Food Chain Radio Show #1128

Michael Olson, Author & Urban Farming Agriculturalist

California Green-Gold Rush

Part III: Cannabis Farming

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Guest: Jeff Brothers, CEO Harborside Farms

Michael Olson Food Chain Radio: California Cannabis Green Gold Rush Part III – The Farming

Cannabis farming in California is moving out of the disreputable into the respectable. And so we ask…how will legal cannabis be farmed?

Illegal cannabis was grown in secret gardens wherever those gardens could be kept secret.

As the cannabis gardens grew in size, they became easier to see, and therefore more vulnerable to being robbed by thieves or raided by government.

Much of the illicit cultivation technology, therefore, becomes focused on getting the most from the least. And that necessity gave rise to “sinsemilla,” which is cannabis that has been refused pollen, and is therefore “without seeds.”

Sinsemilla allowed cannabis farmers to concentrate the amount of THC in each flower, and thus to raise the price from a couple of hundred dollars per pound to a few thousand dollars per pound. And with those kind of dollars flowing, a lot of people got to growing.

Recently California passed Proposition 64, which legalized the use of cannabis– at least, sort of.

The cannabis that was grown in secret gardens is now moving out into the open, and will become another of California’s many horticultural and agricultural crops.

How will California horticulture and agriculture pros grow legal cannabis?

To find out, we ask Jeff Brothers, CEO of Harborside Farms. Brothers personifies one of the great ironies of cannabis-in-our-times. He was one of California’s premiere cut flower producers, but lost that business when the U.S. gave the industry to Columbia so Columbian farmers would stop growing cannabis. Now he is about to become one of California’s premiere cannabis farmers!

Leave a comment below: How will legal cannabis be grown?

Tune in here, for the syndicated the Michael Olson Food Chain Radio Show #1128 November 18, 2017 Saturday 9AM Pacific