVE. UNIT B • DENVER, CO 80216 • 303-362-1873 THETRIMMERSTORE.COM • INFO@THETRIMMERSTORE.COM

thcmag.com 3

4 October 2015

thcmag.com 5

A LETTER TO OUR READERS

“If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.”

- Louis D. Brandeis

Sometimes I spend a lot of time writing this letter over the preceding month. Sometimes I just free flow something that occurs to me after, shall we say, I commune with some sacred herb. But once in a while some news crosses my path at the last minute and I feel the need to change my plans in order to address it. For those of you who don’t know Ryan Loflin, he is a true pioneer of hemp agriculture and the movement as a whole in Colorado. Ryan was one of the very first hemp farmers to put seeds in the ground after the passing of Amendment 64. Today I saw an announcement on Loflin’s Facebook page that really pissed me off. Ryan stated that his hemp crop tested at 0.5 percent THC, a whopping 0.2 percent over the state’s legal limit. So with only one half of one percent of THC, the state considers his crop to be marijuana and thus they have to destroy it. RUFKM!?

Let’s put 0.2 percent into perspective for a moment. Destroying Loflin’s crop over 0.2 percent is like taking his car away for driving 55.11 miles per hour in a 55 mph speed zone.

This situation points out the absolute absurdity of our regulations regarding hemp. The fact is that any marijuana grower worth anything would be embarrassed to have a plant with 20 times the potency of Loflin’s hemp crop, unless it was a CBD strain. Let’s just accept the fact that Loflin’s crop cannot be used for consumption because it is just way too dangerous to have a crop with an extra 0.2 percent of THC, couldn’t it be designated to be used strictly for industrial purposes? Are they worried that someone may want to smoke a house made with hempcrete? No, that can’t be it; maybe if it was made into textiles, crazed hippies everywhere would spark up their T-shirts and just lose their minds. Oh wait, I know, a child might accidentally eat ten pounds of animal bedding made from Loflin’s hemp and catch a buzz.

What this issue boils down to for me is a complete waste. A waste of time on Loflin’s part for propagating the seeds, going through the legal process to grow hemp and most importantly, the time it takes to care for the crop. Then there is the waste of throwing away acres of hemp that has innumerable industrial uses. And last but not least the complete waste of taxpayer dollars being used to destroy his crop.

We spend too much time regulating and partitioning cannabis. There are so many uses for the plant that to create a regulatory framework in which we destroy cannabis because it doesn’t fit into the exact categories we have created for it is not moving us forward. The biggest culprit of this categorization comes from the Controlled Substances Act. Unless cannabis is completely removed from the CSA we will continue to have issues arise like this.

Imagine the landscape of regulation if it weren’t part of the CSA: -Hemp farmers would be able to have crop insurance. Right now they are growing at their own risk.

-Hemp that goes over the legal definition of THC content like Loflin’s would have the ability to be used for something if not consumption.

-Marijuana stalks may have a use for industrial purposes as opposed to being thrown out at harvest -Marijuana producers would immediately be taxed like every other business in the country as opposed to the 60-70 percent tax rate they are paying right now, which would create more jobs and help stimulate more commerce. It would also allow the industry more opportunities to give back to the community via charitable endeavors.

-Banks could work with marijuana businesses making the entire industry safer for all.

-Interstate commerce would boom, allowing one of the most useful plants in history to be available to all who need or want it.

In the past couple of years it has become absolutely clear that we have been spinning our wheels regarding the legislation of cannabis in this country. As long as we continue to nitpick the finer details of regulation on both hemp and marijuana, we are only treating the symptoms of prohibition and not the source of the problem. Every activist on both the hemp and marijuana side should be banding together for a full frontal assault on removing all forms of cannabis from the CSA. There are enough of us out there that if we put any petty differences aside we can make it happen.

De-scheduling of cannabis is the panacea that will clear up most of the largest issues we deal with in both industries today.

I am 99 percent sure that I am right on this. . . give or take 0.2 percent.

Publishers Christianna Brown David Maddalena Editor-in-Chief David Maddalena Art Director Christianna Brown Associate Editor DJ Reetz Copy Editor Alexandra Massam Layout Designers Caroline Hayes Christianna Brown Director of Sales and Marketing Christianna Brown sales@thcmag.com Sales Managers Jason Brown Lisa Fay KC Stark Sam Ruderman Contributing Writers David B. Bush Hazy Cakes Rebecca Chavez Dr. Nicola Davies Caroline Hayes Benjamin Hoopes Bubba Kush Monocle Man Max Montrose DJ Reetz Contributing Photographers Christianna Brown Kale Worden Cover Art Christianna Brown Graphic Design Christianna Brown Printer Publication Printers Corp.

2001 South Platte River Drive Denver, CO 80223 PH: 303.936.0303 www.publicationprinters.com

d /THCMagazine f @THC_magazine @thehempconnoisseur The Hemp Connoisseur is published monthly by The Hemp Connoisseur, LLC. All contents are copyrighted 2015 by The Hemp Connoisseur, LLC. All rights reserved.

For advertising and subscription info please email sales@thcmag.com.

David Maddalena Editor-in-Chief

6 October 2015

*PLEASE CONSUME CANNABIS AND ALCOHOL RESPONSIBLY

www.thcmag.com

thcmag.com 7

In This Issue

CONTENTS October 2015

06 14 18 24 28 32 34

A Letter to Our Readers The Green Scene In The Spotlight Featured Artist Tasty Meds Hemp Eats Cannabis News

8 October 2015

36 38 42 44 48 52 54

Marijuana Straight Talk The States of Hemp Cannabis Religions Overview Dealing with Pests Strain Names Dilemma Base and Nectars Limited Social Use

56 Epidiolex Effective for Epilepsy 60 The Problem With Organic 62 Pot-litically Incorrect 71 Coupons 73 Index

Dispensary Guide DENVER 69 The Clinic 66 The Health Center 66 Infinite Wellness 67 LivWell 68 Northern Lights Cannabis Company 67 Preferred Organic Therapy 67 Rocky Mountain Organic Medicine 67 Walking Raven

COLORADO SPRINGS

66 Canna Caregivers 67 LivWell 67 Original Cannabis Growers

($23.88)

NORTHERN COLORADO 66 Infinite Wellness 67 LivWell

BOULDER 67 LivWell

PUEBLO

66 Leaf on the Mesa

thcmag.com 9

10 October 2015

thcmag.com 11

sincerely, 12 October 2015

thcmag.com 13

The GREEN Scene

E V E N T S

October 10th - 11th Fall Harvest Party @ Stem Ciders 2811 Walnut Street, Suite 150 Denver, Colorado www.stemciders.com October 12th - 14th National Cannabis Summit @ The Sheraton Downtown Denver 1550 Court Place Denver, CO www.ncs2015.com October 17th Connecting with Grace Embrace and Create Extraordinary Relationships @ Aloft Broomfield Denver 8300 Arista Pl Broomfield, CO www.universe.com October 17th Hemp Harvest Party 2015 @ The Walnut Room 3131 Walnut St Denver, CO www.ticketfly.com/purchase/event/946515 October 17th 2015 Denver Zombie Crawl (10th Annual!) @ Skyline Park Arapahoe Street Denver, CO eyeheartbrains.com October 30th 4th Annual Howlin’ Halloween Pet Costume Party @ Woof in Boots 719 W 8th Ave Denver, CO woofinboots.com November 7th - 8th 2nd Annual Colorado Industrial Hemp Awards & Festival @ GrowHempColorado Boulder, CO growhempcolorado.com November 14th 2ND ANNUAL Chromic Con:

The World’s First Marijuana Comic/Fantasy Convention

(PRIVATE EVENT) @ Speak Easy Vape Lounge and Cannabis Club 2508 E Bijou St Colorado Springs, CO sites.google.com/site/chromiccon

14 October 2015

TM

TM

TM

thcmag.com 15

TASTE THE LOVE!!!

Infinite Wellness Center Recreational and Medical Dispensary

For Daily Deals and Coupons:

IWC8.com WE TAKE CREDIT CARDS!!

Fort CollinsRec & Med 900 N. College Ave Ft.Collins, CO 80524 970-484-8380 16 October 2015

LakewoodMed ONLY!

SEE BACK FOR COUPON!

1701 Kipling St.104 Lakewood, CO 80215 720-458-0277

thcmag.com 17

In the the Spotlight Spotlight ProductsWe WeLove Love Products

TAO Discreet Portable Vaporizer Reviewed by DJ Reetz Seems like there are a lot of portable vaporizers flooding the market these days. With so many to choose from, it’s hard for a vape company to stand out. But Tao is giving it a shot with this discreet portable number. Unlike many vapes on the market, this Tao model claims to handle wax, oil, and most notably flower. I’ve been burned in the past (pun intended) by portable vapes that claimed to be made for flower, but the Tao seemed to handle it quite well. The heating chamber is small, so you’ll only be able to load a tiny amount at a time, and I have no idea how best to clean out my spent flower, but it did seem to provide true vaporization rather than heating to the point of combustion. My preferred method of use for this model was to either load wax into the chamber, or swap out the top for the oil cartridge.

You’ll need to pick up some cannabis e-liquid if you want to use the Tao this way, but it makes for the easiest and most discreet experience. The design is sleek, but most vape pens these days are. If you’re looking to flout public consumption laws, this pen isn’t a bad way to do it. Just be careful with the rubber mouthpiece that attaches to the wax/flower topper, as it can easily pop off in your pocket. www.taovapor.com

Men’s Boxer Brief

by Hemptopia Reviewed by Monocle Man Let me first start off by saying I have never been more excited about a pair of underwear until I discovered Hemptopia’s boxer briefs. Hemptopia’s blend of hemp and organic cotton is so comfortable that all of my old underwear feel like sandpaper now. In testing the boxer briefs I decided to do an experiment.

Now don’t try this at home kids as I am a trained professional. I wore the same boxers for three days straight without washing them to test the antimicrobial properties of the hemp. At night I would air them out while I slept commando (TMI?). Every morning I would do the customary sniff check (took me back to college days) and found no remnants of my previous day’s activities. After three days I chose to wash them just out of principle. After one washing they were already even softer. This is absolutely the best underwear I have ever worn. At $26 retail, this may seem a bit pricey for one pair until you account for the fact that it will last so much longer since hemp fabrics last longer than pure cotton. Perfect for high-performance activities like camping and hiking, and great for traveling, as you will not need to pack a new pair for every day on the road. If you buy underwear for the man in your life every Christmas, this will be the pair he looks forward to getting. Check out all of the great hemp products Hemptopia carries at hemptopia.com.

18 October 2015

Body Candle

by Hemp Inc. Reviewed by Monocle Man If you are a fan of romantic candlelight massages, soft skin, or anything of that nature, this product is for you. These great body candles come in a variety of different scents; Nag Champa, orange cream, and white tea ginger. They all smell nice but my favorite is orange cream, yum.

This product burns nicely as a candle and absorbs nicely into the skin as a massage oil/lotion. It feels a little thicker on the skin than usual massage products but still definitely does the job. The scent permeated the air and lingered on my body for a few hours, which was lovely. Massage candles always seem like magic to me, so I quite enjoyed testing them out.

Hemp Inc. is a publicly traded company and they have many wonderful hemp products in their catalog.

Check them out at hempinc.com.

Sweet & Salty Hemp Body Scrub

by Nature's Root Reviewed by Monocle Man My skin has never felt so soft! Sweet and Salty Hemp Body Scrub is a delightful exfoliating product that truly delivers.

Nature’s Root has quickly become a favorite hemp company of the THC staff. All natural and organic ingredients are used to create Nature’s Root’s products. This scrub contains organic cane sugar, Epsom salt, Dead Sea salt, organic ground hemp seed, organic vegetable glycerin, organic coconut oil, organic peppermint leaf, and organic peppermint essential oil. As I am sure you can imagine, this product smells amazing.

I tried the scrub out in the shower. After scooping up a small amount of scrub in my hand, I began to massage it over my skin. The crystalline mix felt a little gummy in my hand at first but once the water hit it, it spread over my body nicely, gently exfoliating as I went. It leaft my skin baby soft and not greasy in the least. Some body scrubs leave you feeling like a greased up mess when you are done with them but not this one. Get your own at naturesroot.com.

thcmag.com 19

Resin Remover Cleaning Kit

by WeedWipes Reviewed by Monocle Man Being the daily cannabis enthusiast that I am, I have tried so many different products and “home remedies” to clean my glass collection. Some of them have been amazing, some have been lack luster, literally. WeedWipes is definitely one of the better cleaning products available. It truly breaks down wax and resin, leaving clean, safe glass to enjoy.

WeedWipes comes in a tub, upon first inspection it seems to be greasy. I was worried it would leave a residue on the glass but it didn’t. The kit comes with a bong/pipe combo brush, vape brush, pipe brushes, and two containers of WeedWipes Resin Remover. They use all natural, nontoxic, and organic ingredients so you don’t have to worry about toxic chemicals.

I tried this product out a few different ways. First I just put a small amount on a paper towel to clean off some dab tools — really sticky ones. It only took a small amount of effort on my part to get the tools clean, a few wipes and they were good as new. Then I found the dirtiest pipe in my collection, the one I use daily gets dirty very fast. I ran the pipe under water first then I put some Resin Remover on one of the pipe brushes, I ran the brush through all of the pipe openings a couple of time and I couldn’t believe how fast it was working. I scrubbed it very thoroughly for a minute or two, then rinsed it with hot water. Boom! Totally clean. This stuff is voodoo. If you want to try it for yourself go to weedwipes.com.

NoGoo Nonstick Containers Reviewed by Hazy Cakes Three cheers for no more wasted concentrates! This handy little concentrate container is made of nonstick, food-grade silicone that is nontoxic. This is important to take note of because there are so many harmful plastics out there these days that we must recognize and support the companies fighting against this.

Fact of the matter is that glass is too heavy to carry around and well, it breaks, leaving you in a worse situation than too sticky of concentrates. The NoGoo promises (and online testimonials will tell you) that nothing sticks to the insides of these brightly colored containers and that they are sturdy – the cap is designed to not come off in your pocket.

Not that into concentrates? These containers are also wonderful for traveling, loose makeup, purse sized lotion, seeds or small parts such as tiny screws. Go ahead, treat yourself with some NoGoo containers from nogoononstick.com.

20 October 2015

PRIC E QU AL IT Y SEL EC TION FEATURED STRAIN // INDICA DOMINANT HYBRID

Purple Cotton Candy

Purple Cotton Candy (Granddaddy Purps x Cotton Candy) is a gorgeous Indica-dominant hybrid with purple color variations and dense, well-shaped nugs. This delicious hybrid offers a unique fruit and candy smell that is sweet, but never overpowering, and a smoke that brings out a sweet Purple Cotton Candy taste in the back of your throat.

THC .39% THCA 22.17% CBD .02% CBDA .13% CBN .06%

TRY OUR PREMIUM INFUSIASM CONCENTRATES LivWell on Nevada MEDICAL

LivWell Lakewood MEDICAL

LivWell Boulder MEDICAL

3234 N Nevada Ave CO Springs, 80907 8:00 a.m. -7:00 p.m 719-622-6652

5660 W Alameda Ave Lakewood, 80226 8:00 a.m. -7:00 p.m 303-922-9479

3000 Folsom St. Boulder, 80304 10:00 a.m. -7:00 p.m.

720-389-4920

LivWell on Tejon MEDICAL

LivWell on Murray MEDICAL

LivWell Garden City REC / MEDICAL

1414 S Tejon St CO Springs, 80905 8:00 a.m. -7:00 p.m 719-634-0420

570 N Murray CO Springs, 80915 8:00 a.m. -7:00 p.m 719-574-8443

LivWell on Broadway LivWell on Larimer REC / MEDICAL REC / MEDICAL 432 S Broadway Denver, 80209 8:00 a.m. -7:00 p.m.

720-428-2550

2863 Larimer St. Denver, 80205 8:00 a.m. – 7:00 303-484-1662

2647 8th Ave Garden City, 80631 8:00 a.m. – 8:00 p.m.

970-616-6007

LivWell on Evans REC / MEDICAL

2193 W Evans Ave. Denver, 80223 8:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.

720-361-2981

Medical locations for registered Colorado Medical Marijuana patients only.

thcmag.com 21

22 October 2015

thcmag.com 23

Featured Artist

by Caroline Hayes

Zachary Dorken ChronLogic Glass

There are an abundance of perks to working for THC Mag, but the one I truly value the most is being able to showcase amazing artists, of all types, from all over the country. From featuring artists I didn’t know about or those who I’m a fan of, to showcasing the works of my friends, to being connected with an artist from a mutual friend, it’s always an exciting and enlightening experience.

Zachary Dorken falls into the category of meeting through a mutual friend (Thanks Bill Millar). A good ol’ Midwest boy, Zac resides in The Mile High City where he just founded his new company, ChronLogic.

Over the years Zac has created a solid portfolio of various types of rigs, slides, chillums and more and ChronLogic is where you can find his work, as well as stores throughout the country and the Denver Metro area. Zac may be newer to the glass scene but he’s sure to make his mark.

new label to reflect this next chapter in my career. With ChronLogic, my goal is to provide smokers with only the highest quality American-made glass smokeware, at a reasonable price. By selling only items created inhouse, by a master glassblower, I eliminate a lot of the headaches associated with “production” glasswork. Precision. Originality. Dependability.

These are the aspects I try to focus on the most. From the smallest piece to the largest, a top-shelf product is what I live for. My inventory is constantly expanding and changing, so get in touch!

THC: Has your artistry brought you any fame?

ZD: No, I wouldn’t say that I’m very well-known. I try to keep the focus on continually improving my work. High-quality, original, eye-catching glassware is my main goal. Glass lasts, fame doesn’t.

THC: Where did you grow up?

THC: What’s the best or worst advice you have ever been given?

ZD: I grew up in Apple Valley, Minn. Just south of the Twin Cities.

ZD: You should be a glassblower. Best and worst advice all in one! Like most things, there’s a lot of hard work to put in and sacrifices that have to be made in order to succeed, but I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

THC: What got you interested in blowing glass?

ZD: I was introduced to glassblowing in Madison, Wis in 2008. From day one, I was hooked. Throughout the scene, there is a passion for originality, innovation, and expression that’s just incredible. I get to work with my hands, creating unique and functional artwork. These are objects that people really cherish and connect with. Being a part of that is great. Playing with fire is pretty fun too.

THC: Has it always been glass that interested you or did you start with another medium?

ZD: Glass is my first and only love. I’ve done a few series of pieces with mixed medium, such as glass layered with clay or electroformed copper, but I’ve never deviated too far.

THC: From where do you work?

ZD: My new company, just launched this last summer, is ChronLogic.

I just recently moved my secret lair to the north side of Denver and couldn’t be happier!

THC: What’s up with ChronLogic?

ZD: ChronLogic is my new brand. After many years of sharing space with other artists, I recently moved into my own studio space. I wanted a

24 October 2015

THC: What songs, foods, people inspire you?

ZD: For my work, I get a lot of inspiration from the colors, shapes, and patterns found in nature. If I’m trying to get “in the zone”, there’s no better music than Phish.

THC: Agreed. What are your favorite types of pieces to create and why?

ZD: I enjoy making all types of functional glassware. The amount of personality that I put into it, determines the satisfaction I get out of it.

Anytime I get to use bright, exciting colors, I’m a happy guy.

THC: Who would you like to collaborate with in the future or whom have you already collaborated with that has been significant?

ZD: I’ve learned a great deal from everyone I’ve worked with over the years, especially the crew in Wisconsin. However, I haven’t had nearly as many opportunities as I’d like to collaborate with other artists. Definitely something I’d like to explore more in the future.

THC: Thanks for your time Zac! The best way to contact Zac is directly through one of these links: www.facebook.com/ChronLogicGlass, www.facebook.com/ZoroGlass, www.ChronLogic.bigcartel.com.

thcmag.com 25

he Third Dimension Jack’s Cleaner II T.H. Seeds DNA Genetics Medicine Man Mr. Nice Apollo 13 Northern Lights Cannabis y Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo h Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A Jack’s Cleaner Sheridan II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Kush nana Kush2045 Medicine Man Marley’s Collie Nebula Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vortex Blvd 303-274-6495 Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannabis y Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of NLCannabis.com Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo h Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A nana Kush Jack’s Cleaner II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Kush Medicine Man Marley’s Collie Nebula Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vorte Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannabis y Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo h Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A nana Kush Jack’s Cleaner II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Kush Medicine Man Marley’s Collie Nebula Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vortex Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannabis y Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo h Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A nana Kush Jack’s Cleaner II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Kush Medicine Man Marley’s Collie Nebula Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vorte Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannabis ly Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo sh Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A anana Kush Jack’s Cleaner II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Kush Medicine Man Marley’s Collie Nebula Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vorte e Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannab y Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo h Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A nana Kush Jack’s Cleaner II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Kush Medicine Man Marley’s Collie Nebula Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vortex Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannabi Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo 1 h Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape Ap ana Kush Jack’s Cleaner II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Kush Medicine Man Marley’s Collie Nebula Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vortex Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannabis ly Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo sh Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A Skywalker Kush Vorte Ripped Bubba Jack’s Cleaner II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Only Shop Kush MedicineMom nana KushEdgewater’s Man Marley’sand Collie NebulaPop e Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannab y Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo h Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A nana Kush Jack’s Cleaner II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Kush Medicine Man Marley’s Collie Nebula Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vortex Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannabi ly Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cannatonic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo sh Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A Cannatonic Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vorte Kush Kosher Kush Medicine Skywalker nana Kush Jack’s Cleaner II Holy GrailKaboom!

ManKush Marley’s Collie Nebula e Third Dimension Space Bomb Sweet Tooth Timewreck DNA Genetics Sensi Seeds T.H. Seeds Mr. Nice TGA Subcool Northern Lights Cannab Medical 21+ y Bean Kaboom Jack the Ripper Ace of Spades Blue Mystic Cheese Quake Northern Lights X Chernobyl Querkle Apollo Cannatonic Recreational h Agent Orange Sour Diesel Bubble Gum Dairy Queen Dacono Kush Deep Purple Qrazy Train Northern Lights 5 Kandy Kush Grape A 26 October Jack’s2015Cleaner II Holy Grail Kush Kosher Kush Medicine Man Marley’s Collie Nebula Ripped Bubba Skywalker Kush Vortex nana Kush

Co o 13 Ape x s Co o 13 Ape ex s Co o 13 Ape x s Co o 13 Ape ex s Co o 13 Ape ex bis 13 Ape x is 13 pe

s o 13 Ape ex bis 13 Ape x is o 13 Ape ex bis 13 Ape x

thcmag.com 27

Tasty Meds Reviews of Colorado’s finest medicated products

Organic Watermelon Rings by Highly Edible 100mg reviewed by Monocle Man There have been a lot of new products popping up lately, and one that caught my eye right away was the Highly Edible gummies. Highly Edible is a CannaPunch company and pretty much had me sold there. CannaPunch has made some of the best tasting and most effective drinks on the market for years. Now they are making gummies.... hell yeah. These tasty treats are organic, vegan, gluten free, and non-gmo. There are a few different types available but I went with the Organic Watermelon Rings. There are ten 10mg rings per bottle. The consistency was perfect and the sweet, tangy taste of the watermelon really made for a delicious edible. Like almost every CannaPunch I’ve had, this had little to no cannabis taste, but it was definitely in there. This was fast acting and seemed to lean toward more of an indica high, because I was knocked out taking a nap within 30 minutes of eating half of the Watermelon Rings. I woke up a few hours later, refreshed and ready for more. I can safely say that I will be picking up more Highly Edible and CannaPunch products in the future, and I recommend you do the same.

Make sure to visit the CannaPunch site to get more information and find out where to buy one of their amazing edibles near you. www.cannapunch.com

Stoned Cold Lemonade by CWD 50mg reviewed by Monocle Man Summertime might be over, but enjoying a refreshing glass of lemonade is good any time of the year. Now throw some THC in the mix and you will see why. The fine folks over at CWD are the manufactures of the Stoned Cold drinks. You can enjoy their THC-infused lemonade or ice tea powder. All I had to do is mix it with 6 to 12 oz of cold water and I had a delightful infused drink. They even include a little plastic scoop if you don’t want to use the whole packet. The Lemonade had a heavy indica feeling and was very fast acting. Only took about thirty minutes for me to start sinking into my seat. I was pleasantly surprised in how good the drink tasted. I’ve tried other drink mixes in the past that taste like straight hash, but this blew those others out of the water. I will be picking up some more Stoned Cold drinks in the future. For a real game changer, try making a Stoned Cold Arnold Palmer by mixing the lemonade and the ice tea together, or maybe make some Stoned Cold Lemonade freeze pops. If you haven’t tried CWD yet, get to your local medical or recreational shop and pick one up today. When life gives you lemons, add THC and enjoy. www.cwdmeds.com

Cherry Lemonade Grenade by Keef Cola 40mg reviewed by Monocle Man Keef Cola is one of Colorado’s edible OGs. Founded in 2009, Keef Cola has been making their superb sodas and drinks for patients for longer than most. This year they took home first place for edibles in the Denver High Times Cannabis Cup. For this review we went with their 40mg Cherry Lemonade Grenade Hybrid drink. It comes in a small plastic bottle. All you need is a little swig, then just wait to see how it affects you. One thing to remember with drinks is that they can kick in a lot faster than other edibles. I take edibles daily so I slammed the whole bottle. The flavor profile of the cherry and lemonade was quite enjoyable. There was a slight cannabis taste, but it didn’t take away from the experience. It took around fifteen minutes for the initial effects to start. A warm wave washed over my body while I was laying down watching TV. The relaxing body high took over for the next hour. It was a great way to unwind after a day at work. If you have troubles sleeping, this hybrid drink would be a great remedy. You can find Keef Cola products at medical and recreational shops across the state. www.keefcola.com

28 October 2015

SLOW DOWN. BREATHE. INHALE. THERE IS TIME FOR BEAUTY. THERE IS TIME FOR REFLECTION. BREATHE. INHALE. THIS IS INDICA.

A single charge for a singular experience. The enhanced battery on the Indica vaporizer now provides up to 90 minutes ™

of continuous use when fully charged. Giving you ample time to breathe, inhale, and slow down. · indicavapor.com

RECREATIONAL ONLY

©2015 Indica, LLC. All Rights Reserved. Patent pending.

thcmag.com 29

30 October 2015

thcmag.com 31

Hemp Eats

Pumpkin Cheesecake Makes one pie and crust Crust Ingredients: 2 1/2 cups ground nuts (almonds, walnuts, pecans or pistachios) 1/4 cup hemp seeds 2 Tablespoons coconut sugar 4 Tablespoons melted butter

Crust Instructions: Preheat oven to 350°F. Place nuts of choice in food processor. Use a milling blade if you have one and pulse until ground.

Add coconut sugar and butter.

Transfer nut mixture to a 9” springform pan. Press gently to form a crust on bottom of pan, using the back of a spoon if needed.

Bake at 350 for 9-10 minutes Remove from oven and allow cool before filling.

Filling Ingredients: Preheat oven to 350°F. 3 - 8 ounce packages cream cheese, at room temperature 1 - 15 ounce can pureed pumpkin

Pumpkin Spice Cupcakes with Hemp Protein Makes 24 cupcakes Cupcake Ingredients: 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour 2 Tablespoons hemp protein powder 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves 1/2 teaspoon ground allspice 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 Tablespoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 cup butter, softened 1 cup white sugar 1/3 cup brown sugar 2 eggs, room temperature 3/4 cup milk 1 cup pumpkin puree Cream Cheese Frosting Ingredients: 1 (8 oz) package cream cheese, softened 1/4 cup butter, softened 3 cups confectioners’ sugar 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/3 cup hemp seeds Directions: Preheat an oven to 375°F. Grease 24 muffin

32 October 2015

cups, or line with paper muffin liners. Sift together the flours, hemp protein powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, clove, allspice, salt, baking powder, and baking soda; set aside.

Beat 1/2 cup of butter, the white sugar, and brown sugar with an electric mixer in a large bowl until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, allowing each egg to blend into the butter mixture before adding the next. Stir in the milk and pumpkin puree after the last egg.

Stir in the flour mixture, mixing until just incorporated. Pour the batter into the prepared muffin cups.

Bake in the preheated oven until golden and the tops spring back when lightly pressed, about 25 minutes. Cool in the pans for 5 minutes before removing to cool completely on a wire rack.

While the cupcakes are cooling, make the frosting by beating the cream cheese and 1/4 butter with an electric mixer in a bowl until smooth.

Beat in the confectioners’ sugar a little at a time until incorporated. Add the vanilla extract and 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon; beat until fluffy. Once the cupcakes are cool, frost with the cream cheese icing. Decorate and sprinkle with hemp seeds.

½ cup hemp seeds 3 eggs 1 egg yolk 1/4 cup sour cream 1 1/2 cups coconut sugar 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg 1/8 teaspoon ground allspice 2 Tablespoons flour 1 teaspoon real vanilla extract Filling Instructions: With a mixer, beat cream cheese until smooth. Add the can of pumpkin puree, hemp seeds, whole eggs, egg yolk, sour cream, coconut sugar and the spices.

Add flour and vanilla. Combine all ingredients by beating.

Once thoroughly combined, pour evenly into prebaked crust.

Bake for 1 hour at 350. Remove from oven and let cool.

Cover with and refrigerate for at least 4 hours or overnight.

Serve with more hemp seeds or nuts, whipped cream or caramel sauce.

thcmag.com 33

Cannabis News

by DJ Reetz

California to Regulate Medical Cannabis After nearly two decades as a pioneering medical marijuana program, medicinal cannabis in California may soon be regulated. The set of bills passed through the state legislature and signed by Gov. Jerry Brown will create the Bureau of Medical Marijuana Regulation within the state Department of Consumer Affairs, an organization that will be tasked with regulating and licensing medical marijuana businesses. Assemblyman Rob Bonita, an author of one of the bills, described it as “the result of an unprecedented stakeholder process in which my colleagues and I brought everyone to the table, from medical marijuana businesses to law enforcement and patient advocates, to create a comprehensive regulatory framework for the state’s billion-dollar medical marijuana industry,” according to the Los Angeles Times. The measure eschewed an excise tax aimed at funding policing and environmental protection to the tune of $60 million.

California was the first state in the nation to pass a medical marijuana measure in 1996, which since then has been largely without regulation.

The Golden State has one of the largest cannabis markets in the world, estimated to be valued in the billions, an order of magnitude larger than that of Colorado.

PTSD Denied as Qualifier for Medical Cannabis in Illinois Despite a recommendation from the Illinois Medical Cannabis Advisory Board, post-traumatic stress disorder will not be added to the list of qualifying conditions allowing access to the state’s medical marijuana program. The decision is the result of a veto by Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner of a measure that would have added PTSD to the list of nearly 40 conditions treatable with marijuana as part of the state’s recently enacted program.

“The state has not had the opportunity to evaluate the benefits and costs of the pilot program, or determine areas for improvement, or even whether to expand the program beyond its pilot period,” said Rauner, according to WQAD News 8.

Wild Hemp Harvested in Minnesota Researchers from the University of Minnesota were able to collect wild hemp from the grounds of Fort Snelling, the first time the plant has been legally harvested in the state in 60 years, according to local ABC affiliate KSTP. The harvest is part of an effort by researchers to identify varieties of hemp suited for the Minnesota climate. Harvesting local wild hemp was only made possible this year thanks to the state’s Industrial Hemp Development Act, and researchers have been relying on imported varieties from Canada and the Netherlands for the past ten years. “Our aim is to breed and create new varieties in the hope that a domestic hemp industry might be reborn in the United States,” said Dr. George Weiblen, a professor of plant biology at the university.

Waning Drug Warriors Release Report Critical of Colorado Cannabis A recent report from the Rocky Mountain High-Intensity Drug Trafficking Area is highly critical of legalized cannabis in Colorado. The group is composed of various law enforcement agencies from Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming, organized by the Office of National Drug Control Policy with the purpose of facilitating cooperation between federal, state, and local drug enforcement agencies. The report, titled “The Legalization of Marijuana: The Impact,” seems to show an increase in youth consumption, out-of-state diversion, as well as traffic incidents and fatalities related to marijuana.

However, the report also indicates that only one-third of the drivers tested as part of the “marijuana-related” incidents showed the presence of marijuana only, with the rest showing the additional presence of other drugs, alcohol, or some combination of the three. The report also fails to indicate if marijuana was a contributing factor in the traffic fatalities it points to, as the report includes statistics for any fatality in which a toxicology screening showed the presence of marijuana metabolites. The report does however include data showing the overall decrease in traffic fatalities in Colorado that accompanies the timeline of marijuana legalization, and also highlights the increased rate at which cannabinoids are being screened for in these incidents.

Ronda Rousey Defends Fellow MMA Fighter Teen Marijuana Use Down Suspended for THC Hemp-eating MMA champ Ronda Rousey recently defended fellow mixed martial artist Nick Diaz at a UFC press conference in Melbourne, Australia.

Diaz was suspended from fighting for five years by the Nevada Athletic Commission after he tested positive for marijuana, a decision that has many in the MMA and athletic communities upset. Diaz has several high-profile supporters, including the immensely popular Rousey, who recently gained attention in cannabis circles when she revealed that hemp seeds were part of her training diet.

“It’s so not right for him to be suspended five years for marijuana. I’m against them even testing for weed at all. It’s not a performance-enhancing drug, it has nothing to do with athletic competition, it’s only tested for political reasons,” said Rousey during the press conference, a sentiment that was met with a swell of applause.

34 October 2015

A report published in the journal Drug and Alcohol Dependence indicates that marijuana use amongst high school students has decreased over the past 15 years. Researchers analyzed data from the biennial National Youth Risk Behavior Survey, finding that among the more than 115,000 high school students surveyed, the rate of marijuana use had dropped from 47 percent in 1999 to 40 percent in 2013.

“What we are seeing is that since 1999 — three years after medical marijuana was first approved — the rates of marijuana use have actually fallen. But we will be watching those states where recreational marijuana use has been legalized to see if that leads to increased use among teens,” said study leader Renee M. Johnson, according to Johns Hopkins.

Across the Globe Adult-Use Cannabis Sales Begin in Oregon Oct. 1 marked the beginning of preliminary adult-use cannabis sales in Oregon. Although the program has not become fully operational, certain medical marijuana dispensaries have been authorized to sell flower, seeds, and clones to anyone aged 21 or older. Purchases are limited to seven grams and concentrates and edibles are still only available to medical patients.

Additionally, up to four clones can be purchased, and an unlimited number of seeds. Oregon allows personal grows of up to four plants. Full adult-use sales are still a ways off, however. The Oregon Liquor Control Board is still in the process of finalizing regulations, and full adult-use dispensaries likely won’t appear until late next year.

Bill Aimed at Curbing DEA Funding of Cannabis Eradication Introduced A bipartisan bill introduced by Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Cali.) and Rep. Justin Amash (R-Mich.) into the U.S. House of Representatives looks to stop the flow of funds and property seized through civil asset forfeiture into the DEA’s Domestic Cannabis Eradication/Suppression Program. Last year, the program received $18 million in federal asset forfeiture funds, and was responsible for over 6,300 arrests, the eradication of more than 4.3 million marijuana plants, and the seizure of $27.3 million in assets, according to Forbes.

The majority of these federal forfeiture funds come from civil rather than criminal forfeiture cases, a process that lacks the same due process and burden of proof as criminal seizures. As of this writing the bill, titled the “Stop Civil Asset Forfeiture Funding for Marijuana Suppression Act of 2015”, was awaiting approval from the House Judiciary Committee.

Hemp 3D Printing Wins MIT Climate CoLab Award A proposal to build houses made of 3D-printed hemp components has won both the Judges’ and Popular Choice awards in the Buildings category of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s 2015 Climate CoLab contest.

The proposal to build homes from 3D-printed blocks of hemp stone beat 12 others in the category for the distinction. According to the proposal, the blocks would allow for a variety of construction options, replacing traditional methods with a higher carbon footprint, and all architectural elements of the completed structures would be made of hempcrete, hemp fiberboard, or hemp plastics.

The Climate CoLab is a collaborative program put together by the MIT Center for Collective Intelligence intended to bring together experts from all over the world to address the issue of climate change. The success of the 3D-printed hemp structure proposal represents a victory for both the feasibility and environmental sustainability of hemp as a construction material.

Albania Now Marijuana-Free Authorities in the southeastern European country of Albania are declaring the country marijuana-free after destroying 99.2 percent of cannabis plants seen by aerial surveillance, according to the UK’s Sky News. This number

represents 690,000 plants covering 109 acres destroyed so far this year.

Efforts to eradicate the marijuana trade began in earnest last year when police in armored vehicles stormed the village of Lazaret in the southern part of the country, allegedly coming under fire from automatic weapons and rockets.

So far, Albanian efforts to destroy the trade in the country have led to the destruction of €7 billion, or $7.8 billion, worth of illicit cannabis, slightly less than half of the country’s nominal GDP.

Denver Marijuana Inspectors Barred from Consulting After a request from city license inspectors, the Denver Board of Ethics has ruled that marijuana license inspectors cannot do outside consulting work for private companies. The decision is the result of requests from inspectors themselves, who sought guidance after being asked to do consulting work for the cannabis industry. The ruling applies to consulting work both within and outside Colorado, with the board citing potential conflicts of interest and the bad appearances as their reasoning.

“The Board of Ethics believes that the proposed engagement of employees of the Department of Excise and Licenses to serve as paid outside consultants to the marijuana industry, which it is charged with authority to regulate, creates a conflict of interest and an appearance of impropriety”, noted the board’s advisory statement, according to The Denver Post.

Denver has been a pioneer of the field since it became the first city in the nation to establish a regulated adult-use cannabis market at the start of 2014.

Denver Man Pleads Insanity in Marijuana Related Shooting Richard Kirk, the man accused of shooting his wife in the head last year after eating part of an edible, has changed his plea from not guilty to not guilty by reason of insanity. Kirk is accused of first-degree murder for shooting his wife, Kristine Kirk, while she waited on the phone with a 911 operator for over 12 minutes for police to arrive. Kirk’s wife described his behavior as erratic and paranoid after eating part of a marijuana-infused candy, at one point ranting about the end of the world and asking her to shoot him. A toxicology report from the incident showed that Kirk had 2.3 nanograms of THC per milliliter of blood and no other alcohol or drugs in his system at the time of the shooting.

The insanity defense will center on Kirk’s mental state at the time, and the effect marijuana had on it, but will not likely center on marijuana intoxication alone. The prosecution will now have to prove that Kurt was aware that shooting his wife was wrong, and have previously asserted that the shooting was a planned result of domestic and financial troubles in the relationship.

The case has drawn national attention, with opponents of legalization latching on to the tragic circumstances as a means to show the dangers of cannabis.

thcmag.com 35

Straight to the Point

Marijuana Straight Talk Takes to the Air by DJ Reetz

36 October 2015

A

new face in cannabis is emerging in the form of a show on Free Speech TV. The show, “Marijuana Straight Talk”, is aimed at eroding some of the tired stereotypes around cannabis use by offering informed discussion and analysis of all things cannabis.

Distributed to some 40 million viewers via DIRECTV and DISH Network, the non-profit news network aimed at a progressive audience seems like a good fit, and with only a handful of shows broadcast since launching in August, “Marijuana Straight Talk” has already become Free Speech TV’s second most popular weekly current affairs program, and third highest rated show overall.

Having grown up in an abusive home, Williams found that she had actually been using marijuana medicinally most of her life, though it had been couched in recreation. “I find that cannabis is a huge agent of healing, emotional healing around that,” she says.

The show brings to mind programs like the “Charlie Rose” show on PBS, cutting in-studio interviews with segments shot at the home of host and producer Becca Williams. Williams comes from a media background, having been a reporter, writer and producer across multiple media platforms. She now brings her years of expertise to “Marijuana Straight Talk”.

With a broader, national audience, the show presented Williams with the opportunity to shape the discussion that was already happening around the country, and do so in a manner that was both informative and entertaining to viewers. “For me, what has been a really viable and effective way of communicating is through infotainment.

In the arena of cannabis there’s a lot of heaviness,” she says. “To be able to convey information in a way that is rivetingly entertaining; that’s my goal.”

For Williams, years in traditional journalism began to drain her, both emotionally and spiritually. “Every morning I would wake up and I would look at the horizon and say, ‘what’s the worst possible, most negative thing going on?’ … and I would head directly for that, because that’s what news is,” says Williams.

“After a while, that really wore me down and I started asking myself, how did I contribute to the [greater] good? And I wasn’t coming up with a good answer.”

Williams eventually moved to Florida, where she founded a short-lived website titled “The Florida Cannabis Report”, which focused on extolling the virtues of the plant and informing the discussion around it. The website didn’t last long though, as she was quickly on to her next project, “Marijuana Straight Talk”.

“We’re all in this together. It’s a movement; it’s a cannabis community.”

-Becca Williams

When a family member was diagnosed with leukemia, Williams b e g a n investigating alternative treatments. The search led her to a macrobiotic diet, which emphasizes unrefined grains supplemented by a mostly vegetarian diet, and the results were nothing short of miraculous. “When I tried to tell the oncologist this he just basically patted me on the head and said, ’There, there little girl, nutrition has nothing to do with it,’” says Williams.

As part of her research, Williams says she came face to face with the potential benefits of medical marijuana. At the time, Williams was working as an editor for a health and environmental magazine being published out of Chicago, but she was hesitant to encourage people to break the law by openly advocating for the use of cannabis. Still, the information spurred her onward.

With an appreciation of the plant developed during her college years, Williams says she began to take more notice of cannabis’ ability to promote healing, both physical and spiritual.

“I loved it. There’s nothing better than sharing a fatty with a group of friends. What happened later, after that, [I realized] how it made me feel, how it relaxed me and kept me present,” she says.

Still, the show won’t shy away from harder subjects. The show’s third episode featured a segment on marijuana dependency, a touchy subject for many in the cannabis community. It’s something Williams says she hopes to maintain, as ceaseless cheerleading for marijuana can actually be detrimental to the movement as a whole.

“If it’s just pounding, pounding, pounding the good stuff all the time and turning our backs on the challenging issues, how are we different from what the government did with their disinformation campaign?” she says.

The show will also be open to citizen journalists, reporting the onthe-ground realities of the cannabis movement in locations outside of the Denver Free Speech TV studios. It’s part of the inclusiveness of the plant, and the movement as a whole, and “Marijuana Straight Talk” is aimed at projecting those values. “We’re all in this together. It’s a movement; it’s a cannabis community. Whether or not one partakes of the plant is really neither here nor there. I think the first line is personal freedom, and if you’re for personal freedom then you certainly would support the legalization of this very helpful plant,” says Williams.

While the show is certainly carving out a notable place for Williams in the world of cannabis, she remains thankful for all the hard work of those who have come before her, and though she now has a very visible platform, she acknowledges those who have set the groundwork. “I stand on the shoulders of a lot of activists and high-profile advocates who have done the heavy lifting. I’m just coming along here and taking the next natural step, and that is talking about how we as a society are culturally inviting this plant into our lives,” she says.

“Marijuana Straight Talk” looks to be meeting those goals, and Williams looks to be another high-profile voice broadening the discussion. Look for the show Saturdays at 2 p.m. on Free Speech TV, or check out back episodes on freespeech.org.

thcmag.com 37

The States of Hemp A Breakdown of Hemp Legistlation Across the Nation

by David B. Bush

Everyone knows how Congress works (or fails to work) when it comes to cannabis legal reform. Change manifests at the pace of the proverbial snail.

Many legislative proposals have been made in Congress to end, or to at least begin to end, cannabis prohibition, yet few seem to be going anywhere.

There are bills that would carve industrial hemp or Cannabidiol (CBD) out of the Controlled Substances Act, bills that would force the feds to defer to state-legal cannabis activities, bills that would provide tax relief from the dreaded Regulation 280E (which has unfairly targeted and burdened the recreational and medical marijuana industries), bills that would allow health care professionals working for the Veterans Administration to recommend the use of medical marijuana (where appropriate), and bills that would deny federal law enforcement funding to interfere with state-legal medical marijuana, or with industrial hemp research and development. And there the bills sit, cooling their heels in legislative purgatory, patiently awaiting the day when somebody on some committee of the House or Senate will finally have the gumption to act.

Reform is not standing still — it is just happening outside of Washington.

Several states are pushing the legal envelope, experimenting with measures to liberalize our cannabis laws that the feds dare not try. It is cause for cautious hope. The following is a brief survey of where legal reform for industrial hemp stands among the several states.

Not Even Started First, the bad news. A majority (but not overwhelmingly so) of the jurisdictions that were surveyed have yet to legalize industrial hemp in any way. There were 27 states in this category, plus the District of Columbia, along with American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Marianas Islands, Puerto

38 October 2015

Rico and the Virgin Islands. States that have yet to reform their laws against industrial hemp are Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maryland, Massachusetts, Mississippi, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Texas, Washington, Wisconsin, and Wyoming.

Industrial Hemp Research and Development A dozen states authorize either their state departments of agriculture or state universities, or both, to cultivate industrial hemp for research and development, only. These are the “Farm Bill” states, which were galvanized to promote industrial hemp upon passage by Congress of a limited hemp research and development program as part of the mammoth, fiveyear, Agricultural Act of 2014. They include Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New York, Utah, Virginia and West Virginia. Few, if any, of the Farm Bill states have actually taken steps yet to appropriate significant funds for research. Hawaii is a major exception in that regard, but the enabling legislation also limited the program to a paltry two years.

Two other states belong among the Farm Bill group: Kentucky and Tennessee. Both employ a liberal interpretation to the allowance under the Farm Bill for “agricultural pilot programs” and the “study of marketing”.

Both seek partnerships with commercial growers and are intent on eventually converting their state-sponsored research and development initiatives into full-fledged commercial industries. The legal foundation for the direction that Kentucky and Tennessee have chosen to take is somewhat questionable; the Farm Bill itself does not contain any provision allowing

commercial production. But so far, other than the ludicrous melodrama kicked off last year when the state of Kentucky imported viable hemp seed from abroad without first getting a Schedule I license from the Drug Enforcement Administration, the feds have generally not interfered.

and stumbled badly when it first launched. Proponents of industrial hemp were forced to do battle with a concerted group of marijuana growers who were concerned over the risk of cross-pollination, a distraction that took months to resolve, substantially delaying cultivation in 2015.

Inactive Program for Commercial Cultivation of Industrial Hemp

Vermont allows cultivation of industrial hemp but has no true regulatory program in place. Growers are simply required to state that what they intend to grow is expected to yield sufficiently low concentrations of tetrahydrocannabinol delta-9 (THC) so as to qualify as hemp rather than marijuana. It remains to be seen whether Vermont will allocate funds to establish a reliable industrial hemp inspection and testing program, or if the federal government will tire of the laissez-faire system in the Green Mountain State and threaten to shut the whole operation down.

Seven states have enacted statutes authorizing commercial industrial hemp production, but the legislation is effectively on hold pending further developments in the federal realm. In some instances, the law expressly provides that it will not take effect until industrial hemp is legalized under federal law. Those states include California, Indiana, Maine, Minnesota and South Carolina. Two other states, Montana and North Dakota, have simply informed growers that even if they complied with state legal requirements to cultivate industrial hemp, they still could not do so without first getting a Schedule I license from the federal government.

Limited Cultivation of Industrial Hemp for Selected Medicinal Uses Missouri stands out as the only state in the union that allows limited commercial cultivation of industrial hemp for very limited purposes.

Missouri has issued licenses to two growers to cultivate industrial hemp for the sole purpose of extracting CBD to treat a legislatively defined medical condition called “intractable epilepsy”. More change may be on the way.

Bills have been introduced in both houses of the Missouri legislature to legalize commercialized industrial hemp production on a much grander scale. Both bills have been slowly working their way through the legislative process. Their fate is uncertain.

Active Program for Commercial Cultivation of Industrial Hemp What that ultimately leaves is three states in the United States that not only have enacted commercial industrial hemp statutes, but actually implemented programs to enable commercial hemp cultivation to get off the ground.

They are Colorado, Oregon, and Vermont. Oregon’s program is brand new

Colorado is unique. It implemented a carefully crafted legal system founded on the state constitution, legislative action by the General Assembly, and a rational set of administrative rules promulgated by the state department of agriculture. Industrial hemp as an agricultural product in Colorado is expanding rapidly and beginning to thrive. For the foreseeable future, Colorado will remain the national leader in commercial industrial hemp cultivation and related industries.

Conclusion Cannabis reform has come not because of an enlightened federal government, but in spite of the darkness. In the best sense of the word, the American states and territories can and continue to serve as laboratories for social experimentation in our efforts to end cannabis prohibition. Today, only a small handful of states (Colorado, Kentucky, Oregon, Tennessee, and Vermont) have made significant progress towards the full legalization of industrial hemp. Colorado is the undisputed leader in efforts to re-establish industrial hemp as a valuable and versatile agricultural commodity in this country. Other states will soon join the club. Eventually, even the federal government will bow to the inevitable rush of fresh air as the window of opportunity swings open.

No laws in favor of hemp Industrial Hemp/Research Allowed Inactive Program for Commercial Cultivation of Industrial Hemp a.k.a “pending” Actively allowing commercial and industrial production of hemp

thcmag.com 39

40 October 2015

thcmag.com 41

Cannabis Religions: An overview

by Becca Chavez

42 October 2015

A

fter the passing of Indiana Senate Bill 101, often known as the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, one of the more surprising developments within the state was the formation of a new church. The First Church of Cannabis was started by Bill Levin shortly after the bill, which allows for corporations to use the defense that their religious belief was “substantially burdened” in court proceedings, was signed. Though Senate Bill 101 is best known for allowing private companies to deny women birth control and discriminate against members of the LGBTQ community, it also appears to create a loophole that would allow for religious cannabis use. Levin isn’t the first person to cite religious beliefs in an attempt to skirt federal marijuana laws in states where cannabis would otherwise be illegal. Many religious organizations have sprung up over the years that cite the use of cannabis as central to their belief system. Among these are Greenfaith Ministry, THC Ministry, Santo Daime, and, of course, Rastafari.

ayahausca to be incredibly therapeutic, using it to cleanse the body during healing processes. Unfortunately for them, many governments disagree and have placed ayahausca on lists for controlled substances. The church has consistently fought for their right to use ayahausca, and has won that right in the United States, Brazil, the Netherlands, France, and Italy.

Bill Levin’s First Church of Cannabis appears to be taking a cue from those that came before. Currently, the church is facing minimal problems, their biggest concern being a security camera the state put up in the parking lot, which many in the area see as a waste of taxpayer dollars. Levin acknowledges that there must be more to a faith than the belief that cannabis is good and should therefore be legal, and has set up a “Deity Dozen” in order to lend credibility to the idea of the church as a legitimate faith. This list of rules is made up almost entirely of suggestions for interacting with oneself and other.

Many people find ayahausca to be incredibly therapeutic...governments disagree and have placed ayahausca on lists for controlled substances. The church has consistently fought for their right to use ayahausca, and has won that right in the United States, Brazil, the Netherlands, France, and Italy.

How the government interacts with people belonging to these faiths is dependent on a number of factors. Greenfaith Ministries is the church with the most freedom, mainly due to the fact that it is based in Colorado, where recreational cannabis use is permitted. This church is the one that Bill Levin looked to when trying to start The First Church of Cannabis. In fact, the evidence of this still lives on the Greenfaith Ministry website. While the church claims to be the first state and federally approved cannabis church, there isn’t much information on the basic tenants of the faith on the website.

If you choose to join the church, there are different membership levels listed on the website along with a request for a small donation that gives you access to the church documents.

Perhaps the most surprising of these tenets of faith is number ten, a simple sentence reading “protect those who cannot protect themselves”. It’s a big request from a religion that appears to only exist as a result of laws built to discriminate against those who have limited legal protection otherwise.

Whether Levin sees the hypocrisy behind the legal foundation of his faith is unclear from interviews, but he seems to be developing a bit of a following despite the churches obviously problematic beginnings.

While Greenfaith Ministry dominates the Colorado religious cannabis scene, THC Ministry is a much more widespread movement. Officially titled Hawai’i Ministry of Cannabis Sacrament, this church was founded

by Roger Christie in 2000. The major tenants of the faith are completely related to cannabis as a healing plant, with little emphasis given to personal relationships or faith in any deities. Though the church does pull quotes from the bible to support their use of cannabis, they don’t appear to pull any other teachings from the text. THC Ministry came under heavy fire in 2010, with many members, including Christie, being charged with marijuana trafficking. These charges appear to have stemmed from the many members receiving sacrament who were travelling through the area.

Christie was found guilty, has served his sentence, and continues to fight for legal marijuana.

One of the major concerns with the new cannabis-related religions that seem to have sprung up is that they lack the legitimacy that many faiths find over time. For people interested in a religion that allows for cannabis use but offers a strong cultural history there are two options. Rastafari is the most commonly known religion that is connected with cannabis, but it is often misconstrued in popular culture to seem as though it is only concerned with cannabis. True Rastafari reject the ideals of western society and works towards Zion, a land promised by Jah and often thought of as Ethiopia. Many who practice the faith believe that cannabis should be legal, especially for their religious purposes. However, the religion itself is against political involvement, which makes pushing for widespread legalization difficult.

A less popular option is Santo Daime. This religion was started in Brazil in the 1930s and draws on numerous other religions to create cohesion.

Though cannabis is treated as a sacrament, Santo Daime has more legal trouble as the result of another sacrament, ayahausca. Many people find

thcmag.com 43

The Enemy of My Enemy is My Friend

How to fight spider mites, molds, and other pests by strategically teaming up with their predators and even their prey

by Benjamin Hoopes

44 October 2015

B

iocontrol, the art and science of controlling pests by introducing their natural enemies, is a $4.9 billion a year industry according to Suzanne WainwrightEvans, known online as The Bug Lady. “They’re free workers. And there’s no workman’s comp, no ‘my kid’s sick and I can’t come to work today.’” I watched her host a panel in Portland, Oregon this summer at the Farwest Show, which focused on ornamental horticulture.

Lloyd Traven was on the panel as well. He’s the owner of Peace Tree Farm, a wholesale flower grower in Kintnersville, Pennsylvania. Lloyd was trained under the philosophy of, “if it moves, kill it”. Now, he regularly buys 18 different organisms to protect his 2,000 species of non-mainstream plants from greenhouse pests. He’s been doing it for nine years. “We don’t even use the pesticides we’re allowed to use because it messes with our beneficials.” Traven added that Peace Tree also has “a whole bunch of stuff coming in from outside and volunteering to work for us because we have no chemical residues in our greenhouse at all. They’re happy to come in the vents and we sort of welcome them. It’s a community of ecologies that we’re working with.”

My ears perked up when the panel began discussing one of the most common pests of cannabis growers — spider mites. The mites feed off of the sap in plants, which can sometimes cause plant stress. Lloyd told the audience that even though a good consultant or technician is usually going to be your best source of information on biocontrol, he has had to figure it out mostly on his own. He explained that the most important questions are, “Which agent? What mite? What are the plants you’re trying to do this on? Some predators don’t work on specific plants.” To figure out which pests you need to whack, you can use traps to catch them and a microscope to get a better view of what species you’re working with. Websites like bugguide. net and insectimages.com can help you to identify the culprit.

Trichoderma harzianum will kill bad molds in the soil and replace them with good mold. Always inoculate soil with mycorrhizal enzymes before putting plants in the ground to help break down the other nutrients.

Among the spider mites’ predators mentioned by the panel were predatory mites such as persimilis, cucumeris, californicus, galendromus occidentalis, and swirski mites.

These organisms are commercially sold through insectaries such as Biobest, BASF, and Syngenta. Lacewings, ladybugs, and praying mantises are also known to eat spider mites. However, Suzanne warned that praying mantises also eat bees, which many gardeners enjoy as pollinators.

Suzanne says that we are still learning much about biocontrol. One of the difficulties of doing research on the subject is that there are so many variables. “University researchers are used to, ‘spray a chemical, does it die?’ They need to be asking, ‘do you use ebb and flood benches or mesh benches? Do you have cement floors or dirt floors? Where are your wind currents going?’ It’s very hard for them to do concise research on it.”

The same weekend, in the same city, the Cannagrow Expo was also held.

While Farwest caters to the ornamental flowers market, Cannagrow’s attendees, as the name suggests, are mainly cannabis growers. Though the crowd was different, many of the principles discussed were similar.

Paul Stanford was one of the speakers. He’s been a cannabis activist in the Pacific Northwest since 1981. During a thoroughly entertaining talk that ranged from how he beat a federal court case in 1991 for growing cannabis to how he supplies Willie Nelson with all the free weed he wants, he spoke in depth about how he grows plants that produce upwards of 10 pounds of buds. He explained how he uses biocontrol to fight mold. “Trichoderma harzianum will kill bad molds in the soil and replace them with good mold.

Always inoculate soil with mycorrhizal enzymes before putting plants in the ground to help break down the other nutrients”. The word mycorrhizae translates from Greek as “fungus roots”. Mycorrhizal fungi, including those

of the trichoderma genus, form a symbiotic relationship with plant roots by breaking down nutrients and making them available for roots to ingest.

They do this through the production of enzymes and antibiotics that also attack plant-pathogen fungi.

Nick and Elizabeth Mahmood are less worried about fighting mold or introducing fungi. They run Green Source Gardens, a licensed medical producer located about four hours south of Portland, in the southern part of Oregon. The Mediterranean climate there is less conducive to mold because it is dry all summer. And the wet, but not freezing, winters “let the fungal component thrive,” Elizabeth explained. “We get an amazing diversity of mushrooms in our space. Every year it’s gotten more diverse.” Different fungi join their garden, in part, through the different wood chips that they use as mulch. Among the fungi varieties are mycelliums, blewits, grisettes, agrocybes, rosegills, coprinus, little brown mushrooms, and garden giants.

“Whenever we see diversity in any kind of species, it’s a good thing, because they’re all contributing something slightly different. They’re all taking part in the biological breakdown.”

Manures and decaying plant matter make great foods for fungus. “We’ve got all the animals we take care of, and then you think of all the little bugs in the soil, those are all our livestock as well. The work is just bringing them their food, and they in turn feed the plants.” The Mahmoods especially enjoy growing mushrooms alongside cannabis. “Cannabis creates a great canopy and shades the understory. This spring we harvested pounds of edible mushrooms.”

thcmag.com 45

Green Source Gardens has a unique take on bugs. “We’ve never intervened with bugs, ever, and are getting better and better results every year,” Nick told me. “All the bugs are there. We have mites, and if you look in the right places, you should find mites. That should be part of how you address a healthy garden; the bugs are all in their right zones. They shouldn’t be eating your buds. Anything that’s got water in a dry climate is food. If that’s the only available water and no one takes care of any other spaces and it’s all dry dirt around all the plants, then that’s what they’ll eat. But if you keep everything growing between all the plants, you’ll have your natural buffer.” The couple showed me a patch of mint in-between a pair of cannabis plants with bugs flying and crawling all around it. “That is what you need in order to not have those issues. Tilling the soil, digging around, is not doing any good for the maturation of the soil ecology.”

According to Elizabeth, the more diversity at each level of the food chain, the better: “Take a predacious soil beetle — they’re a very delicate species, and they don’t show up unless it’s a very healthy environment. If you’re seeing multiple species of predacious soil beetles, then you know you’re doing great because you have a diversity of top predators, which is then going to ensure that you have more of a defense against [a] more-than-diverse base of pests.

It’s just like any healthy ecosystem; the more diversity you have of all different tiers of the food system, the more stable it’s going to be.” Larger predators, such as gophers or moles, can be deterred with gopher plants, which provide the animals with another food source. If that doesn’t work, cats can prove effective hunters.

Since we’re still learning the best ways to use biocontrol, the key to doing it well is to run a good experiment. Take detailed notes about all the variables specific to your setup, what’s working, what’s not, and share your results with your comrades. And remember to go easy on the spraying; that little army that just ate all your spider mites doesn’t like eating chemicals any more than you like smoking them.

46 October 2015

R E G I ST R AT I O N STA RTS N OW

BRING YOUR A-GAME thcmag.com 47

Strain Names

The History, The Problem, and The Solution

by Max Montrose

A Trichome Institute Publication

Strain names — my favorite topic. It’s one of those hot debates that seem to never go away in the world of weed. Most people don’t have a clue about this genetic and economic quagmire. There’s a good chance that what you think you bought from a dealer or dispensary isn’t legit. Sometimes you do buy truthful genetics, but that will be covered later. More often than not, your Girl Scout Cookies will be a rookie’s first grow from some Craigslist swap.

So that things don’t get too sticky, let’s break this bad boy down one step at a time. We’ll start from the top, with the science.

The Science There are arguably three species or subspecies of cannabaceae-cannabis that include sativa, indica, and ruderalis. Due to 80 years of government restrictions on cannabis research, cannabis linage and genetics have been an ongoing debate for decades. Now that we have been given a little slack, researchers like those at the Cannabis Genomic Research Initiative at Colorado State University are mapping the global genomes of cannabis variety types. At the Ruderalis same time, some other op e r at i ons Sativa across the country are starting to Indica fingerprint the terpene profiles of cannabis.

Scientifically speaking, terpenes are evaporating molecular hydrocarbon chains that produce smell. Research like this will inevitably help limit the never-ending strain-name dilemma.

back from the war, dude. It’s some heavy shit.” Thai Stick is from Thailand but apparently distributed around southeast Asia. Acapulco Gold is from Acapulco, Mexico; Durban Poison is from Durban, South Africa; Afghani Kush from the Hindu Kush mountains of Afghanistan; Panama Red from Panama, and so on.

Back then, Americans didn’t cross strains. Some smoked feral ditch weed and schwag very low in THC, and thus not that potent. Apart from C-grade schwag shipments from cartels in Mexico, the chronic that Americans accessed was imported from around the world. Thanks to the war on drugs, cheap, organic, and relatively safe weed bloomed into a billion dollar black market, offering both exquisitely crafted ganja and disgusting, harmful pot.

Thank you, Nixon administration, for helping the world develop such a sophisticated dankness market!

After the C ontrolled Substances Act of 1972, cannabis enthusiasts retreated to their basements and mountain hideouts to grow in secret. Cannabis is still more illegal federally than cocaine and meth, but I digress.

In the mid ‘70s, Berkeley students traveled to Afghanistan, strain-hunting for the type of cannabis Afghans used for their famous hashish. They brought seeds back from Afghanistan and grew them at a similar latitude in northern California. The Afghan strains thrived in the emerald triangle, and many other strains did too.

Landrace Cannabis Origins

One thing is for sure, however; science agrees that there is a strain-name problem. As suggested by the scientific article, The Genetic Structure of Marijuana and Hemp, “We find a moderate correlation between the genetic structure of marijuana strains and their reported C. sativa and C. indica ancestry and show that marijuana strain names often do not reflect a meaningful genetic identity.” But where did it all start? Let’s talk about the history.

The History Back when American soldiers were in ‘Nam, four-finger lids, sticks, and beans existed in hippy sacs. There wasn’t a strain name dilemma at all. From the late ‘50s to the late ‘70s, the name that accompanied a type of cannabis was usually its place of origin. “It’s called Thai Stick... My brother brought it

48 October 2015

Around the mid ‘70s, growers started breeding more potent strains with large, fluffy buds. The goal was to produce the most potent product possible while maximizing quantity per harvest. After many hybridizations (and ounces smoked) they had created a wave of new strains, and all of these new babies needed names. Strains named after their scent are hard to argue with.

Grapefruit Haze, Lemon Diesel, Skunk 1, Blueberry, Grape Ape, Strawberry Cough; these strains are named after their terpene profiles (smells). These terpenes are chemically the same molecules that exist in the fruit and other things we commonly find with these scents.

Outside of strains named after smells, there were a handful of black market

growers producing high-quality genetics with specialized branding: Train Wreck, Northern Lights, Master Kush, Bruce Banner, and AK-47, to name a few. These became the legends of the next age — strains that could make any stoner go slack-jawed instantly.

The Wild West of Weed Before the dispensary circus of ‘09 in Colorado, black market growers and dealers were coming up with strain names as fast as they could counterfeit big-name brands. Your dealer would explain to you the amazingness of his primo dankness through the strain name, because most dealers aren’t sophisticated enough to go into further details. Mr. Dealer might ask you, “You know AK-47, homie? Well this shit is AK-48! What do you know about weed a step better than the best?” Yes, there is really a strain called AK-48. Kat Williams made fun of the name-bragging game during one of his skits. “This shit right here. This, this shit right here nigga, this is kripta chrona-canalike! And every two weeks the shit gets stronger and stronger.”

Every dealer wants you to think their weed is better so you buy their product and not the next guy’s.

I remember picking up some crondo from a homie and jumping for joy when he had my favorite type on deck: Island Sweet Skunk. When my hook said he had ISS, he had ISS. On the other hand, when I was buying pounds off the street for a legal dispensary in 2009, pre-regulation, I had a harder time finding the real stuff. I’d buy wholesale bud and then retail it to medical marijuana patients (that’s how it worked back then). Four different dealers brought me four different types of weed that were all called ISS, or Blueberry that didn’t smell like blueberry, or AK-47 that was long and sativa-like and not large and AK-like at all.

Thanks to the war on drugs, cheap, organic, and relatively safe weed bloomed into a billion dollar black market, offering both exquisitely crafted ganja and disgusting, harmful pot.

Do people really make up strains names just to push product? YES! I’m guilty of it myself. Oftentimes a pound of bud came without a name! Well, we can’t sell weed without a creative name, can we? The first strain I named in the shop was “Pudytang”, and that sold out quick. I printed out a blue and gold label (inspired by our local basketball team) and slapped a “Denver Nuggs” label on the jar. My favorite name I appointed to a jar full of sad-looking dope was “Sum-ah-dat.” The first guy that popped into the shop that morning exploded like a cartoon. He forcefully pointed to the jar with a lit-up smile and said, “Oh shit! Haha! Give me Sum-ah-dat!” It was perfect.

Sunglasses are a perfect analogy for marijuana. When you buy sunglasses, they are usually black, plastic, and all pretty much the same shape. When you buy weed, it’s usually green with reddish hairs and in nug form. Dollar Store sunglasses cost $1 and Oakleys cost $100; what’s the difference? The products are virtually the same, yet one sells for much more due to a trusted brand name. How easy is it to fake Oakley sunglasses, Gucci bags, or Nike shoes? Stupid easy, and it happens every day. The global counterfeit market is in the billions despite products being highly regulated. Until 2010, the cannabis market had never been regulated. And that’s only in the state of Colorado. “I’m your drug dealer; it’s called Girl Scout Cookies. Believe me.”

The Problem With Strain Names Let’s set aside malicious mislabeling for a moment to talk about cannabis

thcmag.com 49

morphology. Let’s say a hippie grower in Humboldt created Master Kush.

He is your best friend’s cousin’s homeboy’s friend-of-a-friend. Let’s say you buy 10 of these Master Kush clones from a buddy. Now, you take these clones back to Colorado in hopes of growing the same tasty herb there.

After all, you have real Master Kush. It should be the same Master Kush wherever you grow it, right?

What you don’t know is how the hell that hippie grew his crop. Let’s say the Humboldt hippie used organic humtea, a mixture of worm castings and seagull guano aerated in a reservoir with beneficial bacteria and mycorrizae. The water pH is 5.5 and has 950-ppm nutrient content. His plants are planted directly in the earth, receive atmospheric CO2 at 320ppm, and are grown consistently between 65-79 °F and 47 percent humidity. In other words, a typical Emerald Triangle California garden environment.

Once in Colorado, someone waters those Master Kush clones with neon-colored, synthetic nutrients and unfiltered Denver city tap water at a 9.0pH. It’s 85 degrees in the indoor grow room with 75 percent humidity.

The nutrients are at 1,200ppm, and the CO2 is at 1500ppm via liquid injection from canisters. Half of the year in Colorado it’s freezing outside, so you ventilate the frigid air to save on AC costs. Unlike the California grow operation, this whole setup is hydroponic. Did you know that dumping cold air and water on kush varieties turns them purple? Well it does, and so all of a sudden your Master Kush looks very different from the mother plant back in Cali.

Compare your product to the hippie’s finished product, keeping in mind that they are from the same mother and have the exact same genetics. It takes nothing more than common sense to see that the vast differences between these two grow methods would produce a very different looking bud. Your indoor, winter-grown, hydro Master Kush buds are purple with orange hairs. The hippie’s buds are light green with dark red hairs. When you look up a strain online, at this point, how much do you care that what you are looking for is called Master Kush? You can’t guarantee it’s the same product you’re reading about online whatsoever.

How Can You Trust Anybody?

How much can you trust someone who says they have a certain variety when it looks and smells completely different from what you’ve experienced before? Cannabis morphology is more complex than counterfeit sunglasses by far. Many books, apps, and websites help people understand strains by hosting photos of the strains uploaded by users. You can easily find hundreds of types of cannabis that are carrying the same brand names, yet they are completely different from each other. Why? Because it’s not the same product, just the same brand name. This is the strain name dilemma we face in the cannabis market today. Hey, app and online strain detection companies! You’re not helping our industry progress; you are making things harder for patients and customers to understand!

So, what about this dispensary’s Blue Dream versus that dispensary’s Blue Dream? The product is either the same genetically, cut from the same mother, or they’re two completely different varieties. If they are from the same mother, and the dispensaries are in the same state, the buds will typically show the same characteristics within a 70-100 percent range of each other. The 30 percent difference comes down to the grower, substrate, nutrients, and other technical grow room factors. If all of the factors are the same, and it’s from the same mother, the finished product should be identical. Unfortunately it’s not always that easy, so what is the best way to go about this?

The Solution: Interpening™ At the end of the day, whether it’s from the black market or a neighborhood dispensary, you can’t trust strain names. So what does one do about photo by Kale Worden

50 October 2015

this dilemma? The easy answer is to stop caring about the strain name all together. Instead, what you should care about is how the product will affect you. Understanding this gives you ultimate control over your smoking experience. There is technique that allows anyone to see and smell the difference between indica and sativa. This technique is called Interpening, and it’s the solution to the strain name dilemma.

Interpening is a method that may be used to identify and understand cannabis, which is based on interpreting the plant’s terpenes and flower structure.

We care about terpenes because they produce aromas that have different physical effects on the user. By examining both the terpenes and the flower structure, you can identify cannabis varieties and even predict the effect that the cannabis will have on you. Interpening also teaches you how to assess the quality of the cannabis, to determine whether it is unacceptable, decent, or a high-quality product.

The most logical comparison for an Interpener would be a sommelier. A sommelier is a trained and knowledgeable wine professional who normally

works in a fine restaurant and specializes in detecting the subtle and unique features of wine. With a few simple observations, he/she can gather a substantial amount of information about the wine, such as where the grapes were grown, what the weather was during growth, and, most importantly, what to pair the wine with during a fine dining experience. Similarly, a well-trained Interpener cannot only identify strains of cannabis, they can also predict the effects of the cannabis and detect unacceptable cannabis qualities.

With the Interpening guide, Weed Wheel, and Interpening Loop in hand, users are informed as to how to detect un-flushed, chemically infused, insect-infested, old, mold/fungus-carrying, and other unhealthy cannabis.

The tools and guide also help users identify the healthiest and highest quality cannabis, all the way down to trichome ripeness.

Would you like to become an Interpener? We’ll be offering regular courses soon. To order your interpening pack, go to: http://shop.trichomeinstitute. com.

thcmag.com 51

BASE AND NECTARS

by Bubba Kush

Hello again and welcome back. As always, I am happy to see you return for another beginner session of Home Grow 101. Last time we spoke about the basic water chemistry and the base nutrients needed for your garden to grow. Let’s move on to the additives that really push your plants into overdrive in order to produce both robust and flavorful buds.

Additives or supplements are sometimes essential for a well-balanced diet.

They are also good for combating deficiencies that can develop during plant growth. The general formula that is usually given by a nutrient company is just that — general. It will be good for average-to-decent yield and quality.

Thus, we must push each strain to optimization by using additives. Some general formulas include additives to optimize production, but still utilize very general dosage amounts that work for most plants. It is always best for novices to do what is tried and true until they get the hang of things and start changing up the amounts and/or adding new additives. A lot of companies will really try to kill you on the price of additives and their necessity. Many of the additives companies sell don’t have time to work due

General Hydroponics has almost fool-proof feeding schedules for all of their systems, which makes it pretty hard to mess up. Don’t mix your nutes drunk and you should be fine following their feeding schedule. I suggest starting with the Flora Series Simple Recirculating or the Flora Series Drain To Waste systems. Starting with these systems will allow you to graduate to the expert level and you will really be able to see what each additive does.

Once you are comfortable with the Simple Formula, slowly start adding more additives and watch each change. You will also see what strains like what nutrients more, if you are doing a few different strains. I will go through the formula with you and give you a little breakdown of what you are feeing the plants.

Now would be a good time to go to the General Hydroponics website and print a copy of either the feeding chart for Flora Series Simple Recirculating or Drain To Waste feeding schedules. The first thing you will notice is that it is broken into weeks, which correspond to the phase of growth the plants are in. The nutrients listed across the top start with the base nutrients: FloraMicro, FloraGro, and FloraBloom. Then come the additives; RapidStart, Liquid KoolBloom, and Floralicious Plus. FloraMicro is the main base, which is composed of good amounts nitrogen and potassium, which the plant uses frequently throughout each phase of its growth. The amount of base or micro nutrient you use is relatively consistent throughout the life of the plant, while the FloraGro and FloraBloom change significantly from veg to bloom. That being said, the Gro is nitrogen and potassiumrich while the Bloom is phosphorous and potassium-rich. As you can see from the feeding chart, the Grow is slowly lessened while the Bloom dosage increases through the flower phase.

When mixing your nutes, always fill the reservoir with water first. Never mix the nutrients in their concentrated form. The most reactive of the three is the FloraMicro. Always mix the Micro first into the filled reservoir. Mixing Micro after there is nutrient in the tank can often cause salts to form. You can always adjust your the Grow and the Bloom after a tank is made to raise you PPM, but never use the Micro.

to the short flower time of the plants. The purpose of this series of articles is to get you growing with the least amount of frustration and the best result on your first crop so you don’t give up. I want you to be successful with your new hobby and enjoy the benefits of growing your own medicine for the rest of your life.

Before we can talk about the additives you will be using, we need to pick a nutrient base to start. I do not endorse any one company (as of now, ha) and I think many of them are of high quality. Many of them simply reverseengineer an older company’s stuff and re-label it. I have seen this done for many years in this industry and don’t quite know how I feel about it. Many things I have done have been re-packaged under different names, but that’s capitalism. What can you do? Again, I stray. The best formulas to start with are those from older, more established companies. You can get fancy once you know what you are doing. That being said, General Hydroponics has been in the game as long as I can remember. I have used many other nutrient systems, and currently use another system now, but General Hydroponics’ formula is a great place for a novice to start and still get decent crops right out of the gate.

52 October 2015

RapidStart is the first supplement you will be playing with. There are many root boosters on the market that you can use instead, as with all the additives we will be using. For now, let’s use what General Hydro makes. RapidStart is a great root growth enhancer, and is one of the most important supplements. You should give as much, if not more, attention to your root growth as your bud growth. Bigger and healthier roots mean healthy, productive plants. I also suggest using a product called Hygrozyme, which helps keep the roots clean and vigorous. Hygrozyme can be used until flush phase to maintain healthy roots and general vitality.

KoolBloom enhances flower production by adding large amounts of phosphorous and potassium to your system. It aids in increasing yields and improving flavor. Start adding Liquid KoolBloom in the second week of the bloom phase and continue until

two weeks before harvest time, then switch to Dry KoolBloom.

The Dry KoolBloom blasts your plants with even higher levels of phosphorous and potassium. Dry KoolBloom increases ripening time but should be used with caution. It is very potent and can overwhelm your plants, so follow the directions carefully. I would suggest that on your first couple of crops you use two-thirds of the suggested amount. Use Dry KoolBloom for one week and then start flushing with water until harvest.

Floralicious is comprised of organic extracts that add vitamins, sugars, carbohydrates, and other micronutrients vital to metabolic activities to your plants. Floralicious also improves stress resistance and overall vigor of the plant. It also aids in flavor enhancement. There are three formulas: Floralicious Grow, Bloom, and Plus. It would not hurt to play with all three and follow the Expert Feed chart. Stick mostly to the simple feed chart for your first couple of crops and add as you grow.

2005-ish, I think. I tried to Google when it was started to no avail. It was a little longer than a year before I went to Canada to teach them how to grow Kush the right way, and they wanted to know how to use this crazy shit. Not

I do not endorse any one company...but General Hydroponics’ formula is a great place for a novice to start and still get decent crops right out of the gate.

General Hydro suggests changing your reservoir every 7-10 days, but I suggest 3-4 days maximum, especially for small systems. Everyone does things differently and what works for one person may not for the other.

It is one of the mysteries of growing. I suspect that is where having a socalled “green thumb” comes into play. I personally believe that everyone has a different spiritual relationship with their plants after living together for a length of time, and there develops a symbiotic relationship of sorts; but I’m beginning to get strange, ha! I like the nutrients to be fresh, and the tank needs to be cleaned regularly to avoid any diseases. It is good to flush once in-between every two reservoir changes (at least) and monitor your nutrient and pH levels constantly.

Flushing is a very important practice. You really want the plant to use all its nutrient reservoirs dry, so it thinks it’s dying and ripens properly. Plants that are not properly flushed often taste bad, burn poorly, cause headaches, and other things you don’t want to hear when people describe your flower. I flush at least 7-10 days in hydro, and even longer when using dirt. Sometimes different stains require a longer flush than others. For beginner purposes, at least flush for a week and then experiment and see if you notice a difference in flush time for the strain you are growing.

With that said, I will leave you with a story about a specific additive that was supposed to be the new “miracle product”. This is kind of a stupid Bubba story but I will share it since it is, well, what it is. I have been growing since indoor growing really started getting wings and new products were starting to be developed. I was the young experimenter and tried everything that came out at the time. Well, almost. This was a product that came out around

sure if I should name the product, but I think it is horrible and there is a lot of press about it causing cancer that has come out over the last few years...

I stray again. The directions on the bottle grossly overdose your plants with mad amounts of phosphorous (and whatever else), which makes your plants finish far too early, and produce unusually hard buds, deformed and discolored hairs, and it basically ruins all smell and flavor. I figured out the right amount to use, but not before having a few really ugly crops.

The product claimed to be a “miracle product” that would cause large and vigorous bud production. While it can work with the proper expertise, I would be wary of any “miracle solutions” of any kind, especially as a novice.

Get a simple, proven formula down first and then start playing. It is fun!

Since this is only a two-page, monthly article, I have tried to keep a decent pace that will keep you from getting impatient. I am sure most of you that have been reading my article already have plants growing by now, and I realize that a monthly article is not the fastest way to get growing. I do hope I was helpful, informative, entertaining, and overall an educational experience for the novice grower just getting his feet wet. I plan for this to be my last article for a few months, until my next grow is fully functioning and I can write more informative articles with proper visual aides for when we actually start planting and growing. I sincerely hope you stick around, and thank you for reading.

BUBBA KUSH BRAND BURNING SINCE 1997

thcmag.com 53

‘Limited Social Use’ Initiative Pulled

by DJ Reetz

The decision to remove a measure that would have allowed for consumption of cannabis outside of private residences from Denver’s November ballot has left many cannabis consumers scratching their heads in confusion. If enacted, the Limited Social Cannabis Use initiative would have created regulations for cannabis clubs and allowed owners of 21-and-over, age-restricted establishments such as bars to designate spaces for the combustion of cannabis provided they were appropriately far away from public spaces and concealed from view. Backers collected over 10,000 signatures in order to get the proposal on the ballot, more than double the number required. A poll on the issue showed 56 percent of responders in favor, and activists and consumers were eager to at least partially fulfill the promise of treating marijuana like alcohol by allowing it to be consumed socially.

Councilman Albus Brooks, an incumbent representing much of downtown Denver as part of District 9, claimed to have been the one who reached out to the initiative’s supporters in an interview with NPR. “This decision ensures we now have the time and ability to include all interested stakeholders to reach consensus on this important issue. I am committed to working on a broadly acceptable solution,” writes Brooks in a statement to THC.

With so much momentum, the decision to remove the issue from Denver ballots seemed catastrophically anticlimactic for many. Angry rumblings and outright outrage bubbled up, drawing criticism from activists such as NORML lead council, Keith Stroup.

Others seem to feel that more data is required before a decision can be reached.

Councilman Paul Kashmann of District 6 acknowledges the lack of venues for tourists to consume, but says he needs time to assess potential negative impacts of such a proposal, such as increased usage and negative health impacts associated with it. “If it were before me today I probably would not [vote for it]. The future remains open,” he says. “The sky has not fallen because of this experiment.” A representative for Councilman Wayne New of District 10 claims that while the councilman is not a public supporter of marijuana use, he may be open to private clubs, depending on the legislation introduced.

But the decision was not an easy one, says Mason Tvert, one of the primary advocates of the measure. Tvert previously worked on the 2005 measure legalizing possession of up to an ounce of marijuana in Denver, and is credited as one of the co-authors of Amendment 64. “We have been working now for over a decade on behalf of adults who choose to use marijuana, and enhancing their rights; we hope that they would respect the decision that we’ve made here,” he says. “We certainly did not arrive at this decision lightly. We based

Assessing support for a potential compromise is tricky; many council members are hesitant to comment one way or another without codified language outlining what exactly such a compromise would entail. “Without seeing specifics I can’t say whether or not I would support it,” says District 4 Representative Kendra Black.

With over half of the city council showing support for a compromise either currently or in the past, the prospect seems to call for some cautious optimism.

If they don’t like the way in which we’re doing it that’s fine, but no one should question the intentions, because they’re very clear. We are doing everything we can to bring a solid social use law to Denver. this decision on what we believe is best for adult cannabis consumers.”

He says the decision to remove the issue from the ballot came after receiving commitments from members of the city government as well as local business groups who opposed the broad language in the proposal for liability reasons.

“In this case the city is willing to work with us,” says Tvert. “It makes sense to see if that’s possible, and if not we don’t lose anything; we simply run the initiative next year.”

While the decision to pull the initiative is puzzling to those in the cannabis community, Tvert remains optimistic about the prospect of moving forward with regulators rather than in spite of them. “The most important part of any law is that it is going to pass and be implemented,” he says.

Still, the Denver city government has in the past been shockingly anti-cannabis despite two-thirds of residents voting in favor of Amendment 64. Mayor Michael Hancock has in the past gone on record against allowing cannabis clubs, and previous city councils have proposed such draconian regulations as banning consumption in private residences if it is visible from a public space.

Law enforcement in the city has targeted any venues that have looked the other way on social consumption, shuttering clubs and driving away cannabis events. Given the history, it seems only natural for cannabis consumers to be skeptical.

But the new crop of city council members that took office this year may be more open than those previous. While most opposed any sort of public consumption when questioned by the Denver Post as part of a pre-election questionnaire, the publicity garnered by the initiative and the attention it has drawn to the glaring absence of approved places for tourists to consume may be stirring some flexibility.

54 October 2015

Just what will remain of the ambitious Limited Social Cannabis Use initiative remains to be seen. Likely the allowance for consumption in designated smoking areas at bars will not make it through, but Tvert will not comment on what exactly his group’s proposal will look like. “Everything is on the table right now,” he says. “We’re looking forward to beginning those conversations.”

“I’m hopeful that the city will live up to its word, but it’s really going to be a process,” says Tvert. “We feel that the city officials and the organizations that we’ve been speaking to are going to live up to their word, and if they don’t, or if we reach a stalemate, then we’ll simply run an initiative like we intended to in the beginning and the only difference is we’ll have even more support at the polls, and I don’t see how that could be viewed as being a downside.”

If talks with regulators do fall apart, an initiative such as this would likely have a greater chance in 2016 than in an off year, when younger voters are less likely to turn out. When asked if this was a determining factor in pulling the measure, Tvert replies, “It’s a factor, but we ultimately want to pass a law that we know will be implemented and will accomplish what we want to accomplish.”

“We still fully believe that adults should have the same right to congregate and socialize while using marijuana that they do with alcohol,” says Tvert. “We are keeping the option open of running an initiative next year if they don’t follow through or if we’re not satisfied with what comes out of this.”

For the time being, Tvert hopes that cannabis consumers can keep their cynicism in check and understand that there are other factors at play. “We’re not trying to win a popularity contest with marijuana consumers; we’re trying to enhance the rights of marijuana consumers,” he says. “If they don’t like the way in which we’re doing it that’s fine, but no one should question the intentions, because they’re very clear. We are doing everything we can to bring a solid social use law to Denver.”

thcmag.com 55

Epidiolex Proving Effective for Children with Epilepsy Dr. Nicola Davies

56 October 2015

W

hile the FDA won’t recognize using the whole marijuana plant in its unprocessed form for medical treatments, it is prepared to look at medicines that contain cannabinoids extracted from the plant. GW Pharmaceuticals is a London-based company with FDA-approved trials entering Phase 3 for their medication Epidiolex, which has so far proved effective in the treatment of epileptic seizures in children.

FDA Grants Fast-Track Status to Epidiolex Cannabidoids are related to the delta9 tetrahydrocannabidiod (THC), the ingredient responsible for the “high” when marijuana is used for recreational purposes. While marijuana has long been credited with the ability to provide relief for sufferers of conditions ranging from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) to cancer, it is only recently that the FDA has granted Fast-Track designation to certain products in a bid to provide relief for patients waiting for cures or treatments.

In June 2014, the FDA granted the Fast-Track designation to GW Pharmaceuticals for its investigational Cannabidiol (CBD) product, Epidiolex. GW Pharmaceuticals have estimated that there are around 750,000 pediatric and adult drug-resistant epilepsy sufferers in America, meaning that their ground-breaking medication could mark a turning point in the lives of many people living with epilepsy.

Drug-Resistant Epilepsy in Children Helped by Cannabis Epidiolex has been shown to be helpful in the treatment of Dravet syndrome, hitherto a treatment-resistant form of childhood epilepsy. A child with Dravet syndrome will appear to be healthy, but within the first year will have frequent seizures; some children can have up to 100 seizures per day. While most seizures are fairly short, many can last for more than five minutes and some for more than 30 minutes. Heat, fever, and other illness can trigger the seizures, but they can also occur without these triggers. Often, the first seizure will occur when the child is administered their first childhood vaccines, which is usually around six months of age.

Natural Cannabinoids Present in Our Brains Parents have been searching for something to help control the seizures during these early childhood years, and researchers have been working on a possible solution. In 1992, William Devane and associates, working under team leader Raphael Mechoulam at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, managed to isolate anandamide, a naturally occurring substance within our bodies that results in feelings of bliss or euphoria. There are CB1 receptors within the central nervous system and CB2 receptors that affect peripheral systems. It was found that anandamide binds to the CB1 receptors, making a person feel relaxed and blissful.

Substances like anandamide are referred to as endocannabinoids, as they occur naturally. Extracts from cannabis help boost natural endocannabinoids to relax the body so that seizures are significantly reduced. It must be pointed out that CBD, a primary ingredient of Epidiolex is a non-psychoactive cannabidoid derived from the cannabis plant, meaning that there is no THC in the medication. Epidiolex has already been found to have anticonvulsant properties in animal studies.

Side Effects to be Investigated In a study conducted by the NYU School of Medicine, led by Dr. Orrin Devinsky, Professor of Neurology, Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry, results are encouraging. It was found that there was a marked reduction in seizures and the medicine was well tolerated. Only a few children experienced symptoms of drowsiness, decreased appetite, and diarrhea. Mechoulam found this interesting, as he felt that pure cannabidiol shouldn’t cause such side-effects.

A child with Dravet syndrome will appear to be healthy, but within the first year will have frequent seizures; some children can have up to 100 seizures per day If there were traces of THC, he believes that the side effects would be more understandable. This is an outcome to be addressed in future studies.

If the safety of Epidiolex can be definitively proven, it should provide relief for children. Devinsky pointed out that reduction in seizures, although it varied from patient to patient, was on average between 42 to 48 percent — a significant figure.

Studies in Progress Currently, two drug studies are being undertaken on Epidiolex, as indicated by the U.S. National Institutes of Health. Professor Yong Park of the Georgia Regents University Health Center is leading “Epidiolex and Drug-Resistant Epilepsy in Children,” a study focusing on children between one and 18 years of age with histories of drug-resistant epilepsy. The trial will be conducted for a period of 52 weeks with an interim analysis after 12 weeks.

At this time, patients will have been given the maximum dose, which would be either 25mg/kg per day or another dose deemed tolerable and safe.

The study completion date is January 2020, with primary data collection completed by December 2019.

The second study is being undertaken at the University of Florida, with the collaborator being The James and Esther King Biomedical Research Program. The official title for this study is “Physician Expanded Access to Investigational New Drug Cannabidiol (Epidiolex) for the Treatment of Drug Resistant Epilepsy.” A total of 50 participants between the ages of two and 16 are being enrolled in the study, in which Epidiolex will be given and patient caregivers will be expected to keep a diary of the incidence of seizures. Interestingly, children with Dravet syndrome and Lennox Gestaut syndrome will be excluded.

Lennox Gestaut Syndrome, like Dravet, is an early childhood onset epilepsy that is difficult to treat. Both studies will accept only patients who have tried at least four other drugs to control epilepsy. Both studies are classified as “open-access,” so patients are receiving the opportunity to try these investigational drugs because of the serious nature of their condition.

Such drugs have not yet been fully approved by the FDA as safe and effective. This study will indicate whether they are in fact helpful or not.

Any new medication could have side effects so it is important to consider all the risks when deciding whether or not to allow juvenile patients to take part in a study of this nature.

No “High” from Cannabis Medicine While the FDA is allowing these trials to take place, it is very important to know that a certain element of the cannabis plant, namely cannabidiol, is being isolated; that cannabidiol is not psychotropic as there is no THC involved; and, that its effectiveness, while encouraging, needs to be fully investigated before final FDA approval is achieved. Under no circumstances should parents give their children pure cannabis in an attempt to selfmedicate seizures.

thcmag.com 57

58 October 2015

thcmag.com 59

The Problem With Organic

by DJ Reetz

60 October 2015

T

he issue of pesticide usage looms large over the cannabis industry these days. The extra attention has revealed that several manufacturers of legal cannabis products have been using banned chemicals to combat pests and mold, leaving consumers to wonder if they are consuming dangerous contaminants while they wait for the roll out of mandatory pesticide testing.

In many industries consumers can rely upon the seal of “organic” on labels to assure themselves that what they are consuming has not been treated with synthetic toxins.

Unfortunately, when it comes to cannabis this just isn’t the case. The reasoning is simple enough: the U.S. Department of Agriculture certifies whether crops are organic, and as cannabis is federally illegal the agency has no jurisdiction to do so, leaving consumers to either distinguish for themselves if a product is manufactured to their lofty standards, or to rely upon the sometimes dubious claims of the manufacturers themselves. It’s a precarious situation, as boutique, small-batch consumers and medical patients who use cannabis to treat conditions that can be exacerbated by contaminated product are denied this small measure of protection.

The issue came to a head when the Colorado Attorney General’s Office of Consumer Protection began inquiring with local manufacturers as to whether or not they were using the term. One of the shops they reached out to was River Rock, a dispensary that has long advertised itself as organic. After what River Rock Chief Legal Officer Norton Arbelaez describes as a meeting of minds with officials, as well as a tour of River Rock’s cultivation facility, the conclusion was reached that the term “organic” being used to describe cannabis could cause troubles federally, and the decision was made to remove the term from any signs and advertising.

“Until we can define ourselves as organic on a federal level, we are not. It’s literally that simple for us,” says River Rock COO Jim Elftmann. “At this point we’ve had our, I wouldn’t call them ‘legal’ issues, but we’ve had our issues dealing with it, and at this point we’re past it and we will never move forward on organic again until they give us a way to legitimately certify it. And when that day comes we’ll be happy to go through the process that needs to happen, but until then we’re just going about our daily business the way we used to, just cut out the word organic.”

Part of the discussions with the state Attorney General’s office included assessing whether River Rock was charging a premium for their product, and if the term was inappropriately giving the company a commercial advantage, says Arbelaez, though neither was determined to be the case. “We didn’t want to be the guinea pig of challenging federal regulation,” he says.

The idea of the program is to certify crops to a standard similar to that of USDA Organic, though Van Hook is clear to state that it is not an “organic” equivalent, as the USDA retains ownership of that word. While Clean Green does take into account many of the same factors as organic certification, such as the use of fertilizers and pest controls, it goes further by ensuring that manufacturers are meeting foodgrade health standards and also incorporates fair labor practices, water conservation standards, and a producer’s carbon footprint as part of certification. Van Hook also says that 100 percent of manufacturers with the Clean Green label are tested for pesticide contamination, unlike the USDA Organic program, which only tests about five percent. Inspectors for Clean Green must meet the same standards of qualification as those of the USDA, requiring at minimum a bachelor’s degree in agriculture or a related subject and five years of experience in the agricultural industry.

“It is in many ways more inclusive, but it’s not so disappointingly bureaucratic and rigid,” says Van Hook. As an example, he points out the inability of organic certifiers to train farmers on best practices. While USDA inspectors are limited to giving farmers a pass or fail, Clean Green offers growers the opportunity to learn how to meet standards.

With product being certified in California, Washington, Oregon, Nevada, and Colorado, the multi-state program offers at least some assurance for customers, even if it is not as widely recognized as a USDA Organic certification. So far, Van Hook says his company has certified over 18,000 pounds of cannabis this year.

“In the unregulated world of cannabis, as we all know, prohibited substances are widely used; substances [are] used in a manner that would be prohibited and against federal law in any other agricultural crop,” says Van Hook.

“We are one big fiasco from the hammer of Thor coming down on this industry,” warns Van Hook. “Once a person has a negative reaction to a pesticide used, or a concentrated form, it’s really going to overnight change the enforcement of the industry. I think we need to avoid that.”

Until federal action is taken to address the issue, organic cannabis exists in idea only.

In the mean time, customers must be wary of retailers and manufacturers claiming their product as organic. By the legal definition it most certainly is not.

Arbelaez suggest that cannabis consumers engage their budtender, and take the time to read the list of ingredients mandated by Colorado regulators to appear on products. “We don’t have that silver bullet of just being able to call it organic,” he says.

Many shops and manufacturers have used the term for years, though the issue is just now coming to light. Unfortunately, this means many more business are likely to have their labeling, advertising, and even the business names themselves changed, and it means that consumers will be left waiting for changes on a federal level before they can rely on the organic labeling to have any real meaning. Arbelaez likens it to the issue surrounding banking. “It’s just another obstacle and hurdle the industry has to endure,” he says.

There is, however, another path that manufacturers can walk in order to provide consumers with some degree of assurance that their product meets standards similar to those of USDA Organics. That solution: third party certification.

One company offering such a certification program is Clean Green Certification, which is based out of California. The company began operations in 2004 after founder Chris Van Hook, a USDA National Program Inspector, was approached by members of the medical cannabis industry to certify their crops. When he asked his superiors about the possibility of organic certification, Van Hook was rebuffed by the head of the federal organics program because cannabis is not a federally recognized agricultural crop.

“Anybody that’s advertising their cannabis as organic or anybody that says ‘we have organic pot’ is really saying to the world ‘we know nothing about the program,’” says Van Hook. “It only exists like that in the cannabis industry. In any other form of agriculture the county agricultural commissioner or the USDA would have stopped the use of the organic word a long time ago.”

thcmag.com 61

Pot-litically Incorrect

Scheduling like a Schmuck It seems like every time somebody mentions the ridiculousness of cannabis’ status as a Schedule I controlled substance they invariably follow it up with, “like heroin and LSD.” It’s pretty damn ridiculous that cannabis, a plant cultivated and used for industrial and medicinal purposes for literally thousands of years, is now considered by the consciousness police to be amongst the most addictive and dangerous substances known to man. Maybe they should use some of that civil forfeiture money to build a time machine and go back and warn Queen Victoria that the plant she was using to assist in her menstrual pain would invariably lead her down a path of addiction and mental degradation.

The DEA warns, “Schedule I drugs are the most dangerous drugs of all the drug schedules with potentially severe psychological or physical dependence,” so clearly cannabis — with an extremely low rate of dependency and overblown if not outright false claims about its negative effect on mental health — doesn’t fit this category. Factor in the whole “no currently accepted medical use” caveat that directly contradicts the medical cannabis programs now in effect in a majority of states, as well as the position of the National Cancer Institute and any number of medical bodies, and it seems pretty undeniable that cannabis doesn’t belong in this category.

But you know what else has no place in the Schedule I designation? Lots of things… like, really, a lot.

LSD As stated earlier, every time some reasonable media source mentions the scheduling of cannabis they follow it up with “like heroin and LSD.” But what needs to follow this is “… which is also stupidly categorized.”

D-lysergic acid diethylamide, or ‘cid’ (as it’s known by really cool people), was added to the CSA during the ‘60s, a reaction to its widespread extrapharmaceutical use. Prior to its placement amongst the worst of the worst substances known to man, LSD was used to treat alcoholism. That’s right, LSD was once used to treat addiction issues, and its beneficial properties were even acknowledged by the founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, Bill Wilson. In the book “Distilled Spirits,” Wilson is quoted as having written, “I am certain that the LSD experience has helped me very much. I find myself with a heightened color perception and an appreciation of beauty almost destroyed by my years of depression… The sensation that the partition between ‘here’ and ‘there’ has become very thin is constantly with me.”

So the founder of AA, who finds himself nearly powerless against addictive properties of alcohol, seems to think that LSD can help stir a spiritual awakening, which is itself an aspect of the AA program. A study published in 2012 in the Journal of Psychopharmacology analyzing studies carried out between 1966 and 1970 confirmed this application as well, finding that 59 percent of patients treated with LSD showed a reduced level of alcohol misuse.

Additionally, LSD has been shown to ease the anxiety of those facing death due to serious illness, as illustrated by a study published in the Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases titled “Safety and Efficacy of Lysergic Acid Diethylamide-Assisted Psychotherapy for Anxiety Associated With Life-

62 October 2015

by DJ Reetz

threatening Diseases.”

If LSD is shown to help alleviate addiction and has potentially beneficial applications for those facing the end of their life, it probably doesn’t belong in the section of the schedule designated for highly addictive substances that have no beneficial application. Sure, tripping balls can lead to some strange and possibly dangerous behaviors, but it seems like those stories we’ve all heard about parents returning home from a night out only to find that their LSD-laden babysitter has placed the turkey in the baby’s crib (and oh god, what’s that in the oven!?) may be slightly disingenuous. The point is, LSD doesn’t meet Schedule I criteria.

Psilocybin Another one of the most dangerous and potentially addictive substances known to man that occurs naturally just about fucking everywhere.

Why, if I subscribed to the notions of intelligent design (and the DEA’s bullshit) I’d swear that god was trying to destroy us all by making the most harmful substances grow out of the ground. Fortunately, I subscribe to the principles of reason, which are pretty clear to the contrary on the topic of psilocybin.

For those that don’t know, psilocybin is a psychoactive compound that occurs naturally in a variety of mushroom species. So if you do believe in the whole intelligent design thing, god made it for you, just as he did cannabis. These mushrooms have long been used for spiritual and shamanistic purposes, so the claim that psilocybin is likely to be abused isn’t really backed up by the overwhelming majority of history behind its use.

A 2008 study also published in the Journal Psychopharmacology found that a majority of test subjects had meaningful spiritual experiences after oral consumption of psilocybin. From the study “Mystical-type Experiences Occasioned by Psilocybin Mediate the Attribution of Personal Meaning and Spiritual Significance 14 Months Later”: “At the 14-month follow-up, 58 percent and 67 percent, respectively, of volunteers rated the psilocybin-occasioned experience as being among the five most personally meaningful and among the five most spiritually significant experiences of their lives; 64 percent indicated that the experience increased well-being or life satisfaction; 58 percent met criteria for having had a ‘complete’ mystical experience.”

If you’re the kind of hippie that believes that promoting spiritual well-being counts as a beneficial trait, then I guess that just leaves the addictive property of psilocybin as its reason for being Schedule I; because who doesn’t ceaselessly fiend for moments of profound spiritual insight? Well, according to Brown University, “Psilocybin does not produce compulsive drug-seeking behavior and addiction to hallucinogens is rare.”

So ‘shrooms can help users find a meaningful place for their existence in the unfathomably infinite and unknowable expanse of reality, and they have little chance for creating dependency. I guess the DEA just likes diving into bullshit.

MDMA Also known as the good part of the drug ecstasy, or molly, 3-4 methylenedioxymet hamphetamine might get a little closer to the “highly addictive” criteria due to its potential effects on serotonin production in regular users. However, as part of a survey of addiction experts that included psychiatrists, epidemiologists and law enforcement that appeared in the British medical journal The Lancet in 2007, experts rated the propensity of dependence of MDMA as a 1.13 out of four, well behind tobacco, alcohol, and even cannabis. When this group factored in the potential for physical and social harm posed by use of the drug, MDMA was ranked as 18th out of the 20 drugs surveyed for overall harmfulness.

Additionally, MDMA may be helpful in the treatment of PTSD. A study published in 2008 in the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs found that a 50 to 75 milligram dose of MDMA was “psychologically and physiologically safe for all the subjects.” However, the study was halted prematurely due to what the authors describe as political pressures, and so was only able to gather results for six out of the intended 29 subjects: women who suffered from PTSD as a result of sexual assault. While not totally complete, the data seemed to show that the women treated with MDMA had a reduction of PTSD symptoms over those who were treated with placebo.

Unless you are of the opinion that twirling glow stick lightshows and sweaty people rubbing against each other while listening to shitty dance music represents a fundamental threat to the fabric of society, MDMA probably doesn’t belong in Schedule I either.

Peyote Another prohibited plant with thousands of years of history behind its use that was half a century ago deemed by some dick to be too dangerous to ever be studied. Peyote is a cactus that grows naturally in parts of Mexico and the southwest United States, and it plays an integral role in religious ceremonies of many indigenous tribes. Ceremonies involve either eating the cactus or drinking a tea made from the plant, and the dangers associated with its use are evident in the rampant peyote abuse seen in many Native American communities.

Oh wait, I’m thinking of alcohol. It’s alcoholism that’s a serious problem across many Native American communities. Interesting then that many of these same communities have traditions incorporating peyote, yet don’t have a peyote abuse problem, despite these populations having a statistical inclination for substance abuse. In fact, a study from 2005 that appeared in Biological Psychiatry titled “Psychological and Cognitive Effects of LongTerm Peyote Use Among Native Americans” concluded, “We found no evidence of psychological or cognitive deficits among Native Americans using peyote regularly in a religious setting.”

Khat Not sure what khat is? Neither was I until I found it on the list of Schedule I controlled substances. It turns out khat is yet another plant used for eons that our DEA has the insight to keep us safe from. Khat is by default a Schedule I substance because it contains the chemical cathinone, a stimulant with potential euphoric effects, which is labeled as Schedule I. A shrub native to Africa, khat has a history of usage that stretches back to the ancient Egyptians. The fresh leaves are chewed to produce the stimulant and euphoric effects mentioned; a practice identified by U.S. and British authorities to be mostly undertaken by African and Middle Eastern immigrants. And like all mild intoxication that is confined largely to minority populations, these authorities have deemed it criminally dangerous.

However, according to the survey published in The Lancet mentioned earlier, khat is actually one of the least harmful intoxicants around, with an addictiveness rating of 1.04 out of 4, a risk of social harm rating at 0.85 and physical harm risk coming in at 0.50.

Ayahuasca Also known as the “vine of the soul” by the indigenous peoples of the Amazon who have consumed ayahuasca tea as part of religious ceremonies since before contact with Europeans.

Ayahuasca contains dimethyltryptamine, or DMT, a powerful psychedelic that is often isolated and used on its own as a Schedule I controlled substance.

You should probably have noticed a pattern in these entries by now. It’s hard to say if these substances are schedule 1 because of their consciousness-expanding and spiritual effects, the fact that they are naturally occurring, or just because out of the thousands of years that they have been used only the past couple decades has been by white people. One thing is for sure: it’s probably not because they exhibit the traits necessary to be Schedule I. Like all the other psychedelics listed here, ayahuasca has a low risk of abuse and dependence, and in some cases is actually used to deal with the emotional and psychological issues that underlie addiction. If you manage to find a shaman to guide you through an ayahuasca experience, you’ll likely be asked to abstain from alcohol and tobacco for a week beforehand in order to cleanse your body of toxins in preparation. So yeah, it’s not really a party drug.

Are all of these drugs completely without risk? No. Like everything in this world, there exists a potential to harm yourself if you use them improperly. There are probably even some other substances that could have made this list; hell, I could make a case for the beneficial applications of heroin based on all the great music that’s been created while under its influence.

But reflecting on the substances listed here it becomes pretty apparent that scheduling isn’t about safety, it’s about squashing any potential understanding of these substances, similar to what’s been done to cannabis.

Placing a substance in Schedule I is tantamount to saying, “This is so dangerous you don’t need to know how dangerous it is,” and it reeks of bullshit. So next time somebody points out how ridiculous it is that cannabis is Schedule I, be sure to point out how ridiculous the entire schedule is, and for that matter, the entire war on drugs.

thcmag.com 63

64 October 2015

DISPENSARY GUIDE

by DJ Reetz

DENVER

COLORADO SPRINGS

69 The Clinic 66 The Health Center 66 Infinite Wellness 67 LivWell 68 Northern Lights Cannabis Company 67 Preferred Organic Therapy 67 Rocky Mountain Organic Medicine 67 Walking Raven

NORTHERN COLORADO

PUEBLO

66 Leaf on the Mesa

66 Canna Caregivers 67 LivWell 67 Original Cannabis Growers

66 Infinite Wellness 67 LivWell

BOULDER 67 LivWell

thcmag.com 65

Canna Caregivers

Canna Caregivers - West The Canna Center www.facebook.com/CannaCaregiversTheCannacenter The CC Group consists of three leading medical dispensaries in Colorado Springs. Their knowledgable and friendly staff will make you feel right at home.

Visit one of their three locations: 3220 N Academy Blvd #4 Colorado Springs, CO 80917 1914 W. Uintah St. Colorado Springs, CO 2306 N Powers Blvd Colorado Springs, CO 80915

Infinite Wellness Center 2 Locations www.infinitewellness8.com

We believe in the infinite possibility of total wellness and in the infinite modalities to achieving this wellness within and without.

We offer our patients a dignified environment with friendly compassionate staff here to facilitate the needs of our patients. It is one of our goals to help dispel the negative press, thoughts and attitudes toward utilizing marijuana as a multi-beneficial medicine. We have set a standard to provide quality medical marijuana and edibles in a wonderful variety while upholding the laws set forth by both state and local governments. We plan to participate in fund raisers and charity events to engage in the needs of our community. It is our intention to bring light and awareness to a fresh view of well being and peace.

66 October 2015

The Health Center 2 Locations www.thchealth.com

The Health Center is a top notch cannabis dispensary with two convenient locations in the heart of Denver.

Boasting upwards of 70 varieties of award winning strains at any given time, the individuals who comprise the THC team pride ourselves on offering the best variety, potency and effectiveness of any cannabis in the region. Not only is The Health Center focused on cultivating the finest quality medicine, but also employing the finest quality staff. Each time you visit, you will be greeted with knowledgeable, friendly associates who take pride in working with you to find the best available options to meet your medical needs.

Leaf on the Mesa

1917 Santa Fe Drive.

Pueblo, Co 81006 www.leafonthemesa.com We at Leaf on The Mesa are a group of dedicated Cannabis professionals with over 15 years of collective experience in the Cannabis industry. We are a Medical and Recreational Dispensary where we aim to provide the best possible care for our patients and customers. We know there are many options for your Cannabis needs. We strive to provide the highest quality products, competitive prices, a knowledgeable staff, and a warm friendly environment.

LivWell

9 Locations www.livwellco.com Colorado’s Price Leader since 2009 LivWell dispensaries are your one-stop cannabis shop, offering a wide range of high quality concentrates, edibles, premium flower strains, glass and cannabis accessories.

Our mission is to provide outstanding cannabis to our customers at the most competitive price, with excellent service.

We offer Colorado Cannabis at 9 front range locations; in Denver, Lakewood, Boulder, Garden City, and Colorado Springs.

Please note: medical patients visiting our Broadway and Larimer locations must be aged 21+. All other medical locations are 18+. .

Original Cannabis Growers 2625 E St Vrain St Colorado Springs, CO 80909 www.OCGhome.com

Simply the best cannabis for less.

We’re the first and oldest Center in our Platte Ave. neighborhood in Colorado Springs.

Call for mature guidance for your personal needs from growers with over 15 years experience.

We offer Happy Hour 4p.m. to 6p.m. Every day.

Our friendly staff will be happy to assist you with all your medical cannabis needs.

ORGANIC THERAPY ESTD 2009

Preferred Organic

1569 South Colorado Boulevard Denver, CO 80222 www.preferredorganictherapy.com

Rocky Mountain Organic Medicine 511 Orchard Street Golden, CO 80401 www.rockymountainorganicmedicine.com

Preferred Organic Therapy & Wellness is a medical marijuana center that empowers quality-minded patients with a revolutionary approach for treating the mind and the body.

RMOM offers an extremely professional atmosphere, knowledgable staff and always top quality, organically grown medical cannabis. If you are ready for a better dispensary experience, come visit our facility at the base of the Rockies in Golden.

Together, the staff ensures that their patients are the most well-informed in the state of Colorado.

They do this by combining patient-driven strain testing that breaks down the distinct properties of each strain, as well as its unique effects, with visual educational aids and enhanced strain titles. Their second-to-none selection of additional treatment products are made even more valuable given that they are combined with the ability to browse detailed information at a leisurely pace.

Come see why Preferred Organic Therapy & Wellness patients are raving about them.

Meet John, the owner of Rocky Mountain Organic Medicine. The road that lead him to start RMOM was an unfortunate one. In February of 2009 John’s wife was diagnosed with colon cancer. She went through surgery followed by eight months of aggressive chemotherapy and radiation. As an alternative to the anti-nausea medication, she used cannabis to ease her discomfort. When John visited many of the dispensaries open at the time, he didn’t find one that he would feel comfortable sending his wife to by herself. They were all seedy in some form or another, and he knew there had to be a better way. In September 2009 he opened RMOM and brought a new level of professionalism to this industry.

Walking Raven

2001 S. Broadway Denver, CO www.mmjmenu.com/walkingraven NOW OPEN TO THE PUBLIC 21+, NO MEDICAL CARD REQUIRED. Walking Raven Retail and Medical Marijuana Center is one of the first dispensaries in Denver. Our mission is to provide high quality products and care at an affordable price. All prices are out the door and we have different tier levels of bud quality. We also offer a range of edibles, concentrates, and novelty items.

We take pride in our organic and meticulous cultivation process; we do not cut any corners and give our cultivators access to the best nutrients and equipment for their hand trimmed buds. Our friendly and knowledgeable staff is trained to assist you in finding a specific products for your desires. Walking Raven MMC is home to the Hong Kong Diesel, our top selling hybrid. Never settle, only shop PREMIUM QUALITY!

thcmag.com 67

E D G E W A T E R

www.NLCannabis.com January 1 2014, at 8 AM the first legal cannabis sale took place here at Northern Lights Cannabis Co, one of only 24 retail stores to open that day for recreational sales!

The history made that day continues to resonate with every legal cannabis transaction, including yours. Shop with us and make history!

2045 Sheridan Blvd.

Suite B Edgewater, CO 80214 303-274-6495 9:00am-9:00pm Daily

Our staff is friendly and our knowledgeable budtenders will guide you to the perfect product. No pre-packaged here. Your purchase comes from the jar you sampled.

Our shop has provided the finest Medical Cannabis since March 2010. Today we provide that same quality Medical and Recreational Cannabis to adults 21 and over from around the world.

Coco grown, our frosty genetics are provided by TGA Sub Cool Seeds, DNA Genetics, Paradise Seeds and other reputable producers.

Stop by and discover “Where Your Buds Are”!

Sweater Weather! o G0 Outside!

Happy Mother’s Day! o

68 October 2015 September May 20152015 2015 6868August

www.thecliniccolorado.com The Clinic is an award winning marijuana center with five Denver metro locations.

The Clinic is Denver’s premier medical marijuana center having won over 20 awards for both it’s high quality cannabis, concentrates and charitable contributions! The Clinic’s staff is extremely knowledgeable and friendly while the atmosphere at their locations reflect the immense amount of care that they provide to their patients as well as their medicine.

The Clinic is also a long time supporter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, as it’s a cause that directly affects their patients, friends and family. As such, The Clinic has raised more than $100,000 for the Colorado-Wyoming Chapter of the National MS Society since they first opened their doors in 2009.

The Clinic has remained at the forefront of the medical marijuana movement by raising the standard for medical marijuana centers everywhere, not only through their patient driven mission but through their dedication to the community! Make sure to stop by The Clinic and see why their mantra holds true: Our Patients Live Better.

Strains

Kosher Kush 2012 High Times Cannabis Cup (Denver) Patient’s Choice Winner Stardawg Guava 2012 High Times Medical Cannabis Cup (Denver) 1st Place Best Sativa Grape God Bud 2010 CO Caregiver’s Cup Triple Crown-winner and 2nd place 2011 Aspen Cannabis Crown, this is the hottest indica in town.

Raskal OG One of the most visually appealing and potent OG kushes around with a distinct diesel fuel aroma.

2012 High Times Medical Cannabis Cup (Denver) 3rd Place Best Hybrid Ghost OG THC Champions Cup 3rd Place Overall Hybrid & Patients’ Choice Hybrid. 2013

High Times US Cannabis Cup 3rd place best hybrid winner Fall ‘97 This indica-dominant strain is a sweet tasting cross between OG Kush and Purple Urkle.

Skywalker OG This clone only pheno of OG Kush has quickly become a patient and staff favorite.

Super Lemon Haze Winner of the 2008 and 2009 Sativa High Times Cannabis Cup Tangie 2013 High Times US Cannabis Cup 1st place best sativa winner Pre ‘98 Bubba Kush 2011 High Times Denver Medical Cannabis Cup highest CBD strain winner

Cherry Pie GDP and F1 Durban cross that won 3rd Place Medical Sativa at the 2014 US Cannabis Cup Durban Poison A classic landrace sativa from Africa that is mouth watering and known for it’s soaring cerebral effects.

Phishhead Kush This strong indica was named 2nd best strain of 2014 by famed cannabis connoisseur William Breathes.

Jack Flash A classic strain that was recently awarded Connoisseurs’ Choice Adult Use Hybrid at the 2014 THC Championship.

Edibles

The Clinic Colorado 3888 East Mexico Ave., Ste. 110 Denver, CO 80210 303-758-9114 The Clinic Highlands 3460 West 32nd Avenue Denver, CO 80211 303-997-7130 The Clinic on Wadsworth 3600 South Wadsworth Blvd.

Lakewood, CO 80235 303-484-8853 The Clinic on Colfax 4625 East Colfax Avenue Denver, CO 80220 303-333-3644 The Clinic On Jewell 12018 W Jewell Ave Lakewood, CO 80228 303-997-9171

D E N V E R

9:00am - 7:00pm Daily

Concentrates

Budder, Shatter, & Live Resin The Clinic carries the full line of concentrates, including Live Resin Batter, produced by our award winning marijuana infused products division, The Lab.

Awards

2014 High Times Cannabis Cup 1st Place US Cup Concentrate - 303 OG Nugrun Live Resin Budder 3rd Place Medical Sativa - Cherry Pie 2013 High Times Cannabis Cup 1st Place Sativa - Tangie 3rd Place Sativa - Stardawg Guava 3rd Place Hybrid - Ghost OG 2012 High Times Medical Cannabis Cup 1st Place Best Sativa - Stardawg Guava 1st Place Patient’s Choice - Kosher Kush 2nd Place Best Concentrate - Strawberry Cough Nectar 3rd Place Best Hybrid - Raskal OG Pre ‘98 Bubba Kush High Times Cannabis Cup: Highest CBD Strain Grape God Bud Spring 2010 Colorado Caregiver’s Cup Winner: Patient’s Choice, Best Aroma, Most Photogenic 2011 Aspen Cannabis Crown, 2nd Place Overall 2013 The 710 Cup 2nd Place Best Sativa Shatter - Tangie 1st Place Best Sativa Shatter Terps Tangie

The Hemp Connoisseur Championship 2012

2nd Place Indica and Connoisseur’s Choice Kosher Kush 1st Place Sativa and Patient’s Choice - Stardawg Guava 3rd Place Hybrid and Patient’s Choice - Ghost OG 1st Place Concentrate and Connoisseur’s Choice - Earth OG Nectar

The Hemp Connoisseur Championship 2013 1st Place Indica, Connoisseur’s Choice and Best Tested - Kosher Kush Patient’s Choice Hybrid - Grunk 2nd Place Shatter and Patient’s Choice- Tangie The Hemp Connoisseur Championship 2014

1st Place - Concentrate - BHO Extracts - Live Resin Badder Kosher Kush Connoiseur’s Choice - Concentrate - BHO Extracts - Live Resin Badder Bubba Kush People’s Choice - Adult-Use Sativa - Cherry Pie Connoisseur’s Choice - Adult-Use Hybrid - Jack Flash

2015 High Times US Cannabis Cup 2nd Place Peoples Choice Concentrate - Kosher Kush Live Resin Batter 3rd Place Peoples Choice Flower - Bubba Kush

Sweet Grass Kitchen, Julie's Natural Edibles, Mountain High Suckers, The Growing Kitchen, Incredibles, Dixie Elixirs, Keef Cola and Cheeba Chews.

Seeds 58 February 2014

The Clinic offers the full line of cannabis seeds from The Bank Cannabis Genetics (formerly Reserva Privada Colorado), including the recently released Phishhead Kush series.

thcmag.com 69

70 October 2015

thcmag.com 59

thcmag.com 71

72 October 2015

DIRECTORY DISPENSERIES: BOULDER

LivWell Boulder Medical Only 3000 Folsom St Boulder, CO 80304 720-389-4920 livwell.com

COLORADO SPRINGS Canna Caregivers Medical Only 3220 No. Academy Blvd., Ste #4 Colorado Springs, CO 719-597-6685 Canna Caregivers - West Medical Only 1914 W. Uintah St Colorado Springs, CO 80904 (719) 637-0420 The Canna Center Medical Only 2306 N. Powers Blvd., #100 Colorado Springs, CO 719-597-9333 Healing Canna 3692 E Bijou Street Colorado Springs, CO 80909 719-637-7645 www.healingcanna.com LivWell on Murray Medical Only 570 N Murray CO Springs, CO 80915 719-574-8443 livwell.com LivWell on Nevada Medical Only 3234 N Nevada Ave CO Springs, CO 80907 719-622-6652 livwell.com LivWell on Tejon Medical Only 1414 S Tejon St CO Springs, CO 80905 719-634-0420 livwell.com The Organic Seed Medical Only 2304 E Platte Colorado Springs, CO. 80909 719-465-1845 coloradospringsmmj.com Original Cannabis Growers Medical Only 2625 E Saint Vrain St Ste A Colorado Springs, CO 80909 路 719-475-9333 www.ocghome.com

DENVER - CENTRAL Advanced Medical Alternatives Medical & Adult Use 21+ 1269 Elati Street Denver, CO 80204 303-993-4547 www.amadispensary.com The Clinic Capitol Hill Medical & Adult Use 21+ 745 E. 6th Ave. Denver, CO 80203 720-536-5229 www.thecliniccolorado.com The Health Center Medical & Adult Use 21+ 1736 Downing St. Denver, CO 80218 303-622-3787 thchealth.com LivWell on Larimer Medical & Adult Use 21+ 2863 Larimer St Denver, CO 80205 303-484-1662 livwell.com URBA @ MMD of Colorado Medical & Adult Use 21+ 2609 Walnut Street Denver, CO 80205 720-328-2227 www.mmdofcolorado.com

DENVER - EAST The Clinic on Colfax Medical Only 4625 E. Colfax Ave. Denver, CO 80220 303-333-3644 www.thecliniccolorado.com

DENVER - HIGHLANDS The Clinic Highlands Medical & Adult Use 21+ 3460 W. 32nd Ave. Denver, CO 80211 303-997-7130 www.thecliniccolorado.com The Giving Tree of Denver Medical & Adult Use 21+ 2707 W. 38th Ave. Denver, CO 80211 303-477-8888 www.tgtree.com URBA @ MMD of Colorado Medical & Adult Use 21+ 2647 W. 38th Ave. Denver, CO 80211 720-389-7911 www.mmdofcolorado.com

DENVER - SOUTH The Clinic Colorado Medical & Adult Use 21+ 3888 E. Mexico Ave Denver, CO 80210 303.758.9114 www.thecliniccolorado.com

The Health Center Medical & Adult Use 21+ 2777 S. Colorado Blvd Denver, CO 80222 303-622-3787 thchealth.com LivWell on Broadway Medical & Adult Use 21+ 432 S Broadway Denver, CO 80209 720-428-2550 livwell.com Preferred Organic Therapy Medical & Adult Use 21+ 1569 S Colorado Blvd Denver, CO 80222 303-867-4768 preferredorganictherapy.com Walking Raven Adult Use 21+ 2001 S Broadway Denver, CO 80210 (720) 327-5613 thewalkingraven.com

DENVER - WEST LivWell on Evans Medical & Adult Use 21+ 2193 W Evans Ave Denver, CO 80223 720-361-2981 livwell.com

EDGEWATER Northern Lights Cannabis Co. Medical & Adult Use 21+ 2045 Sheridan Blvd.

Edgewater, CO 80214 303-274-6495 www.nlcannabis.com

FORT COLLINS Infinite Wellness Medical & Adult Use 21+ 900 N College Ave. Ft. Collins, CO 80524 (970) 484-8380 infinitewellness8.com

GARDEN CITY LivWell Garden City Medical & Adult Use 21+ 2647 8th Ave Garden City, CO 80631 970-616-6007 livwell.com

GOLDEN Rocky Mtn. Organic Medicine Medical Only 511 Orchard Street Golden, CO 80401 720-230-9111 rockymountainorganicmedicine.com

LAKEWOOD The Clinic on Jewell Medical Only 12018 W Jewell Ave Lakewood, CO 80228 303-997-9171 www.thecliniccolorado.com The Clinic on Wadsworth Medical Only 3600 S Wadsworth Blvd.

Lakewood, CO 80235 303-484-8853 www.thecliniccolorado.com Compassionate Pain Management Medical Only 11950 West Colfax Lakewood CO, 80215 303-232-3620 compassionatepm.com Infinite Wellness Medical & Adult Use 21+ 1701 Kipling St. #104 Lakewood, CO 80215 720-458-0277 infinitewellness8.com LivWell Lakewood Medical Only 5660 W Alameda Ave Lakewood, CO 80226 303-922-9479 livwell.com

LOUISVILLE Compassionate Pain Management Medical & Adult Use 21+ 1116-7 W. Dillon Rd. Louisville CO, 80027 303-665-5596 compassionatepm.com

NORTHGLENN Botanacare Medical & Adult Use 21+ 11450 Cherokee St. Unit a7 Northglenn CO 80234 303-254-4200 www.botanacare.com

PUEBLO Leaf on the Mesa Medical & Adult Use 21+ 1917 Santa Fe Drive.

Pueblo, Co 81006 719-544-5323 www.leafonthemesa.com

OTHER: EVENTS

BIG Insustry Show bigindustryshow.com

GLASS BLOWING Glasscraft Glasscraftinc.com

thcmag.com 73

THANK YOU TO OUR ADVERTISERS

40 Best Buds 04 BIG Industry Show 27 Bhang Chocolate 55,66 Canna Caregivers 55,66 The Canna Center 55 Canna Creations 30 Cannabis Business Alliance 29 Cannabis Network Radio 46 CannaQual 57 Cannarunner 33 Canyon Cultivation 59 Chromic Con 05,69 The Clinic 71 Cloud Chamber 41 Dr. J’s 11 Edipure 57 General Cannabis 57 General Cannabis Supply 76 GH Labs 55 Glasscraft 71 Healing Canna 17,66 The Health Center 40 Healthy Choices Unlimited 22 The Hemp Connoisseur Championship 15 Incredibles 29 Indica Vape 16,66 Infinite Wellness 57 Iron Protection Group 17 Julie’s Natural Edibles 09,66 Leaf on the Mesa 64 Leafbuyer.com 21,67 LivWell 13 Mahatma 25 Mary’s Medicinals 43 Medeval Clinic 13 Medically Correct 55 Mountain High Suckers 12 National Cannabis Summit 57 Next Big Crop Consulting 26,68 Northern Lights Cannabis Co. 11 Organix 09,67 Original Cannabis Growers 16,67 Preferred Organic Therapy 10,67 Rocky Mountain Organic Medicine 25 Smoke Studios 03 The Trimmer Store 02,67 Walking Raven 75 Western Centers, Inc.

74 October 2015

INDUSTRY GROUPS

Mahatma mahatmaconcentrates.com

Cannabis Business Alliance cannabisalliance.org

Medically Correct medicallycorrect.com

Cannabis Consumers Coalition cannabisconsumer.org

Mountain High Suckers mountainhighsuckers.com

Colorado NORML www.coloradonorml.org

MMJ EVALUATION

NCIA www.thecannabisindustry.org Marijuana Policy Project www.mpp.org consumeresponsibly.org

INDUSTRY SERVICES 7 Leaf Marketing 7leafmarketing.com Best Buds bestbudsapp.com Cannabase cannabase.io Cannabis Camera www.cannabiscamera.com Cannabis Network Radio www.cannetradio.com Colorado Pot Guide coloradopotguide.com General Cannabis generalcann.com iCannabis Radio www.icannabisradio.com NHA National Hemp Association http://nationalhempassociation.org/ Iron Protection Group ironprotectiongroupsecurity.com Leafbuyer Leafbuyer.com Next Big Crop Consulting nextbigcrop.com

INFUSED PRODUCTS Bhang Chocolate www.bhangchocolate.com Canna Creations 720-483-8228 Canyon Cultivation canyoncultivation.com Dixie Elixirs www.dixieelixirs.com Dr. J’s www.drjsllc.com Edipure edipure.com Incredibles incrediblescolorado.com Julie’s Natural Edibles juliesnaturaledibles.com

Amerimed 2257 S Broadway Denver, CO 720-532-4744 www.amerimed.com CannaQual 6795 E. Tennessee Ave., Ste #175 Denver, Colorado 80224 303-690-4882 www.cannaqual.com Medeval Clinic 6650 S Vine St, Ste L50 Centennial, CO 80121 720-744-2010 www.medevalclinic.com Relaxed Clarity - Broomfield 1006 Depot Hill Rd. Suite 100 Broomfield, CO 80020 970-412-5955 www.relaxedclarity.com Relaxed Clarity - CO Springs 3133 North El Paso Street Colorado Springs CO 80907 719-645-5955 www.relaxedclarity.com Relaxed Clarity - Pueblo 503 Avocado Street Pueblo, CO 81005 719-354-5445 www.relaxedclarity.com

SMOKING ACCESSORIES Indica Vape www.indica2.com PURR purrsmoking.com Scientific Inhalations sipipes.com SI Pipes sipipes.com

TOURISM Cultivating Spirits cultivatingspirits.com High Country Cannabis Tours highcountrycannabistours.com

TRIMMING SERVICES The Trimmer Store 800-429-6034 thetrimmerstore.com

thcmag.com 75

TM

76 October 2015