2014 02 UK

FREE 18+ For adults only. Soft Secrets is published six times a year by Discover Publisher BV Netherlands

Issue 2 - 2014

Medicinal

use of

AMSTERDAM

cannabis

could be

CU PWIN N ER

WWW.PARADISE-SEEDS.COM

Atomical Haze ®

allowed (in Jersey)

Jersey’s Health Minister has been told by the island’s lawmakers that she does have the power to make Class B drug cannabis legal for medicinal purposes.

Council] because I’ve also got to take the advice of the health effects because it is at the end of the day an illegal drug.”

Cannabis has been associated with harmful side effects; primarily paranoia and brain function problems. But it’s also been used in medicine around the world for thousands of years.

However, Deputy Anne Pryke said that she would need to consult expects in the island before she made a decision for the drug to be used in medicine.

Deputy Tadier said: “We’re essentially in a no-man’s land. There are products that are cannabis based that are being used for medicinal purposes but the problem is, they’re not always the most effective form of cannabis and they’re very expensive to get into the island, so what I’m trying to do is just make it more userfriendly from a patient perspective but also for GPs who believe their patients might benefit.”

The discussion was raised in the States sitting last month after Deputy

Deputy Anne Pryke said: “I will need to take advice [from the Drugs Policy

A change in the law would mean that those suffering from conditions like MS where the drug relieves muscle pain and spasms, could use the drug to allievate their symptoms.

In this issue: MEDICAL CANNABIS BIKE TOUR 2014!

Montfort Tadier asked a question about what the law was on using cannabis for medicinal purposes.

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GREENHOUSE GROWING

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TRAVEL: KASHMIR

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Some islanders have also been campaigning for the move in recent months.

In Guernsey there was a protest march called ‘Walk to Weed’ and in Jersey’s Youth Assembly six-formers discussed it in the States Chamber.

Source: www.channelonline.tv

3

Home Affairs Select Committee to launch inquiry into medicinal cannabis!

Last issue we reported the positive changes in cannabis laws across the Atlantic. At the start of the year Uruguay had taken the heroic step to legalise cannabis in an attempt to halt the flow of cash from reaching drug cartels and ensure the drug is available to all users; medical and recreational. At the same time, north of the border, cannabis was made legally available for recreational use in the US state of Colorado. Heralding what many believe to be the beginning of the end of prohibition.

At the time we were disappointed in the lack of progress in discussing cannabis laws in the UK. Well, no sooner than the ink had dried on the magazine, we received a call from CLEAR UK that certainly lifted our spirits!

Following a meeting in the Houses of Parliament, it was confirmed that an inquiry will be held into the use of medicinal cannabis in the UK! With the assistance of Andrew Turner, MP for the Isle of Wight, CLEAR representative Peter Reynolds led a delegation of three medicinal cannabis users to meet with Keith Vaz MP, chair of the Home Affairs Select Committee (HASC), to discuss how cannabis helps with their medical conditions.

The longer inter-nodal distance and multibranching allows for extra large harvests. This variety prefers extra nutrients during vegetative growth and requires 8-9 weeks for flowering indoors, typically reaching up to 1m tall and yielding up to 500g/m². The Edge will also perform Outdoors in mild climates and will finish as early as mid/late September.

The Edge delivers a powerful and uplifting high which transitions into a strong stone. This is a robust variety which performs well even for less experienced growers and will tolerate conditions which are not always ideal. Whichever way you grow The Edge you should get a heavy crop of quality pot.

Genetics: Indica/Sativa 25/75% Flowering time: 8 - 9 weeks Height: approx. 1 meter THC content: 17% Good for indoor, outdoor and greenhouse Seed bank: Dutch Passion

The Edge

If you’re a fan of strong old-school Skunk varieties with bumper harvests then this is a perfect choice.

The Edge is a Sativa dominant variety that delivers heavy harvests of top quality cannabis with a strong Shiva aroma which will remind you of the good old days. THC levels of 17% are typical, so this is a powerful variety. The Edge has a Skunkappearance, but with slightly more stretch.

Peter, along with medical patients, George Hutchings, Paul Lewington and Dean Price explained the process that CLEAR members have followed to obtain a prescription from their UK doctor and then travel to Holland to have their medicine dispensed at a Dutch pharmacy. They informed Mr Vaz that, apart from GW Pharma’s liquid cannabis spray, Sativex, the Dutch company Bedrocan produces the only form of medicinal cannabis which is prescribable by doctors.

During the meeting the CLEAR representatives discussed how five people have already successfully imported their medicine to the UK, openly declaring it at customs. George explained how, in

November 2013, his trip had ended in the seizure of his medicine at Southampton airport. He is now pursuing an appeal to the Border Force and his solicitors have taken steps which may lead to a judicial review of the Home Secretary’s refusal to issue an import licence.

Currently any UK doctor can prescribe any licensed or unlicensed medicine for any condition as they see fit. The only prescribable form of herbal medicinal cannabis is Bedrocan which a Dutch pharmacy will dispense against any EU doctor’s prescription.

The issue then is importing it to the UK. The first step is to apply to the Home Office for an import licence. Unfortunately this is likely to be refused. However, five CLEAR members have successfully imported prescribed Bedrocan by declaring it openly at customs with a copy of the prescription in support. Only the last person to try - George Hutchings - had his medicine seized.

Following advice from Dr Julian Huppert MP, a member of the HASC, Peter Reynolds argued that if a doctor has prescribed Bedrocan then the Home Office should issue a licence enabling it to be imported, otherwise, politicians and civil servants are overriding a doctor’s expertise. Mr Vaz strongly agreed with this point.

Mr Vaz was also impressed to see copies of UK doctors’ prescriptions for Bedrocan and believes that the Home Affairs Select Committee would be convinced by such evidence. The next step for Peter Reynolds is to write to Mr Vaz and Dr Huppert formally outlining CLEAR’s case. The committee will then consider this along with any other evidence it may choose to call and produce a report with recommendations.

This inquiry is the achievement of three long years of work by CLEAR with the support of their members and they hold high hopes that it may lead to long overdue reform and a more compassionate policy on medicinal cannabis.

Great work guys!

grow your own style. pass it on!

5

Hey Soft Secrets, Long time reader, first time grower! Here we have Critical Kush, raised on Canna Terra Vega and Flores, Rhizotonic, CannaBoost and PK 13/14, grown under a 250w florescent and 400w HPS. These pictures show the last few days of there lives, around 18 weeks old and one actually came out for harvest today; I’m both happy and sad about it. Maybe it was beginners luck but this first grow went without a hitch and I even have a few bowls of finger hash from the first plant!

Keep up the great articles and have a great day all!

Attention Readers!

Fancy a FREE packet of FEMINISED seeds from DINAFEM? Then send us a picture of your grow room or best cannabis plant, including a visible copy of Soft Secrets, and we’ll send you 3 seeds. Should your photo happen to feature your beautiful wife or girlfriend wearing a sexy microbikini or super hot lingerie, you will receive 6 seeds. Photo of the Month will even receive 9 prime quality feminised seeds. With compliments of Soft Secrets and DINAFEM!

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again; actually getting a smokable harvest from your first grow is something to be proud of. This crop is an absolute revelation for a first timer! Look at the size of those buds. You’ve obviously been doing your homework.

Bit of advice for your next go; strip those fan leaves off as you approach harvest time, this will force the plants energy into bud production rather than expending it on maintaining leaves. Good work, sir.

Here we have our Cheese Bomb from Bomb Seeds, amazing strain grown by Ryan and Brownie from the North East of England, used 75% Canna 25% Advanced Nutrients. Buds were like stones covered in resin. I have done the Berry Bomb, THC Bomb, Big Bomb and few other by Bomb, this is by far the best and would do it again. To all those visiting NL this year go to the Dizzy Ducky in Den Haag best menu for green and hash. Hello to Dan, Rose, Elyon and Izzy Welcome to the jungle! Somebody send a search party! Any crop that’s large enough to play hide and seek in, deserves to feature in Soft Secrets. Great stuff.

E-mail your entries to SSUK@softsecrets.nl.

NOTE: All entries are handled with the utmost discretion. We don’t publish out of focus pics, and we don’t like photos of plants in veg stage.

It’s fat buds & sweet babes we want to see!

E-mail: SSUK@softsecrets.nl

Dear Soft Secrets, Thought I’d share a few pics to try and get some beans. Editors choice maybe? Grown in pots of coco hand fed. Some under a CFL 200W and some under 400W. Vegged for 3 weeks and flowered for 9.5 weeks. Vitalink Coir base nutrient, Buddhas Tree Advanced Meta Boost, PK 9/18 and Solar Green Power.

Flushed for 2 weeks, first week on Advanced Nutrients Final Phase and final one on pH 6.5 water. Super potent and smells seriously strong.

Bring karma in to your room not drama.

Peace out Ganjaman420% Mmmmmm... we can smell that frosty looking lady from here! Another impressive piece of bud porn grown on the Buddhas Tree range. You UK growers love that stuff! Little tip for next time; if you want to make the editors choice, get some some boobies next to your buds!

Just proof that the British weather is OK for outdoor growing. This Early Girl was grown from seed and yielded about 2 oz per plant. I used seaweed extract as a booster. Can you recommend any other outdoor seeds?

There’s nothing better than a nice bit of bud that’s been grown free-of-charge under that big grow light in the sky.

Contrary to popular belief, you can cultivate outdoors pretty much anywhere in the UK... even as far North as Scotland and Ireland. Early Girl has a short flowering period (hence the name) which is handy for our short summers. Why not try an autoflowering strain? The new varieties are fast to finish and are good producers. There are loads available. We’ve seen great results with Cream Caramel, Auto Mazars and – of course – the legendary Think Different.

6 Hello again Soft Secrets, I’m still loving your publication as much as usual, especially now the New Year has started and it will soon be time to see and read about many outdoor grows and information again.

Well I’ve been busy indoors with a few automatics, so I thought I would send a couple of pictures for you guys to see and hopefully publish. These are only grown in 1 gallon pots in a small closet but I am happy with the results.

Hope you enjoy the pics, keep up the good work with the magazine guys.

Peace and happy growing.

LEETXANCHAMAN. Good to hear from you again friend. You’re becoming a real regular round these parts!

That’s a nice looking result from such a small pot. We particularly enjoy the little squirrel tail at the top of the bud! If you’re hand feeding small pots, maybe try a fabric or root pruning pot next time? As the roots hit the air on the outside of the pot, the tip dies off, causing them to send out lots of secondary roots. You’ll get a much bigger root mass with them and, as you know, more roots equals more fruits! We look forward to seeing your outdoor efforts later in the year.

Hello there, Long time reader and fan! First time sender. I am a fairly recent stealth grower on my third grow now, which has been my best so far! I am a bargain basement grower, my total set up including seeds has cost me under £80! This is my second harvest of Lemon Haze hope you enjoy!

Sincerely PROFESSOR. GRENTHUM That’s some lovely looking Lemon, sir! If that’s what you can achieve with an £80 set up, we’d love to see how you do with some more advanced hardware. Someone donate some equipment to this guy fast! Strip some of that foliage back once your buds are setting and you’ll see them swell in size as the plants energy is redirected from maintaining leaves to developing flowers. You can have that tip for free!

Hiya guys, The plant was a Greenhouse Seed company “The Doctor”, bit of genetic freak early in it’s life, but it pulled through!

I’ve been experimenting with a hybrid type of RDWC, which I designed and built myself. The root mass completely filled a 20 litre bucket! Had to support the main cola after 4 weeks flowering and I used an ozone generator to avoid bud-rot problems. I grew two of these girls under one 600w bulb. This was the larger of the two and she weighed in at over 10oz of sweet tasting giggle-weed. I reckon my room’s very close to dialled in.

My lady is a 6’2” blonde bombshell, she rides a motorcycle, always smells nice, enjoys a giggle and she’s a brilliant cook. She looks after me as well as I look after my girls.

Who could ask for more?

JIM (UK) Wow! We hope you look after her as well... what a body! Two smoking hot girls in this picture! With weights like this being achieved, it’s no wonder that so many UK growers have fallen in love with the DWC technique.

9

WORD

Word From The Street What’s going on in our nations grow shops at the moment? What are the popular products? We had a chat with Midlands grow shop owner Mike (not his real name) to see what’s been selling well over the last

By Little Lebowski few months.

SSUK: Mike, thanks for taking the time to have a chat with us. To start off, it would be interesting to know how business in general has been over the last few months.

Mike: Yeah, it’s been an interesting year to be honest with you. I’ve been in the industry for nearly five years now and 2013 has been a bit of a funny one. The weather had a serious effect on business over the last 12 months. The start of the year was very cold, so a lot of growers were struggling with low temps and were waiting for spring to arrive. Then, all of a sudden, the weather went incredibly warm which put lots of growers off starting anything. Then in late September, most people decided they were ready to start and it kicked off properly.

Do you think that tells us something about growers having difficulty to control their environment? Is more knowledge required?

I think it’s down to a number of factors.

Firstly, serious growers carry on, regardless of the weather. If you look at somewhere like California, they have hot weather 24/7

think this has an impact on sales. Thirdly, I know plenty of small-scale, personal growers that put a few plants outdoors over the

custom drip or DWC system for them, but now system manufacturers have started to design and sell large plant systems – like BubbleBox and AutoPot XL - and these have been really popular.

Is this a trend that you’ve seen across all your customers? There’s obviously some repercussion for getting caught with high plant numbers.

Yes and no. I mean, I think that people

wise to the fact that it’s less maintenance to grow fewer plants and, with an extra week or two of vegging, they can actually get more yield from two or three plants than they were getting from nine. I still find that my smaller-scale, personal growers will do four plants. Simply because they don’t want to risk doing a single plant and it dying on them half way through a crop and – more commonly – they like to grow more than one strain in their tent at the same time.

Yes, it’s always good to have a bit of variety in the jars! What about other trends? We’ve done a few articles on LED lighting; do you have customers asking for them?

Yes, more than ever. I think that the hot weather had a real influence on the spike in demand for LED’s, they run far cooler than HID lamps and the technology has come on leaps and bounds in the past couple of years.

This means that we’ve actually got the confidence to sell them to our customers now, when previously it felt like you were taking a real risk in offering them, even if your customer really wanted them. Now, we’re just careful to explain that to get the best from LED’s you need to change your growing

Single plant systems are becoming popular amongst UK growers

summer, rather than attempt to cool their single 600w lamp powered room.

Interesting. So, what about different types of products and trends that you have seen over the last few months?

THE WEATHER HAD A SERIOUS EFFECT ON BUSINESS OVER THE LAST 12 MONTHS and they keep growing indoors throughout the year. Professional growers will buy chillers and air-con units in the summer and heaters in the winter. I’ve had lots of interest from my serious customers in complete environmental control products like the OptiClimate, which is an absolutely incredible piece of kit. Secondly, the economy has taken a bit of an upturn and people are working again, so casual growers won’t invest in the type of equipment required to grow during cold / hot spells. I genuinely

Well, one thing that’s been happening for the past few years is that customers seem to be growing fewer plants per light and are striving for very high yields per plant.

Five or six years ago, it wasn’t uncommon for a grower to put 16 plants under a 600w lamp, then they did nine plants, then this dropped to four or five. This year, I’ve seen a trend for growers to cultivate one or two very large plants under a single light. Until this year, the growers had to use big pots and hand feed them, or we’d knock up a

OptiClimate environmental controllers; for the serious grower

LED grow lights keep you growing through the warm summer months

BUY THE BEST LIGHT PACKAGE, FAN AND FILTER THAT YOU CAN AFFORD always have that in the back of their mind, you know, planning for the worst case scenario. But, I also think that people are getting

techniques; there’s less heat emitted which affects the temperature and humidity of your room, you’ll find that your plants transpire less and drink less, this means that you can run your nutrient solution at a higher EC than when using HID lamps. And, before you ask; yes, they do work!

Thanks for that Mike, hopefully you’ve inspired a few growers to try something new. What about first timers thinking of taking the plunge? What would you recommend?

Stick to pots, soil and some basic nutrients for your first go. It’ll help you learn to spot when your plants are hungry.

Buy the best light package, fan and filter that you can afford. Don’t be tempted by some of the cheap shite that’s available at the moment. The biggest factor effecting yield is environment. Treat your plants to the right environment and they’ll pay you back ten-fold in yield! Give it a go, you won’t regret it.

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11

PRODUCT FLASH DUTCH PASSION 2014 CATALOGUE AVAILABLE

DUTCH PASSION OUTDOOR PLANT OF THE YEAR

Dutch Passion have released the 27th annual catalogue, it is available for PDF download on the Dutch Passion website and the printed version is also available free in many seeds shops and headshops throughout the world.

The Dutch Passion catalogue features some rich colour photography of some of the best cannabis varieties available.

Dutch Passion announced the best outdoor customer grow of 2013 went to ‘Mr High’ who grew a magnificent 4.5m tall Frisian Dew in the Czech republic. The plant yielded 1.5Kg of top quality pot for the lucky grower and Dutch Passion commented that it was unusual to see a Frisian Dew reach over 4m tall.

New varieties featured in the Dutch Passion 2014 collection include AutoUltimate and AutoDurban Poison are new additions to the Dutch Passion AutoFem collection. CBD Kush and ComPassion are two new CBDrich varieties with 1:1 ratio’s of THC:CBD. Dutch Passion also have two new traditional varieties, Orange Hill Special and The Edge. Orange Hill Special combines genetics from California Orange and Orange Bud, and ‘The Edge’ is a new THC-rich super potent Skunk selection. www.dutch-passion.nl

‘Mr High’ was able to grow his epic Frisian Dew outdoors in natural Czech summer sun, he gave his Frisian Dew great growing conditions and plenty of water in the heat of summer. This allowed the Frisian Dew genetics to grow under optimum conditions and the result was a monstrous plant which any back-garden grower would be proud of.

1.5Kg harvests from Frisian Dew are not unusual, when grown in greenhouses the plants can often exceed 2Kg and occasionally 3Kg. The outdoor growing season starts soon for Europe and Dutch Passion will be running special offers on Frisian Dew seeds, see their website for details. www.dutch-passion.nl

PLAGRON COCOS PEBBLES

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Hydroponic growing with a stabile pH and excellent drainage

HORTIGARDEN HG100 The Hortigarden HG100 grow closet is 1 metre wide x 1 metre long and 2 metres high. Perfect for indoor growing at home with 400 and 600 W lights.

Designed and produced by growers for growers.Hortigarden grow products are characterised by the excellent quality of their finishes and by their meticulous design.

The Hortigarden grow cabinet line offers you the cabinet that’s best suited to your needs; several measures and shapes are available.

Here are the main features of these cabinets: t )JHI RVBMJUZ QBDLBHJOH XJUI assembly instructions included inside. t &BTZ UP BTTFNCMF BOE EJTNBOUMF t 3FJOGPSDFE TUSVDUVSF TP UIF DBCJOFU DBO FBTJMZ TVQQPSU MJHIUT FYUSBDUPST BOE BDDFT sories. t 5PQ RVBMJUZ [JQQFST t .VMUJQMF FOUSJFT GPS QJQFT DBCMFT BOE BDDFTTPSJFT BMM XJUI EPVCMF GBTUFOFST t 99- TJ[F TJEF XJOEPXT t 3FGMFDUJWF .ZMBS DPBUJOH PO UIF JOTJEF t .BEF XJUI NBUFSJBMT UIBU EPO U IBSN UIF OBUVSBM FOWJSPONFOU PS PVS QMBOUT You can find this cabinet and other Hortigarden products at www.hortigarden.com and www.lamota.org

Cocos Pebbles offers the advantages of both Cocos Premium and Euro Pebbles. The cocos will keep the pH in the substrate stabile. The pebbles provide the substrate with excellent drainage and an adequate oxygen level.

Plagron Cocos Pebbles is a 50/50 combination of high quality Cocos Premium and Euro Pebbles, also known as ‘the cleanest pebble out there’. Controlling the pH is easy, because this substrate is buffered for a stabile pH throughout the entire cultivation period. The EC value of Cocos Pebbles is extremely low, therefore the grower has full control over the fertilisation. Plagron Cocos Pebbles is suitable for almost any hydroponics system, because of the excellent drainage that the pebbles supply.

Advantages of Cocos Pebbles: t $PNQMFUFMZ CVGGFSFE TVCTUSBUF XJUI B TUBCJMF Q) t &YDFMMFOU ESBJOBHF t )JHI PYZHFO MFWFM t (VBSBOUFFE MPX &$ WBMVF t $PNCJOF $PDPT 1FCCMFT XJUI $PDPT " $PDPT # GPS UIF CFTU SFTVMUT Do you have any questions? servicedesk@plagron.com For additional information about Cocos Premium, Euro Pebbles and other products check www.plagron.com

12 EURO PEBBLES FROM PLAGRON SUBSTRATE / NON FERTILISED Hydroponic growth for the highest yield

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Plagron Euro Pebbles is a high-quality inert hydrological substrate. Among experts, Plagron Euro Pebbles is known as ‘The cleanest pebble out there’. The pebbles are treated with the greatest possible care, therefore they are cleaner and firmer than comparable products.

The raw material are pure and salt -free clays that are baked in an open oven to produce the characteristic irregular granules. The fine pores of Euro Pebbles are capable of absorbing large amounts of moisture and nutrients, the absorbed moisture can be released to the plant gradually. Plagron Euro Pebbles is widely applicable, because nutritional value is adjustable and pH value is neutral.

When the Euro Pebbles are carefully washed after each cultivation and then soaked in 1MBHSPO )ZESP " # BOE 1MBHSPO 1VSF Enzyme for 24 hours, they are indefinitely reusable. Euro Pebbles can also be mixed with other substrates to improve drainage.

Advantages of Euro Pebbles: t $MFBOFS BOE GJSNFS UIBO DPNQBSBCMF QSPEVDUT t )JHI XBUFS BOE PYZHFO IPMEJOH DBQBDJUZ t 4VJUBCMF GPS SFDJSDVMBUJOH TZTUFNT t 'PS UIF CFTU SFTVMUT DPNCJOF &VSP 1FCCMFT XJUI 1MBHSPO )ZESP " # FO 1MBHSPO Pure Enzym.

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The digital ‘BLscale’ Pocket scale (order code: 40 30 56) is super slim and thereGPSF UIF JEFBM USBWFMMJOH DPNQBOJPO 8JUI B XFJHIJOH SBOHF PG H UBSF calibration function and an illuminated display, it is always ready to weigh, with accuracy small or large quantities.

An automatic standby feature Soft Secrets readers now have the opporconserves the two (CR2032) tunity to win one of 3 pocket scales! batteries and the scale automatically switches off, if it The only thing you have to do to win such has been left on. So you can a magnificent BLscale is answer the followbe sure the ‘BLscale’ delivers ing question: How many years does Soft what it promises, time and Secrets exist in your language? time again, so you can completely relax and concentrate Email your answer to ssuk@softsecrets. on the essentials. nl with the header ‘BLscale competition’.

Winners will be notified by email. Deadline HeadShops can order the is the street date of the next issue, see ‘BLscale’ Pocket scale (order page 54. code: 40 30 56) online at: www.neardark.de

DUTCH PASSION VOTED ‘BEST SEEDBANK’ AT SPANNABIS 2014 Dutch Passion were proud winners of the ‘Best Seedbank’ award at Spannabis 2014. The award is the result of a public vote of Spannabis visitors and is a major boost for Dutch Passion, one of the original Amsterdam seed banks dating back to the 1980’s. The ‘Best Seedbank’ award is given for the seed bank offering the best overall seed collection, including traditional seeds, AutoFem, CBD-rich strains and Outdoor. Dutch Passion reported Spannabis 2014 to be the biggest yet and had record numbers of visitors. www.dutch-passion.nl

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13

15

GROW WITH GRUBBYCUP

The Cannabis Vascular System

by Grubbycup

Vascular plants include flowering plants such as cannabis, and are distinguished in part by their use of specialized cells known as xylem to raise water and nutrients from the roots up to the leaves, and phloem to transport sugars

Roots absorb water, and raise it via the xylem. and organic compounds produced in photosynthesis around the plant from sources where they are made, to where they are stored or used. The xylem and phloem systems run throughout the plant, branching as needed so that every cell in the plant is within a few cells reach of them.

The xylem allows plants to take up and distribute water internally via a process known as transpiration. There are small openings in the outer skin of the plants called stomata. Most of the stomata are concentrated on the undersides of leaves. These openings allow for carbon dioxide (CO2) in for use in photosynthesis, and allows the oxygen (O2) and water vapor (H2O) out. Most of the water the plant draws in from the roots will

ultimately be evaporated through these stomata openings.

stomata will close to conserve water, and transpiration may stop.

At the top of the xylem system are the guard cells. They surround the stomata openings and swell to open, or deflate to close the openings. The guard cells allow the stomata to open when light and moisture are conducive to growth, and to close in times of drought, high heat, and darkness. This is why supplemental CO2is generally only used during the lit hours of an indoor garden (unless a continuous release system is used where stopping and starting the CO2 flow is problematic). Since the stomata has to be open for CO2 uptake, it makes sense to restrict CO2 enrichment to times when the stomata are open.

Xylem cells run throughout the leaves and stems, supplying water and minerals to cells in need as well as to the stomata. In flowering plants these xylem cells are known as vessels. Water enters the xylem pathway from the root system by passing through cell membranes at the Casparian strip. The Casparian strip is a waxy bottleneck that forces the water

The evaporating water vapor that exits through the stomata draws water up through the plant to replace it much like a chain. Water has a tenancy to stick to the sides of a container (adhesion), and it has a tendency to stick to itself (cohesion). Because of these two properties, water in narrow tubes form a continuous chain of water molecules.

Water evaporating through the stomata pulls the chain of water up the stem to replace the lost fluid through many long narrow hollow tubes made from Most of the water the plant takes up is dead cells known as the xylem. The evaporated from the underside of the water molecules form a chain, and as leaves through the stomata. the top of the chain is lost to evaporation, the rest move up to fill the void.

Small apertures or pits provide a path to pass through a cell membrane before for water to rise from one xylem cell entering the xylem pathways. to the next. These small apertures help keep the water clean, and help local- Before it reaches the Casparian strip, ize vapor locks from air bubbles. The water first passes from the surrounding path is one way; water rises from the soil into the roots via osmosis. Since roots to the leaves. At night, when the the water in the soil has a lower minstomata close, the chain of water is held eral concentration than the water in the in place until they open again and the roots cells, water will pass through the cycle continues. Transpiration increases semi permeable cell membranes. This with higher temperatures, which is why osmosis creates a small amount of “root plants require more frequent watering pressure” to assist in moving the water in summer heat. However, keep in mind up to the rest of the plant, although this that if temperatures are too high, the force is smaller than the capillary and

other forces drawing water up the plant.

Root hairs absorb nutrients by direct contact. Roots end in a root cap that protects the rapidly reproducing meristem cells that push it deeper into the growing media. Root hairs grow along the roots to extend their range, and increase surface area.

Root hairs can extend their reach by use of beneficial fungi. Mycorrhizal fungi (if present) trade minerals (especially phosphorus) to the root hairs in exchange for carbohydrates produced by the plants.

This benefits the plant since the fungi both extends the reach of the root hairs, and is able to enter and exploit smaller cracks in soil particles.

In a nutshell, transpiration draws the water from the soil up from the root hairs, to the roots, through the plant through the xylem, and out through the stomata openings.

In contrast to the xylem; the phloem is a series of cells that run through the plant that transports the sugars made in photosynthesis in a process known as translocation. The sugar solution is known as sap which moves through small holes in the ends of sieve cells by osmosis.

Unlike xylem, which are dead cells that use passive physics to move water in one direction only, the phloem are living cells that move the sap in either direction depending on need. They can transport sugars, hormones, and other organic compounds to the roots for storage, or from the roots to flowering sites for seed development. Sugars are added to the sap where they are made (or stored) and removed at the location where they are needed (the sink).

Gentle Readers, being at least acquainted with the basics of a cannabis plant’s vascular system can help growers understand how a plant takes up nutrients and water, and uses sap to transport sugars and organic molecules.

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18

CANNABIS EVENTS

SPANNABIS 2014 The eleventh edition of Spannabis, the largest cannabis market in Europe, was bigger, busier and more successful than ever. In three days the exhibition was visited by no fewer than 33,000 visitors! All the big names from the European green industry were in attendance, making Spannabis 2014 the most successful edition ever held. Text & photos: cccp This year over fifty companies and 200 booths were present at the fair at the Fira de Cornella in Barcelona. New this year was the outdoor area where the area in front of the entrance of the famous glass pyramid was transformed into a true market, complete with booths, food stalls and the necessary tables and chairs.

The weather was almost perfect, giving visitors and exhibitors a great outdoor chill-out area to take a break, smoke a joint or drink a beer under a beautiful sunshine. A DJ on a small stage near the entrance played uplifting dub and reggae in the background. It gave the outdoor area a festival-like atmosphere that was enjoyed by everyone. There was no music indoors this year, which was appreciated by almost all exhibitors.

People could hear each other, and now also had a lot more time and space to talk to customers and visitors. The fact that the outdoor area was continuously busy somewhat lessened the pressure on the exhibition halls, making it quieter indoors than in previous years. All-in-all a great success and a solid improvement over previous years, we therefore truly hope that the outdoor area will be present again next year.

It was already busy on Friday, but Saturday things really got going: in the morning there was a huge crowd waiting at the entrance to get inside, and ticket sales were in full swing. After managing to secure a ticket, a number of attractive promo girls awaited visitors with bags

Visitors queuing up to have their photo full of freebies or glossy brochures. A good sign, because it shows that the taken with the Strain Hunters jeep European cannabis industry is maturing and increasingly becoming part of the ‘regular’ horticultural industry. This was also confirmed by the composition of the visitors: we regularly encountered Chileans, Argentines and other Latinos, in addition to many Americans and Canadians. Each looking for the best deals for the emerging market in Latin America and the ever-expanding market Trimpro, for heavy users in North America.

Also striking was the presence of many Social Cannabis Clubs from all over Europe, who literally and figuratively came to give out their calling card.

They exchanged information, expertise and know-how with each other and, of course, were able to recruit members on the spot. Spannabis was the place to be The Canna stand is a permanent for the Social Cannabis Clubs. fixture at Spannabis All-in-all Spannabis 2014 was a great edition and one that will be tough to beat.

Hugo Madeira, the editor-in-chief of the Spanish edition of Soft Secrets, was a happy man. Asked for his reaction Hugo said: “I think Spannabis is the best cannabis trade fair in the world. Each year the fair gets bigger, and every year there are improvements over the previous year. I also feel that the fair is becoming increasingly professional, with exhibitors from all over the world. The companies that I spoke to were all very pleased with this edition. I think Spannabis is here to stay.”

The Dutch company Zambeza Seeds brought along their own joker

A CSC from the UK busy recruiting members

Valencia last year, this year Barcelona: the drivers of the Medical Cannabis Bike Tour had a rough couple of days

An impressive crowd was waiting to be let inside

Eva Seeds brought a great cannabis The outside area was a festival in itself

castle along to the exhibition

Valencia last year, this year Barcelona: the drivers of the Medical Cannabis Bike Tour had a rough couple of days

19

Soft Secrets contributor and growing guru Ed Rosenthal

There was certainly no shortage

Nirvana Seeds from

of Grow Tents

the Netherlands: still going strong

One visit to the Resin association!

Dinafem has become one of Spain’s largest and most established seed banks

A Spanish beauty

The lads with Jorge Cervantes

Better than the local cheese counter!

20

COMIC

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MC BIKE TOUR 2014

€ 100,000 FOR MEDICAL RESEARCH CYCLED TOGETHER!

Medical Cannabis Bike Tour 2014

The speeds differ dramatically. The slowest climbers move at a snail’s pace of seven km per hour, while the true descenders fly down at speeds of 70 km per hour, even passing cars on their way. The wind does not let up, and when the sun disappears behind the clouds, it becomes extremely cold. During lunch caregiver Alex folds a few pieces of makeshift insulation from cardboard which a few ladies slide under their jerseys. Sexy!

They come from all over Europe and even North America. Norwegians, Spaniards, Britons, Germans, French, Americans, Germans, Slovenes and a Canadian. The Medical Cannabis Bike Tour is becoming increasingly international! There are even four women, which can surely Nice training ride!?

There’s something ridiculous about it: only benefit the performance of the male riders. Our base is the town barely trained, weed-smoking, beerof Onda, where the cannabis circus set up camp in an impersonal drinking adults pretending to be profescyclists. But once you place your hotel the day before the start. The Spanish spring sunshine ensures sional too-heavy body on the narrow strip of a pleasant temperature. A slight bummer is the wind blowing from plastic of a racing saddle, you forget that the north. Shit, just the direction we need to cycle into tomorrow. But you are a broiler chicken compared to the well-trained greyhounds in the pro we can’t turn back now: the sponsors that made this already historic peloton. In an unflattering tight cycling suit, it’s quite easy to imagine you’re occasion possible are counting on us. All for science!

By Jan Sennema. Photos: Oscar, Ramon and Tim

1st stage: Onda -Tortosa, 130 km We really did plan to leave on time, but that visit to the pizzeria last night got a little out of hand. As did our beer consump-

nabis celebrity Jorge Cervantes has left the tour! The brakes of Cervantes’ brand new bike blocked, causing the longhaired featherweight to rollover twice. With all

heard him say before. Daan, from coffee shop Dizzy Ducks in The Hague, can’t quite believe it. “That guy just flies up the mountain, without a visible drop of sweat...” he says with a mixture of indig-

Cancellara, Contador or Mollema. On a lightweight racing bike grown men turn into competitive cockerels, which applies equally to the members of the Medical Cannabis Bike Tour. Your morale sinks like a pudding if you get passed and are unable to follow. Look, there’s that damn Frenchman Jean-Philippe again

nation and awe, just before he leaves me behind without a chance.

3rd stage: Selva del Camp – Barcelona, 128 km

tion for that matter. What the hell, the weather’s great, bring on the 130 kilometres. I’m wearing cycling shorts with three well-stocked panty liners on top of each other. You won’t hear me complain about saddle pain. At half past ten the peloton

the stones along the road it could have ended a lot worse than a swollen hand and some leg abrasions. The disappointment is apparent on Cervantes’ face. He looks like a sad little boy in his now useless cycling outfit. Hasta la vista, Jorge!

THE BRAKES OF CERVANTES’ BRAND NEW BIKE BLOCK, CAUSING THE LONG-HAIRED FEATHERWEIGHT TO ROLLOVER TWICE. rides out of Onda. The flat land is still barren from the winter. The route takes us past sprawling mandarin orchards and fields of almond trees in full bloom. The smell is intoxicating: aromatherapy on wheels. After riding nearly 70 kilometres against the strong wind, lunch comes as a relief. No hot pasta like last year, but bread and lots and lots of bananas.

While we are eating torn-off pieces of baguette, we hear some bad news: can-

2nd stage: Tortosa – Selva del Camp, 118 km Today our destination is Selva del Camp, high up in the hills. ‘Hills’ sounds childish, but it certainly isn’t for us well-meaning amateurs. What does it matter if a pile of rocks is only 800 metres high if the road to the top is 30 kilometres long? The peloton quickly crumbles, and, seen from the hilltops above, resembles yellow-black spots scattered like ants creeping up the slope.

on his expensive bike - and it’s even his spare bike! He’s an ‘amateur’, which in cycling means you ride on average 2 km per hour slower than professionals, for whom 40 km per hour against the wind is considered slow. Including races, they ride over 250 kilometres per week. No competition of course for us degenerate cannabis lovers. “Nice training ride,” I

Your muscles start to play up after two days of cycling. Groaning and with crooked legs we stumble over to the breakfast buffet. Fortunately cannabis also provides muscle pain relief. Paradise Seeds front man and tour organiser Luc warns that we are facing the acid test today: here come the mountains! Let’s first see whether we can get up from the breakfast table, then we’ll see. The first kilometres aren’t too bad. The wind doesn’t seem so sharp and the scenery, after all that pig farming, is increasingly idyllic. Finally we drive through the unspoiled nature that we saw daily during the previous edition.

Reservoirs surrounded by rustling forests, picturesque villages, a babbling stream we clamber over on a wobbly plank.

Unless of course your name is Rasta Jan or Yuri and you tear through the stream at full speed. A lost Gaudí-esque church along the way adds a psychedelic touch. ¡Viva España, pardon... Catalunya! Jeroen and I leave lunch earlier to enjoy a cup of coffee at the nearest cafe. We have barely sat down before a yellow-black peloton in close formation comes buzzing by like a swarm of wasps. Impressive! The pack flies by with the ominous hum of rubber tires and well-lubricated bicycle chains.

25 Before we can finish our cups they have disappeared behind the next roundabout.

Agony Therapy We subsequently reach the foot of our last obstacle, the Garraf Massif. Initially it doesn’t appear to be a problem, but as we get higher the more difficult the climb becomes. Time after time you think you have reached the top, but at every bend things are even higher and steeper.

Even the descent, normally a hard-won reward after a climb, is diabolical. The road seems to collapse vertically into an abyss. On the poorly paved road are the chalked names of Horner, Valverde and other illustrious pros who have gone before us. Each slope is followed by a razor-sharp hairpin for which you pretty much have to bring your bike to a halt. Daan - fortunately unscathed and undamaged - takes a fall, while Organic Earth’s Bart is just barely able to avoid a collision. Cycling is also agony therapy.

An unnoticed stone in a curve may be enough for life in a wheelchair. But above all, cycling is suffering. Your leg muscles burn, your shoulders are screaming for a massage and you just can’t figure out how to turn your butt to stop the pain for a bit. Cursing everything and everyone, you soldier on with only one goal: completing the tour.

Time for the last few kilometres! While mental coach and centipede Patrick

cackles hysterically through a megaphone from the bus, we ride in almost

AMSTERD

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military fashion through the suburbs of Barcelona. Passersby stop in surprise and shout encouragement. Cheering children run along with us. Elderly people poke each other, reading the texts

on our shirts with a smile. We merrily ring our bicycle bells, we look like a

gamelan orchestra on wheels. Darkness falls well before we reach the city limits, and it will be a nail-biting final ten kilometres, nervously navigating between the cars that emerge from all side lanes.

But then the Spannabis trade fair building finally appears in the distance. We are three days, 400 kilometres, 220 bananas, 330 muesli bars and 100,000

Euros in sponsorship money further. The Medical Cannabis Bike Tour 2014 is over.

Mission accomplished!

Thanks to all the sponsors, our caregivers and mental coaches Tim and Christopher, Doc Medique, tour comedian and bicycle whisperer Gerard, Alex and Roos, Patrick, Kees, Luc and Matej.

26

OUTDOOR 2014

THE ECO-FRIENDLY HARVEST

By Tony, from Dutch Passion

Greenhouse Growing Northern European home-grown cannabis is often dominated by the indoor self-sufficient home grower. The variable climate, especially in Northern Europe, has resulted in a rapidly growing army of indoor growers. A quick glimpse of the sponsor advertisements in this edition of Soft Secrets will show you just how large the market has

Greenhouse growing is becoming more and more popular across Europe. Every year we see lots of new growers achieve harvests beyond their wildest dreams thanks to a small number of plants grown in greenhouses and polytunnels. There are no ongoing electricity costs to worry about, nor any electrical/fire safety concerns due to an unattended indoor grow-

Frisian Dew produces strong plants with thick stems!

Greenhouse full of Frisian Dew, nearly ready for harvest!

become for the indoor cultivator. Every major European city now has thousands of home growers and many of these cities have numerous grow shops to choose from. Whats more, the number of indoor home-growers rises each and every year, a trend that has been in place since the 1980’s. But there are alternative ways, and more eco-friendly ways, to grow your own stash. After all, indoor growing consumes lots of electricity and the initial costs to buy your tent, light, carbon filter, fans etc comes at a price.

room while you are at work or on holiday.

A single, well grown cannabis plant cultivated in a greenhouse can easily deliver over a kilo of top quality dried bud, even in northern Europe.

Of course, not everyone is lucky enough to own a garden in which they can put a greenhouse. But many growers that do own a greenhouse are discovering the joy of growing a plant or two in it. And those growers that have enjoyed success with greenhouses will tell you that pot grown under the sun, in soil, often has an extra

‘kick’ of potency and flavour. Some cannabis varieties are selectively bred to be able to grow outdoors, without greenhouses, even in Northern European countries such as the UK, Holland etc. And extremely good results can be achieved with pure guerilla-grown cannabis. But anyone who has been inside a warm greenhouse when the sun is shining in early spring or late

units that can be discreetly placed in the corner of a garden or patio, all the way up to the fantasy greenhouses which could grow dozens of 4 metre tall monster plants. Greenhouses can also be made from a variety of materials, from fully transparent glass to the stoner-favourite opaque polycarbonate which ensures privacy for your crop. Polytunnels have long been a favourite continental way of providing ideal growing conditions whilst preventing anyone seeing what is growing inside. These days greenhouses can be supplied, if preferred, with lockable doors to provide an extra sense of security and stopping the kids accidentally discovering your favourite hobby.

Many greenhouse growers often tend to grow smaller numbers of plants than the indoor grower. The reason for that is simple enough, a well grown greenhouse cannabis plant can often yield more than several smaller indoor tent-grown plants. This is an important legal consideration for the greenhouse grower especially for those growing in countries where cannabis remains illeFrisian Dew, blooming in the sunshine! gal - the penalties for getting caught with 1 or 2 plants in a greenhouse are likely to be less severe than an indoor grower with 10+ plants in a tent.

Cannabis plants grown in greenhouses/polytunnels have unrestricted root growth which can promote epic plant growth. The photographs shown in this article come from a legal Belgian cannabis social club called TUP who grew 16 Dutch Passion Frisian Dew plants in a greenhouse. The Frisian Dew plants Plenty of buds on every bloom! were 4m tall and 3.5m wide, the average yield was 2Kg of dried cannabis per plant, with the heaviest one yieldautumn will tell you what a tremendous ing over 3Kg and the worst plant still difference it makes to have a thin sheet of delivering a respectable 765g. Many glass, polycarbonate or polytunnel over indoor hobby growers are happy to get the plants. It effectively extends the grow- 50-100g per plant. So the attractions ing season and enables the growers to of greenhouse/polytunnel growing are amplify the harvest quantity they can obvious enough. achieve by protecting the plants from the worst of the weather.

The best greenhouse growers will give several important tips to get the heaviPerhaps the biggest concern for green- est crops. house growers is the security of their Soil quality. A little bit of effort to crop, but even that is starting to change. improve the soil quality will pay serious Greenhouses are now available in a mas- dividends to the end result. This will sive range of sizes from small single-plant often mean hard work. The soil should be

27

The Frisian Dew plants bow down under their own weight!

Greenhouse/polytunnel growers fall into two categories - those that root the plants directly into the ground and those that grow plants in containers. Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages. Plants rooted directly into the ground can’t be moved if an emergency arises, but on the other hand they will not require daily watering in summer and can be left unattended for days/ weeks if necessary. Greenhouse plants A beautiful sight for the self sufficient grower, abundant buds! grown in containers can be moved if circumstances require it, but just like monster tomato plants they will need regular feeding and watering to survive.

Greenhouse full of Frisian Dew, beautifully grown plants! dug to aerate it. Manure, nutrients and other additives such as bat guano, wormcastings etc can be added to ensure that the roots have a plentiful supply of minerals to absorb.

Air flow. This is often the most underrated aspect of greenhouse growing.

You can have some top quality cannabis seeds, great soil and lots of sun. But if you don’t have enough fresh air flowing through the plant you will see final yields reduced. In the case of our legal TUP greenhouse, the air-flow was difficult to maintain evenly throughout the 30metre length of the greenhouse. The difference in yield was 1.5Kg between the side of the greenhouse with good airflow and the side with poorer airflow.

The rapid increase in the number of home growers really has seen a surge in the number of indoor growers. But for those growers with access to a greenhouse or polytunnel there are great opportunities to grow all the pot you need from a small number of plants and Harvest time, Frisian Dew drying! hardly any cost.

Sunlight. The more sunlight the better, cannabis plants can soak up more-or-less all the light thrown at them. If you are planning to use a greenhouse or polytunnel then try to get the best location which gives all-day exposure to light.

Heat. Even in Northern Europe greenhouse temperatures can exceed 40ºC+ during mid summer. This puts a lot of stress on the plant and will increase water requirements. Ensuring plenty of fresh air (eg through roof windows/vents) is one way to help the plants through the extreme heat.

Frisian Dew plants ready to start flowering!

The results can be spectacular, even if conditions are not optimised. Take a look at the photographs from the

Healthy looking plants soaking up the sunshine!

The start of the grow, 16 small Frisian Dew plants getting started!

Frisian Dew, rich covering of resin and beautiful colours!

TUP grow. The Frisian Dew plants grew to incredible proportions and provided kilo’s of top quality, totally organic cannabis. For the self-sufficient home grower just one good greenhouse plant could easily provide a years worth of recreational/medical cannabis. In a greenhouse the plants will often start to bloom around August time in Northern Europe and finish in September or October. The extra protection which the greenhouse gives the plants at the end of the season helps the plants cope with the onset of cool and damp conditions.

If the plants look like they will out-grow the greenhouse then several options are available. Plants can be repeatedly topped during the early stages to produce shorter and bushier plants.

Or they can be tied down to prevent the main growing tip crashing into the greenhouse roof.

Long and heavy blooms, typical of Frisian Dew

28

TRAVEL

Kashmir, aka Heaven What happened to Jesus when they took him off his cross? Did he die and go to Heaven? Or did he get saved and spirited away to Northern India on a false passport when no one was looking? Word around here is that he lived out his days as a guru in the local mountains, dying later on as

an older man in Srinigar, Kashmir. You can even visit his tomb in town, its free. No shit. Its easy to see why he might have ended up here as well; epic Himalayan landscapes and a famously vibrant climate have inspired a culture traditionally rich in highly skilled craftsmanship and most things agricultural, especially cannabis.

Which should explain why its Kashmir, aka Heaven that we’re talking about here...

Up in Heaven they’ve got two main ganja products for you when you get there, charras and gardaa. The gardaa is cheap and easy to get hold of, a couple of quid for five grams in the city. You get what you pay for though. To get to the product they dry the plants and then beat them or thrash them to knock the pollen off, usually on a plastic sheet in bare room.

The dust is then collected and sieved to arrive at the gardaa. In terms of quality most gardaa is similar to clean soap bar – low grade and not particularly tasty, but it takes the edge off things. Its like a rough third grade Moroccan. Not to be mistaken for real pollen though, because

they do produce a bit of that too, but you’ll have to find a connoisseur farmer who makes their own because commercial batches are rare.

The charras is where their craftsmanship comes into its own. Hand-rubbed from live

plants, charras is like a fine wine because it needs time to mature. When its wrapped in cotton and stored in a dry cupboard it takes about a year for all the water to evaporate, which accounts for anywhere up to twenty five per cent of the original weight. Most of the moisture in charras comes from the plant as its being rubbed, but sweat and the odd rain drop can also pollute it. Broadly speaking, there are three main grades/types of charras: jungly, regular charras and cream. Jungly comes from wild plants so it can be great, or awful. It could have grown in the shade by the side of a busy road, or on the sun-drenched side of a forgotten about mountain. It could be anything. Regular charras comes from sown fields and is rubbed in a way that pulls the maximum amount of resin glands from the plant, so the odd bit of leaf or strand of fibre inevitably makes it into the mix. The cream is obviously the best. This is created by rubbing the best plants very gently just two or three times between the hands so only the ripest trichomes are separated. It can take a professional a whole day to rub just six or seven grams of

The Professor

cream, against forty or fifty grams of regular charras in the same time period. This is why you should always ask for one year old charras, cream if possible, and when you get it you’ll find out what all the fuss is about! Kashmiri cream really does take you to that place, its empowering, inspirational, creative, Zen-like, social, addictively smiley and better than anything we found in a far longer and more fruitful time in the Parvati Valley. Its certainly up there with the best Morocco and Lebanon have to offer.

You have to be careful though. Old, dried up yellow ganja leaves are often rolled into a charras mix, doing this means the person rubbing can rub up to one hundred and twenty grams a day, around three times as much as normal. Seed oil is also another popular pollutant, this will make the charras look smooth and shiney and it’ll bubble like a witches cauldron when you put a flame to it but you can spot it easily because, despite its high oil content, the lump just won’t be very sticky.

Both of these two common pollutants are at least from the cannabis plant, but that isn’t always the case. The black-smoke spewing trucks and buses that trundle up and down the roads in their hundreds means that roadside jungly can be up to eighty per cent dust and carbon monoxide. Its not pretty but the local hustlers

are getting forty quid a tolla (ten grams) from dumb tourists for this stuff. Another popular trick is to wrap a thin layer of good charras around a ball of rubbish, as you can see in the big ball in the photo with the jewels. Hair gel, sun screen and mud also make it into some unscrupulous mixes. The usual advice applies; don’t buy anything in the street from someone you just met and check everything thoroughly before you buy.

Talking of scams, that’s something else Kashmiri’s are known for. Plenty of people come here looking to make a bit of money out of the local fine goods, but be warned: ‘I paid for a backgammon board with builtin charras to be sent home but the bloody thing never arrived and customs didn’t contact me so I know I got shafted.’

‘How much does hashish cost in your country? Wow! You could make a lot of money!

It is very easy for us to send it back to your country from here, we can build it into tables or boxes, but its not worth doing for less than three kilos. How much money do you have spare? If you only have a thousand pounds you could pay me the rest when it arrives in your country, that is no problem, I like you, I feel I could trust you with my life! It takes about three weeks to make the tables, I have a very good friend...’

Don’t believe a word of it. Keep your dollar in pocket and enjoy your holiday cos if you haven’t got family connections and good back-up around here you’re going

29 to get fleeced if you start talking kilos, simple as that.

Up in the mountains, away from the towns, people are a little more chilled and genuine. This is where we found our one year old cream, but, alas, no plantations.

We asked a couple of tour guides who knew the mountains inside out: ‘I don’t know of any fields in the mountains anymore, years ago it used to grow everywhere but now we never see any and we walk all over the mountains – the only places we don’t go are controlled by the military. I don’t mind because I don’t smoke it but the horses and sheep love to eat it, if they find a nice wild ganja plant you won’t be able to move them until they’ve eaten the whole thing!’

The famous growing spots of the region are easy enough to find with a bit of detective work, Srinigar is close to most of them, but when we did the rounds every farmer in every little village and impoverished rural

community we found gave us the same story: ‘The military came and cut all our plants down.’ And they weren’t bullshitting either. Bare fields with thin haircuts of cut stalk were everywhere during what should have been the last week or so before the start of harvest. These small-time country folk were nervous too. At first sight of our car most of them melted away into the background, some a lot faster than others, but they were friendly enough when they realised we weren’t cops or soldiers: ‘The military always cut our plants down now. Ten years ago all of this valley was full of ganja, the best ganja in the world, but now you have to walk many days in the mountains to find the big fields, and the army control everywhere.’

We made do with puffing on a bit of fresh jungly while we chatted. Almost every ditch, roadside, river bank and forgotten about bit of land in the immediate area was riddled with wild, inbred bush weed. In a lot of Kashmiri towns it really does grow everywhere, it is the dominant plant of the land. But, thanks to the ongoing border dispute between India and Pakistan, Kashmir is littered with thousands of offensively visible soldiers who’s roadblocks police the drug movement between towns by default, as a result of their looking out for potential terrorists. One can only wonder what the soldiers make of it all. To get to most of the farms they raid they have to

drive for several kilometres along roads flanked with wild ganja, and it doesn’t matter if they’re on duty in the middle of a city highway or on a quiet country road, its quite likely they’re going to be standing within spitting distance of a cannabis plant, even if it is just a runty three inch tall male growing out of a crack in the concrete.

As sure as skunk stinks, a lot of hash is still being produced in Kashmir and once you’ve been here a while its hard not to get the impression that the military are in total control of the trade, just as they’re in control of nearly everything else here.

you die – it is an absolutely stunning place to visit, and the vast majority of people you meet will be some the friendliest and most hospitable people you’re ever likely to come across. You won’t find many men here who don’t smoke hash either, and nearly all the ones that don’t used to so unless they’re in uniform they’re perfectly amenable to the subject: ‘It can be used as a medicine? Really? You should get me some good seeds – I’ll grow it in my garden!’ And this was from a non-smoking, middle-aged family man. Trekking in the Himalayas here is epic as well, there’s nothing quite like chuffing a fat bif of one year old cream at four thousand six hundred metres after you’ve climbed up to the bottom of a glacier! When you get into town all the military check points just serve to add a little bit of excitement to what can otherwise be long and uncomfortable journeys, and then there’s something very satisfying about clocking a cocky hustler who’s trying to scam you and then telling him you’d rather smoke a piece of goat shit than the ball of dust and exhaust fumes he’s just put in your hand. Come and enjoy the intensity, learn their tricks and absorb the atmosphere.

The food’s great, and you’ll never be short of a trippy carpet to mash out on while you’re flying through inner space either.

Boom Shanka.

But don’t let talk of war, soldiers and stitchups put you off going to Heaven before

The Professor can be found at: worldwarweed.com

Maybe they know more than us. ‘The army cut our plants down... The army control everywhere... I don’t know of any fields in the mountains anymore... and the only places we don’t go are controlled by the military...’

30

GROW WITH THE BARON

Low Gear vegetative growing – a tactical slow down Most of the time we strive to grow our plants as fast as genetics will allow. Faster growth from the start means more growth sites and fuller plants with less chance for pathogens and bugs to creep in,

By Baron Wasteland. leading to the biggest yield in the fastest time.

A lot of people start their seedlings in a small vegetative area then grow them until the desired size is reached and the plants can be transplanted into a larger flowering/fruiting area. But what if you need a break from your schedule? How do you stop your vegetative seedlings running amok, outgrowing their kindergarten stage too quickly?

feeding Veg Nutrients to an established plant at 1.6 EC, PH 5.5. I would suggest dropping the EC down to about 1.2 or 1.3. This will slow the fast pace of growth, but if you slow the plant’s

growth considerably, but don’t worry it won’t actually hurt your plants. They can take it!

The third biggie is light! Of course it is important to stick to your current light/ dark timing schedule (usually 18 hours of light, 6 of dark for vegetative growth), but do reduce the available light intensity as this will also help slow growth.

If you reduced the light without also lowering the temperature and feed EC

the veg on hold for a few weeks without any long lasting damage to your plants.

Another good idea to halt growth is to pinch out the growing tips. The plant will take a couple of days to catch up and force growth out laterally. You probably do this already in combination with other techniques to encourage full, bushy plants, but it can also be used to put vertical growth on hold for a little while.

Make sure you keep an eye on your

Occasionally life throws a curveball that affects your grow schedule – moving house, illness, accident, holiday, leaky flower room that needs fixing, equipment failure… there are lots of reasons why you may need your plants to temporarily slow down to accommodate your needs for a change.

A friend of mine grows on a very small scale. He has limited space so grows his seedlings in a small cupboard before transplanting into his main garden.

Just as his plants were ready to be transplanted and triggered to flowering he had a car accident, which meant he would be unable to tend his much larger flowering plants for a few weeks – limited mobility meant he couldn’t clean and set up the hydroponic system and didn’t have anyone he was able to ask for help. The seedlings were now pretty large, and ready to outgrow their vegetative area in a major way.

What should he do? How could he put the vegetative plants in low gear while he recovered?

Firstly it’s important to get your plants Photo courtesy of Dinafem healthy. Methodically go through each one removing any dead or sickly looking leaves. Check the roots, if there is metabolism down in other ways too any Pythium (“Root Rot”) remove these then you won’t get a deficiency. Stop brown bits too. Hopefully you won’t need feeding any high Nitrogen boosters or to do either of these treatments, but if growth hormones too. Stick to just the you must then give them a little dose of basics of your full-spectrum balanced a gentle vitamin stress buster afterwards feed with no growth additives – the to help them recover e.g. “Super Thrive”, additives work best when everything “Revive” etc. If you have the facilities else is optimised, so for our current situavailable then a good spray of Ozonated ation of slow growth, additives would water can really help disinfect the leaves be equivalent to putting a turbo on a car and roots of your babies too (See Ozone with bald tyres.

Article in previous issue).

The second big adjustment is to lower You now have to go against a few of your the temperature. Most popular hydromost rigid rules, so prepare to change ponic plants grow fastest in temperatactics – we don’t actually want fast tures of around 70-80 F in the day, dropgrowth for a change! Not until we are ping by preferably no more than 10 F lower at night. Because we are looking ready for it to speed up again anyway. to slow the metabolism and limit fast Firstly cut the Nutrient EC of your feed. growth, we can drop the temperature Of course each plant is different, but just down to about 60 F during the day, and for example let’s say you are currently a little cooler at night. This will slow

at the same time then your plants would stretch considerably. This is why it is important to do all these steps concurrently. It is still important to spread the light out evenly over your plants, as you don’t want any in shade, but you are looking to reduce the overall lumens reaching them by around half.

Depending on what setup you have, you may be able to switch off some lights, or alternatively you could always raise the lights up higher above the canopy, thus achieving the same reduction in available lumens. Don’t raise the lights too far though as light intensity and distance follows an inverse square law – so when the distance from light to plant is doubled, the plants receive only a quarter of the available light intensity.

These three steps will slow plant growth considerably and will allow you to put

plants during this time. Don’t neglect the roots and watch out for pests. Longer in veg means longer for problems to develop, so keep up basic grow room hygiene and maintenance as much as possible.

My friend who had the car crash put his veg plants on hold for over 7 weeks using these techniques! There were no complications, deficiencies or stretching and his plants are healthy growing at their usual fast rate again now.

Once you are ready to get the plants back into full speed growth regime, it is as simple as going back to your usual routine – bring the light intensity up, raise the heat and raise the nutrient EC back to normal over the course of a few days, then start introducing your chosen boosters again.

Your plants will adapt and you will be back on to your usual schedule!

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33

OPINION

Death by Cannabis

Dr John Dee

Most readers will be familiar with the old cannabis death gag (or one of its variants)? It usually goes something like this: “Did you hear about the stoner who was killed by cannabis? A ton of it fell on top of him.”

Ha ha.

Yes, for many years it has been assumed that there is no particular risk from cannabis (if one ignores the fact that in the UK there is still a tendency to mix weed with tobacco, a “herb” which most certainly does have a number of risks attached).

Where deaths do occur, cannabis is usually involved as opposed to responsible; walking in front of a car because you’re stoned and not paying attention, for example. The car is what kills you but if you hadn’t smoked that joint before leaving the house you’d probably not have stepped in front of it in the first place.

Thus cannabis becomes a contributing factor. One could say the same about IPods contributing to death through inattention.

It came as something of a surprise, therefore, to read at the end of January headlines such as “Tragic proof that cannabis can kill”.

The story relates to Gemma Moss, a 31 year old who was found dead in her bedroom in October last year. She had smoked weed for a number of years then quit for two years before starting again. A post mortem examination seems to have found nothing out of the ordinary, other than “moderate to high” levels of THC in her blood. The death has apparently been registered as “cannabis toxicity” and the coroner has recorded a verdict of “death by cannabis abuse”.

As it happens, the story of the unfortunate Ms Moss pretty much coincided with another one in Time magazine (27/2/14) where it was reported that a study in Germany claims to have found two cases of death by cannabis (something about “fatal cardiovascular complications”) of men aged 23 and 28. Nothing out of the ordinary was found in the post mortem examination of the 28 year old, but the younger man had some sort of “serious” underlying heart problem. Both of the deceased had cannabis in their systems.

Something here smells a bit funny, and it’s not just the weed. In all three of the above cases, the heart just appears to have stopped beating.

Cannabis is pretty much universally recognised as being as low in toxicity as it’s possible to find in a psychoactive substance. It’s thought that a cannabis user would need to consume between 20,000 and 40,000 times the amount in a joint in order to have a fatal overdose. And this, clearly, is not possible.

What about an allergy to weed? I’m not joking here. It does happen, albeit rarely.

However as allergic reactions are pretty much immediately clear and obvious, and given all of the deceased were experienced users, this can probably be discounted.

In which case, what could it be? The medical people are doing what they always do: no definite reason for death, but all of them had cannabis in their systems;

therefore cannabis must be connected somehow, right? Well, maybe. It must be at least worth considering that the fiddling with the cannabis plant that’s gone on – particularly in the past couple of decades – has produced something that we’re just not aware of as yet.

On the other hand – and perhaps more realistically - if one looks at the medical literature, there are a number of references to Sudden Adult Death Syndrome, Sudden Unexpected Death Syndrome and so forth, most of which seem to be related to a problem with the heart (in fact, causes are split into two groups: cardiac and everything else). While cannabis probably can’t be completely discounted in the above cases, neither can it be “blamed”.

The bottom line is that millions of people worldwide enjoy cannabis with little or no detrimental effect. These isolated and tragic deaths just seem to be “told you so” scare stories.

Some sources: http://metro.co.uk/2014/01/30/the-tragic-proof-that-cannabis-can-kill-motherdies-from-poisoning-after-smoking-drug-4284553/ http://time.com/#10372/marijuana-deaths-german-study/ http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/01/30/cannabis-death-inquest-verdictgemma-moss-dismissed-campaign-group_n_4695702.html

34

BACKGROUND

Cannabis Tech! to-use interface allows you to ask the Nerds questions via text message. The service is completely free to use and is operated by a friendly group of experienced growers.

We got in touch with a few friends stateside and asked them to give the service a go, the feedback was great! They tested the Nerds on a variety of subjects from ventilation to nutrient management and the responses were detailed and came back within a few minutes. The fact that the service is completely free makes it an absolute winner, the app is financed via banner advertising which is non-intrusive and doesn’t spoil the experience at all.

The downside? It only works in the U.S…. for now.

Got a grow question? Text the Hydro Nerds Home growers have always been a tech savvy bunch of people; embracing new technology to improve all aspects of their grow. Whether it’s the latest greenhouse lighting trickery, automated environmental controllers or nutrient nanotechnology, we’re pretty open to trying something new that’ll make life easier and – hopefully – improve our yields.

The love of technology doesn’t start and end with grow room hardware. Any company in the industry worth their salt has a social media presence where they connect directly with their customers and, with smart phones now being the norm, many have developed apps to improve the user experience even further.

It’s no surprise that some of the most interesting apps have been developed overthe-pond in that hotbed of growing and technology; California.

Hydro Nerds is a text based service that provides you with a direct line to professional growers in California 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The premise is simple, you download the app to your smart phone and the easy-

Weed Farmer is a cool app-based game that enables users to hone their growing skills in their own virtual nursery, from seed germination to vegging plants, flowering and harvesting, you control all aspects of cultivation. Choose the right lighting, ventilation, growing media and watering schedules to grow the ultimate crop.

Think of it as a modern day Tamagotchi for growers!

24 hours of game time passes in 30 minutes of real time. So it takes a couple of hours to germinate your seeds, half a day to get through the veg period and a couple of days to flower your plants. Just like in real life, you have to keep a close eye on your plants to ensure they don’t succumb to nutrient deficiencies, disease or pest outbreaks. We really enjoyed the competitive element to the game, as you start off as a one-light grower and work your way up to big warehouses!

So, you’ve got your room dialled in and nutrient programme all lined up, courtesy of the Hydro Nerds, and have completed your test grow on Weed Farmer. But what strain are you going to grow?

Well at the start of the year U.S based Leafly (leafly.com) introduced a new

mobile app that enables users to access all of Leafly’s website features through an interface designed specifically for iOS and Android devices.

Download Leafly to your smart phone and you have a comprehensive strain database at your fingertips. It allows users to filter strain searches by multiple attributes at once, including effects, medical uses, flavour profiles and more – helping medical cannabis patients zero in on the perfect strain for their condition, or the cannabis connoisseur explore new strains to experience.

Leafly’s website and mobile app have been described as the “Yelp of cannabis” (that’s the Yellow Pages to our UK readers). Through Leafly, users have access to more than 57,000 reviews of over 650 strains of cannabis, as well as 36,000 reviews of cannabis dispensaries in the U.S. and Canada, Israel, The Netherlands, Spain and Belgium. Leafly’s website and app generates an enormous 2.3 million visits every month.

Angry Birds and Fruit Ninja! On top of that base, we’ve built a new app that is a huge step forward, both in design and functionality – I can’t wait to hear what our users have to say about it.”

In 2011 – just one year after its launch – Leafly was acquired by Privateer Holdings, the first private equity fund focused on investments in the legal cannabis industry.

The scene is BIG business in the States!

“Leafly is where the cannabis industry is headed,” said Brendan Kennedy, CEO of Privateer Holdings. “Fifty-eight percent of Americans are in favour of full cannabis legalisation and eight out of ten are in favour of legalised medical cannabis.

Cannabis is going mainstream and the future is less about pot leaves and Cheech and Chong and more about companies like Leafly that provide quality, professional service to a variety of customers.”

Speaking to Leafly founder, Cy Scott, he explained to Soft Secrets the motivation behind producing the app, “the new app is all about making Leafly easier to use and enabling users to take advantage of Leafly’s functionality. We’ve put a lot of thought into how to distil the full website experience into a mobile format and are proud of the result. Leafly’s website is a remarkable tool, but the way the new app puts cannabis information at people’s fingertips is unmatched.”

As well as the strain database, the app also gives users access to Leafly’s “Learn” section that includes news and culture content as well as a knowledge centre that helps educate new cannabis consumers through FAQs, how-to guides, and terminology glossaries. This is ideal for growers of all experience levels; from the newbie who is unsure of what strain to start with, right through to the experienced gardener hunting for something a little obscure to grow.

“Leafly is already a leading mobile resource for cannabis consumers,” explained Scott.

“Our previous app had a 4.5-star App Store rating. That’s better than Facebook, Twitter,

Leafly offers you a comprehensive strain database at your fingers

The Hydro Nerds app and Leafly’s mobile app is available for free download through Apple’s App Store and Google Play. Weed Farmer costs a few quid, but is a great way to waste a bit of time and is surprisingly realistic.

Happy browsing!

NEW

NEW

25€

22€

3

CRITICAL+ 2.0

AUTOFLOWERING

NEW

20€

3

CRITICAL CHEESE AUTOFLOWERING

25€

BLUE CHEESE

AUTOFLOWERING

22€

3

22€

3

WHITE WIDOW AUTOFLOWERING

23€

3

19€

3

3

CHEESE

WHITE CHEESE

NEW

NEW

AUTOFLOWERING

25€

3

AUTOFLOWERING

27€

3

25€

3

3

AUTOFLOWERING

MOBY DICK

ORIGINAL AMNESIA AUTOFLOWERING

AUTOFLOWERING

AUTOFLOWERING

CRIRICAL+

DINACHEM

DINAMEX

NEW

NEW

NEW

NEW

NEW

NEW

21€ 3

KUSH’N’CHEESE

26€ 3

ORIGINAL AMNESIA

21€ 3

DEEP CHEESE

28€ 3

CRITICAL+

HAZE 2.0

18€

3

20€

24€

3

BLUE CHEESE

3

BLUE THAI

33€ MOBY DICK

3

CHEESE

25€

3

3

OG KUSH

ORIGINAL STRAWBERRY COUGH

21€

3

25€

23€ 3

CRITICAL JACK

25€ 3

WHITE WIDOW

37

CLASSIC STRAINS Stable, Varied Phenotypes

Northern Lights Northern Lights is a cornerstone of modern Cannabis history that has been awarded accolades and cups too numerous to mention, across Sativa Diva nearly four decades.

Strain Name: Atomic Northern Lights Canadian Creator: Dr Atomic Genetics: 35% sativa / 65% indica Origins: Afghani x Thai Haze Flowering: 50 - 65 days Outdoor Harvest: Mid-October Strain Name: Northern Lights Dutch Creator: Sensi Seed Bank Genetics: 10% sativa / 90% indica Origins: Northern Lights #5 x Northern Lights #2 Flowering: 45 - 50 days Outdoor Harvest: Mid- to late September Some strains are simply famous; Northern Lights, however, is legendary. If you smoke Cannabis, there is a very high probability that you have tried either Northern Lights or one of its sister varieties, as the NL is one of the most eponymous Cannabis strains to have ever existed. Unlike most varieties, the Northern Lights can be credited to more than one label’s genetics and hard work, linked to several continents and prevailing across nearly four decades – exhibiting a longevity that few strains will ever accomplish.

Northern Lights from Sensi Seeds

to their new home in the Netherlands, where the Seed Bank created the Dutch version of Northern Lights (nowadays sold by Sensi Seed Bank). The heady indica was being grown in Dutch greenhouses along with fellow trailblazers Skunk #1, Early Pearl, Holland’s Hope and Original Haze.

Dr Atomic, the Canadian seed label, represents the old-school source of the North American lineage for Northern Lights.

Genetic Origin Generally attributable as originating in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States, the Northern Lights has a long history featuring multiple protagonists. Some credit Washington state as its birthplace, Thin, dark green leaves and silver-frosted although the genetics are reputed to have buds are typical of Northern Lights come from California as early as the 1970s. [Credit: User Dan/WikiMedia Commons] Afghan seeds and Thai genetics were crossed during the 1980s in an attempt to create and stabilise a strain that could After obtaining Dutch NL genetics and withstand the short, wet, gloomy outdoor returning to cross them with some of their growing cycles in that area. distant relations from the early days, Dr Atomic ensured genetic diversity for NL From that early batch of stabilised fans in North America. Growers were then plants, several of the new indica pow- able to choose from plenty of different erhouses that had been developed in versions of the Northern Lights genetics the United States were then transported on two continents.

While the NL is hailed as an indica for indica lovers, it is also quite easy to grow and finishes flowering in around eight weeks (as little as six in hydro). This strain presents itself with compact, dense buds often separated by a few centimetres of stalk, making trimming a breeze. While the buds are tight and thick, they are not so impenetrable that bud rot is a major problem, making it a nice indica to grow in even humid conditions. The foliage on most Northern Lights varieties is typically dark green, evidence of its vigorous lineage, but the palmate structures are not as wide as other indicas on the market. The buds are coated with a silvery-white frosting of trichomes and the yield is excellent.

A compact, tight plant, Northern Lights phenos can be singular in cola structure but the more typical appearance is the traditional evergreen tree shape – a dense, compact central stalk surrounded by four or five lateral branches – indicative of the NL #2. The original basis for Sensi’s cross, the NL #1, presented more of a tall, leggy plant, displaying the weed-on-astick visual aspect when fully flowering.

Mild in flavour yet potent and fast-flowering, NL #5 featured at the Cannabis Castle during its peak breeding years. The Seed Bank’s NL was perhaps the bushiest sister, offering a high-yielding, resinous crop that imparted a strong effect and juniper or pine scent and flavour.

Related Strains The various hybrids that feature Northern Lights are too numerous to name, considering how stable and far-reaching the NL genetics have been over the decades.

Scarcity also poses a problem, due to dwindling genetic libraries that still contain original cuts. For example, since the NL #5 – a wonderful example of hybrid vigour that combined a female NL x Thai (75/25) with a pure NL father – was only ever available in clone form, it is very unusual at present to find these genetics publicly on offer.

A beautiful relation known as NL #5 x Haze made the rounds in the more professional grower scene throughout the Netherlands, especially in Amsterdam, but only luck or knowing the right person would have

allowed access to it as a cutting. The deep relaxation of pure NL genes blended with a heady haze touch, offering a powerful effect that tasted of pine and spice and smelled like truly old-school Cannabis.

Black Domina and Hash Plant are two varieties offered by the Sensi Seed Bank that maintain the original NL aesthetic, albeit hybrids. The Blueberry x Northern Lights from Dr Atomic is a real Canadian legend, which offers a slightly headier effect than the original, combined with a sweet, earthy flavour and scent.

True classics containing NL genetics include the Flying Dutchmen’s Aurora B, which combines the original Northern Lights with an Afghan father, pumping up the indica stock and ensuring a high yield, authentic indica taste and aroma plus a range of true NL phenos. Fans of pioneer

Aurora B. from the Flying Dutchmen is a NL hybrid with a high yield and potent effect

genetics may remember the Mangolian Indica from Sagarmatha Seeds, a hardhitting and stupefying combination of Northern Lights, Skunk #1 and Afghan with a sweet, citrusy-mango flavour. Of course, it would not be fair to leave out the Chronic from Serious Seeds, which was the darling of the 1990s indica scene and many smokers’ first introduction to Northern Lights genetics – that is, those who were too young to smoke pot during the original NL wave.

Finally, anyone looking to experience the confusing effect of true indicas crossed with haze plants should try the Super Silver Haze (Green House Seed Company), which heavily features both families of Cannabis in a resinous, relatively easy-togrow hybrid that permanently impacted modern Cannabis history.

38

GENETIC BACKGROUND

Just how did auto’s get so good?

It’s a question that people keep asking. Just how did automatic cannabis varieties get so good over the last 5 years? After all, the first generation of automatics were limited to small harvests of half an ounce, or less. And the strength of the first generation automatics was adequate rather than exceptional. But all that has changed.

Today the best seedbanks have really cracked the breeding methods which allow them to produce very heavy yielding auto’s, and potency levels are now indistinguishable from traditional varieties. So how Tony, Dutch Passion did all this happen so quickly?

There are a few reasons for the performance surge in feminized automatics (often called ‘AutoFems’ or simply ‘autos’). But it is also worth saying that any home-grower looking to grow automatics should do their homework before splashing the cash on the seeds. Just like traditional ‘photoperiod’ varieties, some seedbanks offer better quality/consist-

which signal the approach of Autumn.

The start of flowering is a sign that the cannabis plant is aiming to complete its lifecycle before winter arrives. The indoor grower artificially mimics the natural life cycle by using his HPS (or LED) light for just 12 hours in each 24 hour cycle. The traditional photoperiod cannabis plant responds to shorter daylight hours by

WE DON’T EXPECT TO SEE AUTO’S COMPLETELY REPLACE TRADITIONAL VARIETIES, NOR DO WE THINK ANYONE WANTS TO SEE THAT ency than others, some seedbanks really know what they are doing whilst others are still learning. The better seedbanks are able to deliver seeds that have yield potential of 250g+ per plant, with THC levels in the same range as traditional varieties. They best seedbanks use the strongest parent genetics available, and they understand the intricacies and fine points of the breeding process.

starting to flower, producing the sticky buds that all home-growers dream of. To many of us in the breeding community, it always seemed a shame that a flowering cannabis plant couldn’t be forced to bloom under longer daylight hours.

Just when a flowering photoperiod plant really needs all the energy it can get to produce cannabis, we have to hold it back to just 12 hours of light per day.

AutoFem’s are bred to allow them to bloom under 20 hours (or even 24) of daily light. With a traditional photoperiod variety the cannabis genetics will grow vegetively under long hours of daylight and will only bloom when light is reduced to 12 hours per day. This is logical, the cannabis plant has evolved to start blooming when it senses the onset of shorter days

Then, a few years ago, some of the most talented breeders found that they could adjust the genetic foundation of the cannabis plant to allow it to do something which many said was impossible.

They were able to use genetics from the Ruderalis cannabis family to allow cannabis to bloom heavily even if the plant was grown under 20 hours of daily light.

At first many said this was impossible, but history tells us that rules are there to be broken, and cannabis growers are breaking rules all the time. Perhaps that is one of the reasons why so many selfsufficient home-growers have taken a shine to auto’s.

But how did auto’s manage to evolve so quickly? It took just 5 years or so for auto’s to go from being the ‘new kid on the block’ to being a firmly established part of the home grown scene. Even the biggest fans of auto’s did not expect such a rapid rise to fame. In Dutch Passion we see our customers are buying almost as many auto seeds as traditional seeds. And other established seedbanks are seeing

the same trend as auto’s become more and more popular.

There are a few key reasons why auto’s evolved so quickly t 4PNF PG UIF CFTU DBOOBCJT CSFFEFST quickly embraced auto’s to see for themselves what they could do. In any industry, if you can get the most talented and intelligent people involved in a new technology you will very quickly see one of two things. The technology will either sink or swim. In the case of auto’s, the attention of the best cannabis breeders has allowed auto’s to evolve at a rapid pace. t 5IF AQIPUP HFOF IBT TIPXO JU DBO CF manipulated to give a massive advantage to the home grower. Being able

39 ers were able to introduce some of the best connoisseur cannabis parent genetics into the gene pool being used to breed auto’s. The result was a dream combination of the best breeders, with the best genetics, working with high levels of interest and motivation to push auto’s further and faster than anyone thought possible. to bloom cannabis under 20 (or 24) hours of light offers a dramatic increase in the photosynthetic potential for the yields of the average home grower.

Today, many of the most informed auto-experts feel that auto’s can now routinely out-yield a traditional variety in the same time period due to one key fact: auto’s have almost twice as much light energy available during flowering, this equates to bigger yields. t 5IF DIBMMFOHF .BOZ PG VT SFTQPOE XFMM to a challenge, whether it is a sporting challenge, an intellectual challenge or a personal challenge. To the best breeders and seedbanks it is always a challenge to be able to improve the odds in favour of the home grower. In the 1990’s it was Dutch Passion that first created feminized cannabis seeds when others said it was impossible.

Today we are watching auto’s become a mainstream choice for home growers. t 5IF HFOFUJDT "T UIF GJOF QPJOUT PG breeding automatic varieties became better understood, the best breed-

But there are other benefits to automatics as well. The average home grower tends to grow small numbers of cannabis plants, typically around 10-20 plants per year for their own use. Medical growers may grow a few more plants especially if they are producing edibles, oils or concentrates. Home growers tend to be cautious; they like to

grow discreetly using the smallest, simplest set-up and the minimum number of plants.

The average home grower does not like to maintain separate grow tents for ‘veg’ and ‘bloom’, and with auto’s they don’t need to.

Many home growers now have the light regime in their tent on a fixed daily system of 20 hours lights-on, followed by 4 hours lights-off. With automatics this will allow the tent to be used by auto seedlings as well as mature auto’s approaching harvest time. You can start new seeds whenever you wish and simply put them in the growroom with the other auto’s regardless of the fact that they are all at different stages of growth. Auto’s typically take 11 weeks or so from seed to harvest, they allow the home grower to use a single room on a fixed light cycle for all their plants. The longer ‘lights-on’ period is also useful for home growers to keep their grow-room warm during cooler months.

So where do auto’s go from here? The short answer is watch this space. More work continues on auto’s, a lot of what can be achieved (in terms of yields and potency) has already been achieved. But there are still a few exciting new ideas in the pipeline which could become reality in the next 1-2 years. With the right breeding we will see more and more CBD-rich auto’s appear. We also expect to see continued improvements in quality and yield, although it is generally just a small fraction of the home-growers

that can really push the auto genetics to their full potential.

We don’t expect to see auto’s completely replace traditional varieties, nor do we think anyone wants to see that. But some seedbanks, including Dutch Passion, are seeing the best automatics become more popular than many established traditional varieties. Perhaps the market for seeds will reach an equilibrium where auto and traditional varieties co-exist in roughly equal parts. In the meantime the best advice we can give to anyone wanting to grow auto’s themselves is this: find a seedbank you trust with a good reputation for automatics and try them for yourself. You really will be surprised at how simple, convenient and devastatingly powerful the best of the modern auto’s have become.

41

JORGE CERVANTES

Garden Rooms Garden rooms require a secure space, consistent environment, and a regular maintenance schedule. They also increase carbon footprint.

Climate, consistency, and security are the best reasons to garden indoors. Medical cannabis can also be started in a garden room and moved into a greenhouse or outdoors. Plants get an early start with minimal environmental impact when moved outdoors.

Air 20% temperature humidity CO2 and O2 content Light 20% spectrum (color) intensity photoperiod (hours of light per day)

To set up a garden room, you must first assess needs and desires. How much medicinal cannabis do you want to grow? How much time, space, and money are you able to invest to achieve this goal? Do you want to build the garden room, or do you prefer to purchase a prefabricated “grow closet?” Building a garden room takes time, skill, and a budget. The room will also need adequate electrical power, an air ventilation outlet, and a source of clean water.

Water 20% temperature pH (a measure of acidity or alkalinity) EC (electrical conductivity) O2 content Nutrients 20% composition purity Growing Medium 20% air content moisture content

This barrel full of water illustrates that cannabis will grow only as fast as its most limiting factor. Light, air, and imbalanced soil are most often the factors that limit growth indoors.

Growing an indoor garden like this from start to finish requires an investment of time, money, planning, and hard work.

Your personality traits and habits are also important to consider. Do you have a regular schedule? Do you have enough time to dedicate to this project? Do you start projects and tend to not finish them? Are you away from home several days at a time? All of these factors figure into your ability to maintain an indoor medical cannabis garden.

You will have to make your own clones if a source of clones is not readily available. You will have to divide the room in two to form a clone/mother room and a flowering room.

The harvest can be periodic or perpetual.

Carbon Footprint

The size of the garden space dictates the type, wattage, and number of lamps. The most efficient lights with the highest lumens-per-watt conversion include CFLs (compact fluorescent lamps) and HIDs (high intensity discharge lamps). CFLs are available in various lengths and wattages.

According to a study by Evan Mills, PhD*, indoor cannabis gardeners use 1 percent of all electricity in the USA, shelling out $5 billion dollars to electric utility companies every year. This is the equivalent use of 2 million average households. Approximately 22 billion kilowatt hours are consumed. California, one of 16 states to allow cultivation of medical cannabis, is estimated to consume 3 percent of all electricity in the state.

Gasoline and diesel electric generators use about 140 gallons (530 L) of fuel to produce one plant.

The goal of the garden room is to supply everything that medical cannabis needs to grow well.

*Read the summary and full report, Energy up in Smoke: the Carbon Footprint of Indoor Cannabis Production, at http://evan-mills.com/energy-associates/Indoor.html.

Once divided, the rooms need vent fans and filters, circulation fans, hygrometers/thermometers, and sources of water and electricity.

42 room was tightly sealed, limited oxygen was available and the fire went out. After the fire, the gardener moved the source of the fire—ballasts—out of the room. Do not count on fires putting themselves out in sealed rooms, however. This gardener got lucky!

This sealed room is set up and ready for the gardener to bring in clones and start growing.

The entire room is spotless and free of pathogens.

The room must be sealed completely so that no air enters or exits. Caulk all corners and put weatherstripping around doors. Some gardeners install a vent fan to create a very small amount of negative pressure.

An air conditioner is essential to supply fresh filtered air.

A sophisticated air filter can be installed to scrub ethylene, nitrous oxides, and other contaminants such as fungi from the air in the room and precisely control fresh air exchange.

Even efficient indoor rooms like this one create a carbon footprint. Fortunately, these plants will be moved outdoors in the coming weeks.

Gardeners cultivate medical cannabis indoors to produce high-quality crops and keep their high-value produce from thieves. Keeping cannabis illegal increases the carbon footprint of gardeners. Criminalizing cannabis contributes to long driving distances, odor and noise suppression, and off-grid fossil fuel power production.

A 20-pound CO2 tank lasts two weeks in a sealed room with ten 1,000-watt lamps. The room must be equipped with a big air conditioner to adequately dehumidify and cool the air. The grower must figure out how many watts the air conditioner uses, and how much it will cool the room.

Recommended Btu Requirements for A/C in Sealed Rooms Cumulative Watts

Reduce your carbon footprint by reducing your use of electricity, gas, and diesel fuel.

Promote renewable energy generation. Use indoor grow room heating, cooling, and lighting systems more efficiently. Install photovoltaic (PV) solar panels.

A/C Btu’s Moderate Temp

A/C Btu’s Low Temp

More efficient growing practices lower carbon footprints, as does using lowerwattage lamps and fewer electrical and fossil fuel–using devices. Employing all the natural principles possible will help lower carbon footprints. Human caloric energy is much less expensive than fossil fuel energy, and we can make more human energy quickly, but fossil fuel energy takes a very long time to recreate. Growing medical cannabis outdoors eliminates most costs other than for a few tools, transport, water, soil amendments, and fertilizer.

1

1.000

600

4.000

2.400

3.300

2.000

2

2.000

1.200

8.000

4.800

6.600

4.000

3

3.000

1.800

12.000

7.200

9.900

6.000

4

4.000

2.400

16.000

9.600

13.200

8.000

Mix your own fertilizers from simple, readily available elements. When you purchase local ingredients and mix your own organic fertilizers, you are supporting local industry and farmers. You are also lowering your overall carbon footprint by decreasing transport, packaging, and sales costs.

5

5.000

3.000

20.000

12.000

16.500

10.000

10

10.000

6.000

40.000

24.000

33.000

20.000

Use online tools to qualify your carbon footprint. Enter information on electricity, gas and diesel fuel usage and vehicle fuel consumption, and renewable energy generation to measure your total carbon footprint. Take a couple of minutes to fill out the Nature Conservancy’s carbon footprint calculator (www.nature.org/greenliving/carboncalculator/index.htm) to get an idea of the environmental waste you produce.

Fuel Type

Btu’s per Unit of Fuel

Shelled corn

6,300 Btu’s per pound

Propane

91,500 Btu’s per gallon

Natural gas

100,000 Btu’s per therm

Kerosene

127,000 Btu’s per gallon

Electricity

3,413 Btu’s per kilowatt hour

Closed (Sealed) Rooms Closed or sealed garden rooms have most all of the qualities found in a phytotron, a scientific growth chamber, and they create a very big carbon footprint. Just like a phytotron, precise control of each factor—light, temperature, humidity, CO2, and so forth—can be individually controlled in a closed room. The room is sealed completely so all air that enters and exits is controlled.

Targeted specifically at the hightech gardener, sealed rooms are for gardeners with advanced skills.

This enclosed room has its ballasts outside so the entire room can be sealed off. In fact, a fire started in this room several months before this photograph was taken. Since the

GrowBots (www.growbot.com) are able to perform robotic control including remote iPhone video monitoring. A fully equipped 12-light grow room costs $80,000 USD and has a big carbon footprint. The initial out-of-pocket cost is more than $6,500 per installed 1,000-watt lamp. It will take two perfect and heavy harvests to cover the initial cost—not including genetics, growing supplies, and electricity. Turnkey convenience is expensive in both money and carbon footprint. A small single-light homemade semisealed garden room costs about $1,000 USD to set up and performs nearly the same level of control. ========================== This is the first of six excerpts from Jorge Cervantes ´new book, the Cannabis Encyclopedia: Indoor, Outdoor and Greenhouse Cultivation, Concentrates and Cooking Medical Marijuana, 279 x 216 mm (8,5 x 11-inch) format, 608 color pages, 2.100 color images, with 340,000 words. Publication date: September 2014. Find more information including the complete Table of Contents and more excerpts on Jorge´s site, www.marijuanagrowing.com. ==========================

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45

INTERVIEW “THE GENETIC DIVERSITY OF CANNABIS HAS BEEN SEVERELY DIMINISHED”

Robert C. Clarke Recently published Cannabis: Evolution and Ethnobotany is a fascinating book about the origins and development of cannabis and the long, complex relationship between humans and the plant. Soft Secrets spoke extensively with one of the authors, Robert C. Clarke, who is widely regarded as one of the greatest experts in the world of cannabis.

Text: Derrick Bergman, Photography: Robert C. Clarke & Derrick Bergman Clarke has been conducting research on cannabis since the early seventies and previously wrote Marijuana Botany (1981) and HASHISH! (1998), the “Bible” of the history of hashish. He has lived in Amsterdam since the late eighties, where

hashish or develop their own cannabis varieties, his work is essential.

“The vast majority of all cannabis

Soft Secrets: When and how did you in the world is Cannabis Indica, not first make contact with cannabis?

Cannabis Sativa” Clarke: “I studied at the University of California at Santa Cruz and arrived there in 1971 as a freshman. During my very work. The plant would probably be betfirst evening there I smoked cannabis at ter off if we did not interfere with it. Our an introductory party in my dorm. Since co-evolutionary relationship, which has that night, cannabis has never left my lasted for thousands of years, has proved life. Eventually, though I was mainly inter- beneficial for both parties; cannabis has

spread worldwide for a wide variety of purposes and has paved the way for our historical dramas. At the end of the twentieth century the plant was threatened by eradication programmes, human greed and modern advances due to the destruction and displacement of local fiber, seed and drug varieties, including the traditional cultures that cultivated the plant. More recently, Westerners with the best intentions brought “enhanced” hybrids back to the producing countries, resulting in genetic pollution and the expelling of the local varieties that still existed there. The genetic diversity of cannabis has by now been severely diminished. My concern is that the current measures to suppress cannabis will destroy a large extent of its potential before we can exploit its strengths. The main goal that Mark Merlin and I had when writing Cannabis: Evolution and Ethnobotany was to educate people who lack the knowledge to make enlightened decisions about the future of the relationship between humans and the cannabis plant.”

CANNABIS: EVOLUTION AND ETHNOBOTANY IS A BROAD, INTERDISCIPLINARY EXPLORATION OF THE NATURAL ORIGIN AND EARLY EVOLUTION OF THIS FAMOUS PLANT, WITH EMPHASIS ON ITS HISTORICAL ROLE IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF HUMAN SOCIETIES. ested in cannabis, the need to graduate forced me to write my dissertation, The Botany and Ecology of Cannabis, which I self-published in 1976.”

he works as a project manager at the International Hemp Association. Clarke is a friendly sixtysomething, who is considered by insiders to be one of the greatest authorities in the field of cannabis. Do not expect to find simple instructions on how to quickly grow superweed in his books, but thorough botanical and historical research. Clarke’s books are heavy and expensive, but are cherished by people who are serious about the plant. For those wanting to manufacture quality

You rarely give interviews and have the reputation of being a recluse to some. Rightly?

“No, not really. I’m just very busy researching and publishing about cannabis. In my free time I like to travel to remote places to fish. So I can sometimes be tricky to find, but I do love company.”

Author Doug Fine often says that he “works for the plant”; do you feel the same?

“I do not feel that cannabis needs our

Cannabis Seeds vary greatly in colour and size, the large seeds come from China and are used as food

46 hemp competitive with other natural and especially synthetic fibers. In Eurasia, hemp is mainly cultivated on small farms.

The fibers are hand processed on a cottage industry level, which hemp is ideally suited to.”

Throughout history, horses played an important role at distributing humans and cannabis throughout Eurasia. This horse is eating wild cannabis in the Altai mountain range in eastern Central-Asia.

Can you tell us something about the Cultivator’s Choice seed bank? Who were the founders and what was their relationship with Sacred Seeds?

“David Watson founded both Sacred Seeds and Cultivator’s Choice in California, in the late seventies. Sacred Seeds specialised in improved and stabilised, traditional (“open-pollinated”) cannabis varieties. Cultivator’s Choice offered superior hybrids, based on the improved Sacred Seeds varieties. Watson’s varieties, including “Skunk 1”, “Afghani 1” and “Original Haze” were brought to the Netherlands in the early eighties and formed the foundation of the Dutch seed industry. They were the foundation of the majority of modern Western drug varieties of cannabis. Cultivator’s Choice was one of the original seed banks in the Netherlands and still exists. During the first years of the Dutch seed banks I wrote the chapter, What’s in a name? in the first Cannabible by Jason King.”

When and why did you move to Amsterdam? How did the Dutch cannabis world look back then?

“I moved to Amsterdam in the late eighties to work with David Watson and HortaPharm, the medicinal cannabinoid research and development company.

The first time I was in Amsterdam, it surprised me that everybody smoked cannabis mixed with tobacco. A benign herb mixed with addictive and toxic tobacco? Think about it! The only wide-

only really began to improve when seeds of high quality hybrids from North America were brought here and seedless (sinsemilla) cannabis was produced with modern Dutch greenhouse cultivation techniques, which was the origin of the Skunk Revolution.”

What are the three most common misconceptions about cannabis?

“Number one: marijuana and hashish are a stepping stone to the use of hard drugs.

Even though this claim is based on false logic and there is no statistical evidence, this fairy tale still lives on as the main argument against the legalisation of cannabis, even for medical use. Second misunderstanding: cannabis drugs are a panacea, a wonder drug. Although cannabis drugs have proved to effectively combat the symptoms of many diseases, they do not work for everything or for every patient. And there is actually no hard clinical evidence that cannabis can in fact cure a disease. Exaggerating the benefits of medicinal cannabis can impede progress. Wild claims are just as ridiculous as the claim that cannabis use leads to the use of hard drugs.

Let’s talk about your new book. Do you regard it as your life’s work?

“My co-author Mark D. Merlin is a professor of botany at the University of Hawaii and has written several books about drugs. In addition to doing extensive field research, I had a job during most of the seventeen years that we needed for this book. The term life work is therefore not entirely accurate, but the book definitely kept us occupied for a significant part of our lives! The relationship between humans and cannabis is thousands of years old and has affected almost all cultures and countries in the world, so the amount of information available is immense. Going through all that information was a huge task; we quote more than 700 scientific articles and books.

Cannabis: Evolution and Ethnobotany is a broad, interdisciplinary exploration of the natural origin and early evolution of this famous plant, with emphasis on its historical role in the development of human

Cultivation of hemp in the Chinese prov-

Misunderstanding number three: hemp ince of Shandong, the plants are harvestcan save the world! Another harmful ed before the flowering phase begins. exaggeration. No single plant, not even one as old and valuable and multipurpose as cannabis, can save the world. societies. The cannabis plant has long This overstatement stems from the idea been prized for its strong and durable that cannabis is a weed, which can there- fibers, oil-rich, nutritious seeds and psy-

fore be grown anywhere and under poor conditions. Cannabis can indeed survive in many extreme conditions, but fiber and seed varieties require well drained and regularly irrigated fields. Agricultural land is scarce worldwide, so hemp must always compete directly with food crops.

Hemp also needs a lot of water and lack of water is one of our most pressing environmental issues. In addition, the processing of hemp fiber is labourintensive and the industry does not have modern technology available to make

The new, 452-page and one and a half kilo large-format book by Robert Clarke and David Merlin can safely be considered a treasure chest for the true cannabis connoisseur. Cannabis: Evolution and Ethnobotany is beautifully published by the University of California Press, beautifully illustrated and full of knowledge and new insights. Lester Grinspoon calls it “one of the best, if not the best book about the extraordinary plant Cannabis Sativa that I have ever read.” Grinspoon: “It is encyclopaedic in its scope, carefully documented and well written. A must for libraries, cannabis researchers and a growing group of readers who are interested in this remarkable plant.”

Cannabis: Evolution and Ethnobotany Robert C. Clarke and Mark D. Merlin University of California Press ISBN 978-0-520-27048-0 approx. €79.99

DUTCH WEED BEGAN TO IMPROVE WHEN SEEDS OF HIGH QUALITY HYBRIDS FROM NORTH AMERICA WERE BROUGHT HERE AND SINSEMILLA CANNABIS WAS PRODUCED WITH MODERN DUTCH GREENHOUSE CULTIVATION TECHNIQUES, WHICH WAS THE ORIGIN OF THE SKUNK REVOLUTION. ly available high quality cannabis was imported hashish from many different countries. There were only a few types of imported weed available. Seeds from that imported weed and from bird feed were widely sown in and around Amsterdam, and hundreds of beautiful plants flourished on balconies and in pots. But not all of them were mature before the onset of frost in the fall.

Nederwiet ( Homegrown Dutch weed - ed.) was no more than a picturesque novelty of very low quality. Dutch weed

One and a half kilos of cannabis knowledge

choactive and medicinal substances from its female flowers. The culturally valuable and often indispensable products that can be made from cannabis have profoundly influenced the commercial, medical, ritual and religious practices of human cultures.

The desire for those products drove the evolution of the plant in the direction of the current varieties. Interest in cannabis is growing, as is the public debate on its many applications. This book can help us to understand why the human race continues to believe in this plant and

continues to adapt it to meet its needs. It has 464 large-format pages and is richly illustrated with photographs, plans, drawings and tables. The text is structured as a reference work, so that anyone interested can quickly find information about a particular aspect of the relationship between humans and cannabis.”

In the book you conclude that the genetic diversity of cannabis is decreasing. What can we do to combat this?

“The fact that so much genetic diversity has been destroyed is due to a combination of greedy commercialisation and government repression. The use of cuttings even further limits the diversity. Sinsemilla (seedless) growers work with cuttings and plants but rarely seeds, only if there are no cuttings or if they are searching for a new variety. Sexual reproduction and genetic recombination both strengthen and maintain genetic diversity. To maintain seed variety and particularly to improve it you need to grow a large number of plants in a favourable environment and apply both natural and human selection.

You use seeds of the healthiest and most suitable plants to produce the next generation. This cycle must be repeated in order to keep a variety healthy and pure.

48 If you cut a cutting of a plant and produce no seeds, genetically speaking you create a dead end street. Feminised and female seeds are in fact cuttings in the form of seeds. Male plants do not grow from feminised seeds, so there is no chance of sexual reproduction, and you’re back in a dead end. To preserve what is left of the genetic diversity of

A woman harvesting cannabis in western Nepal. Here the plant is cultivated both for its fiber and for its flowers and grows wild in many places. cannabis, we can do three things. First: plant and produce seeds. As a result, more genes will survive in plant populations, which stimulates diversity. Two: Collect the remaining traditional varieties, multiply, select and cross them to preserve the genetic integrity of each variety. Stabilised seeds are the basic building blocks necessary to create hybrid varieties. And three: stop sending “improved” Western varieties to traditional producer countries. We have already lost the most traditional varieties and we must do our best to save what’s left.”

field. But what they forget too quickly is that every year more than 800,000 Americans are arrested for cannabis, which is once every 48 seconds! Also, many of the cannabis pioneers who preceded them are currently in jail. Our main mission would be to change the system in such a way that nobody goes to jail anymore for personal use or personal cultivation of cannabis. Internationally, it is definitely a positive sign that Uruguay has legalised cannabis and that other countries are beginning to cast away the dogma imposed upon them for decades by the US and Europe. They are developing their own reforms that suit their local circumstances.”

“All cannabis is cannabis indica” was once the title of an interview with you.

What did you mean by that?

“Traditionally, botanists categorise plants based on similarities in their physical structure. In the past twenty years we have begun using additional chemical characteristics of plants, from their DNA structure to their production of secondary substances such as cannabinoids (THC, CBD, etc.) and essential oil components such as terpenes. Until fairly recently, we considered the diversity of the cannabis variety as follows: cannabis sativa was considered the most diverse and widespread variety, with fiber, seed and drug varieties throughout Eurasia, from Europe to Japan. The drug varieties from Mexico, Jamaica, Colombia, Africa, India, Nepal and Thailand are now usually called “Sativa”. Only the traditional sieve hashish varieties from Afghanistan and Pakistan were considered Cannabis

How do you think the cannabis world will look in five years?

Clarke: “I’d like to think that in five years time cannabis will be legal at the federal level for all applications. With all demonstrable progress in the area of the law on state level that might be possible, but I doubt it. There are still some major obstacles on the path to legalisation.

The federal government will not give up without a hard fight, which could A girl from the Hmong tribe weaves with well drag on for a long time. Financial hemp and sells hemp seeds at a local institutions, the agribusiness and other large producers and marketing compa- market in Sapa, northwest Vietnam nies will all fight against the legalisation of cannabis until the moment they see an opportunity to benefit from it. But their Indica, and were mostly named Indicas. joint opposition will be difficult to sup- Most modern cannabis varieties are press. What we need is the normalisation considered as hybrids between “Sativas” of cannabis: legalisation with regulation and “Indicas”. But to quote the Firesign similar to alcohol and tobacco, to devel- Theatre> “Everything we knew was op a certification system of production wrong”! If we try to understand the evoand sales. lution of cannabis, the historical distribution and the ways in which the plant was Somewhat surprisingly, a portion of the used in the past, it is valuable to use a fiercest resistance to normalisation in more modern classification system. In California comes from cannabis grow- “Cannabis: Evolution and Ethnobotany” ers, most of whom only started in recent we use a system that is largely based years. The obstinate, conceited and often on the pioneering work of Karl Hillig of selfish defenders of the right to cultivate Indiana University. We see the cannabis cannabis complain that if cannabis is variety and its evolution in a new light legal, large companies will enter their now, with another subdivision,

Cannabis Sativa represents only cultivated European fiber and seed varieties and its descendants, such as North American wild “ditch weed” (sativa substrain) and wild European and Central Asian descendants (Spontanea substrain).

The distribution and genetic diversity of Cannabis Sativa are relatively limited compared to that of Cannabis Indica and Cannabis Sativa does not include drugs varieties. We use the term “narrow leaf hemp” (or NLH) to indicate Sativa substrains for fiber and seed varieties.

To indicate wild populations, Spontanea substrains, we use the term broad leaf hemp (or BLH).

Cannabis Indica is grown for fiber, seeds and drug production and is divided into four substrains. The Indica substrain originates from South and Southeast Asia and was later introduced in the Middle East, Africa and the New World, particularly for drug production. We use the term “narrow leaf drug” (or NLD) to indicate substrains of Cannabis Indica drugs varieties. The Afghanica substrain originates from the Hindu Kush mountain region of Afghanistan and was traditionally used for the production of sieved hashish. We use the term “broad leaf drug” (or BLD) to further subdivide the Afghanica substrain. The Chinensis substrain originates from China, Korea and Japan and was introduced later in Eastern Europe. The term “broad leaf hemp” (or BLH) indicates the Chinensis hemp varieties within the Cannabis Indica substrains. The fourth substrain is Kafiristanica and represents the wild and possibly wild ancestral populations of Cannabis Indica. We use the term “narrow leaf drug ancestor” (or NLDA) to further subdivide the Kafiristanica.

The distribution of Cannabis Indica is much broader and its genetic diversity is much more complex than that of Cannabis Sativa. And more importantly: all Cannabis Indica substrains have the genetic potential to produce psychoactive THC. In summary, you can draw a few conclusions about the global classification of cannabis. The vast majority of all cannabis in the world is indeed Cannabis Indica, not Cannabis Sativa. People do not smoke Sativa for its narcotic effects, only Indica varieties. Therefore, there are no

“Sativa” drug varieties or “Indica x Sativa” drug hybrids. All drug varieties belong to the Cannabis Indica strain. Both Sativa and Indica produce fiber for textiles and nutritious seeds. The European hemp production is based on Cannabis Sativa, the Chinese on Cannabis Indica.”

What are your favourite cannabis and hashish varieties?

Clarke: “It really depends on the situation. “Set” and “setting” are very important. When it’s time for creativity and getting things done, then varieties with

Wild cannabis in Nepal, of the NLD type (Narrow Leaf Drug)

a narrow leaf drug (NLD) background are suitable; most consumers experience a stimulating effect, both mentally and physically. Varieties with a strong broad leaf drug (BLD) background usually have more of a calming effect and are suitable for evening entertainment, followed by a good night’s sleep. I usually avoid BLD varieties and tend to prefer NLD phenotypes. I opt for hybrid varieties with characteristics like sweet aromas, complex flavours, strength and stimulating effects. These properties come from the traditional, mainly NLD hybrids like “Skunk No. 1”, “Original Haze” and “Sage”, which in turn descend from complex hybrids of national varieties from Colombia, Mexico, India and Thailand.

Obviously these NLD varieties are excellent basic material to make dry or water extraction hash with. Enjoy!!”

Robert C. Clarke with Ben Dronkers (r.) and Doug Fine (l.) at the presentation of his new book at the Cannabis College in Amsterdam, November 27, 2013

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51

BACKGROUND VAPING: THE NEXT “GREAT LEAP FORWARD”?

THE REVOLUTION HAS BEGUN! The Way Things Were...

Back in the very early Noughties, I was in Amsterdam for a number of days for reasons that escape me now. One rainy afternoon, I wandered into an establishment for a “comfort break”, to find a cluster of people grouped around a rather large and cumbersome piece of equipment that appeared to be designed as a new way of ingesting cannabis. Everyone seemed rather excited about this, and so – in the name of scientific enquiry, of course – I felt obliged to participate in the goings-on.

If memory serves, I had to provide my own weed and also had to pay a nominal sum for the experience. Anyhow, I did so, and the “supervisor” took both and placed the weed on a little platform like thing which in turn had a rather complicated blowtorch gizmo situated beneath it. The torch, cables, platform and the rest were all firmly attached to a round base.

All of this was then covered with a sort of big bell jar usually found in laboratories, but with the bottom modified so that the thing could be screwed tightly into the base. There were a number of tubes emanating from the top of the jar, and I was instructed to take one of these, wait until the jar chamber had completely filled with “white” smoke (very important, that bit), and then to inhale as much of it as I could.

With that, the blow torch thing was fired up, and after what seemed like an interminable amount of farting about with dials and knobs, the supervisor explained that the flame didn’t actually touch the grass, but that the heat released the THC vapour (which was why the “smoke” – even though it wasn’t actually smoke at all – was white).

So I followed all of the instructions and I have to tell you, readers, I can’t say I was

that impressed. Everyone else seemed to be getting the desired effect, but – hand on heart – I just didn’t get it at all.

Neither of my companions was particularly taken with it either, as it seemed like a terribly complicated way of getting not much of anything.

Demonstration over, the sales pitch commenced; this was, the supervisor assured us, the next big thing. No smoke would of course mean diminished health risks, even though (he hastened to add) there was no explicitly proven risk from cannabis smoke in the first place.

Yes, this was my first introduction to the vaporiser, and to cut to the chase, he was prepared to do a once only deal of something like £800 for one of our very own. He seemed quite put out when we demurred.

To be honest, £800 for something that wasn’t exactly discreet (let’s face it: you couldn’t exactly take it anywhere unnoticed), seemed to require a degree in physics and/or electronics to get it to actually work (and even then there was a bit of a question mark hanging about), and worst of all, didn’t appear to actually work wasn’t one of those “snap the salesman’s hand off” moments.

The Way Things Became...

Jump forward a year or two, and miniature versions of this thing began to appear in head shops around the UK. They could set you back anything from £40 to £80. We tested two of them at the time with the same result: a pretty poor hit for a lot of hassle. And this time there were the added minuses (so to speak) of burnt tasting weed and a big potential fire risk. No thank you.

At around the same time, however, glossy dope magazines were advertising rather snazzy, all electronic, switch it on and away you go vaporisers for the medical mari-

juana crowd. Here too though, there were drawbacks, namely, while they were smaller than the Dutch model, they looked like something you’d find as part of a life support machine (all beeps and flashing LED lights), they nearly all had to be imported from the US, and they had a still pretty hefty £500 - £600 price tag attached.

That said, I read - with a lot of interest some reports in the scientific literature that were appearing around the time.

There certainly appeared to be a lot to be said for these gizmos as far as the health side of things went. Unfortunately, while the American models seemed light years ahead of the things we’d test driven, they just couldn’t make the damned things portable and discreet enough to be used anywhere other than one’s own house.

The Way Things Are Now...

Jump forward to 2012, and wouldn’t you just know it? Big vaporising technology is finally made small, and it comes from a rather unsurprising source: not the tobacco industry, exactly, but the tobacco industry must have some connection with the E-CIGARETTE phenomenon.

Personally, I regarded these initially as something of a fad. Then I tried one (note: not the things sold in supermarket, but a proper rechargeable, adjustable strength, all singing and all dancing one) and I haven’t touched a cigarette in a number of months now.

Quite aside from feeling generally better, not having a cough and all that sort of thing, I’m also saving quite a lot of money, don’t stink like an ashtray all the time, and don’t feel like so much of a social pariah (though there are some residual subjective image issues around looking like a bit of a dick).

Once I had converted to the electronic cigarette, I had the obvious thought as to

By Dr. Dee

whether it could be used for other inhalation purposes. And it seems that it can, though it seems that while the hardware technology is coming on in leaps and bounds, the “peripherals” technology (as in what you actually put in it) is lagging a little.

Basically, yes, it seems one can use certain types and brands of E Cigarette “pens” to vape weed. However, there appears to be some controversy surrounding the matter. Ideally, what should be used in E pens is cannabis oil, but – at the present time at least – this is rather difficult to get a hold of in any sort of quantity. The obvious answer then would seem to be to make your own oil, but this can be a rather tricky and fiddly way of doing that requires a bit of scientific know how, and in the UK oil carries a stiffer penalty than regular weed or resin, so there’s that to consider also.

But if you think about it, if there’s any truth in the belief that “the market” responds to demand, then it’s only going to be a matter of time before we see a lot more oil making an appearance, assuming enough people are prepared to turn on to the whole vaping thing.

Better still would be for some whizz kid genius to come up with a way of producing oil from one’s own weed supply that didn’t involve the potential risk of burning one’s house down.

Here’s the thing. Here in Scotland (AKA “The Sick Man of Europe”), dope of any sort is nearly always smoked in joints mixed with tobacco. This, of course, is a bad thing, but comes as a result of three things in my view. Firstly, there’s an economic imperative at work: short of growing one’s own, good weed is just so expensive that “bulking it out” with tobacco seems the only viable option for many people (this particu-

52 larly applies to younger people with less deposable income to play with, as well as your more “habitual toker”).

The second reason is that the dope and tobacco in a joint thing is just how it’s always been done; a tradition, if you like. Thirdly, it also gives tobacco users their nicotine hit and allows “ex tobacco smokers” to carry on living in denial. Note: for those readers unacquainted with the mores of Bonnie Scotland, a large number of people still smoke tobacco.

VIVE LA REVOLUTION! With caveats...

Amazingly, there has been very little proper scientific carried out regarding the medical and social effects of vaping. Significantly, though, ASH (Action on Smoking and Health) has given vaping the tentative thumbs up: “E-cigarettes, which deliver nicotine without the harmful toxins found in tobacco smoke, are likely to be a safer alternative to smoking. In addition, e-cigarettes reduce second-hand smoke exposure in places where smoking is allowed since they do not produce smoke.”

To my mind, if vaping delivers everything it promises, then for recalcitrant tobacco smokers, a wholesale switch, encouraged and underwritten by the government, should be a public health priority.

It’s worth taking another look at the benefits of Vaping just to remind ourselves of them. There are two main ones: No smoke, no tar, so (arguably) no cancer.

No smoke, so (arguably) no passive smoking, so no passive health risks.

Plus there are a whole range of tangential benefits, such as decreasing the risk of house fires, reductions in toxins going into the air and so forth. No more holes burned in clothes from cigarettes or joints. No more hot rock holes in t-shirts.

Now think about it for a minute. This could be huge, particularly in terms of the way we consume intoxicants. Let’s start with tobacco, one of the most harmful ones. There’s no real risk from nicotine per se; it’s the tars and the smoke that cause nearly all of the harm. Therefore, if everyone who smokes tobacco switches to Vaping, then...what? The term “addiction” is loaded with negative baggage.

Addictions are bad. They’re harmful. But what if one’s addiction to nicotine is satisfied, and the user gets to hold something that looks like a cigarette, even to the extent that what’s being inhaled gives a “burn” and vapour that looks like smoke is exhaled, but without all the attendant problems of harm to self and harm to others? This is why nicotine patches, gum and all the rest of it fall absolutely flat: they just don’t fill that whole experience of smoking need. Where does all

of this leave the addiction “specialists” other than whinging about any sort of addiction being bad and that we really shouldn’t be slaves to nicotine? Bullshit.

A lot of health zealots will no doubt be apoplectic at the idea, but there has to be a distinction drawn between good and bad addictions. Let’s not get into the linguistic and semantic arguments here, but in essence, “bad” ones are, well, bad, and have a tendency to be costly in terms of personal and social harms without giving anything “good” or positive back (step forward, tobacco!). “Good” addictions, conversely, are habits that other individuals or groups may not approve of, but don’t really rate as far as harm is concerned, and may actually have some explicit or implicit

benefits (again, more research is really required around this).

It’s fair enough to condemn those anti social individuals who blow smoke – dope and/or tobacco – everywhere, but where is the problem exactly with what looks to be an almost harmful vapour? They’re even scented to make them smell nice.

The Futurist in me thinks that what we’re on the threshold of is a social shift on a par with the introduction of “home grow” lights and hydroponics set ups in the 1990’s, hybridisation of weed and all the rest of it; and that’s big news. It’s time to grasp the nettle and seize the day, people. Avanti!

ASH: http://www.ash.org.uk/files/ documents/ASH_715.pdf

Mapito has in recent years become more and more popular. This oil-based foam product was produced for the furniture industry, where it is used as stuffing for sofas and armchairs. The trimmings left over from the production process are chopped into flakes and the product goes by the name of Mapito. These flakes are a popular medium among growers because they weigh very little and can give up good yields. All in all, it makes a great substrate for growing on.

Growkits and = 0DJLF 7UXIÁHV 0DJLF 7UXIÁHV

NEW A FORMUL IGHER MUCH HLD YIE

Ask your local growshop

THE ONLINE CANNABIS ENCYCLOPEDIA

54

SHOP REVIEW / INDEX OF ADS / COLOFON

Chills & Thrills in “Magic Amsterdam” * Specialized staff members demonstrate how the different models work in a special corner, where customers can also try the products out. * The shop also carries the unique handmade glass bongs by Akatsuki Glassmovement in Japan.

In 1996, Chills & Thrills opened its doors on Nieuwendijk 17, Amsterdam, as one of the first smartshops. In this historic area of the city centre, just two minutes from the Central Station, the former owner had managed to make a good name for himself in the field of smart products, seeds and equipment.

In 2009, Truffle Brothers, who used to supply mushrooms and truffles, purchased the shop, adding it to the Procare Group.

Nowadays, following a complete metaNPSQIPTJT $IJMMT 5ISJMMT IBT CFDPNF a concept both in the Netherlands and abroad. Most visitors are impressed by the vast assortment offered and the staff’s expertise in smart products.

"U $IJMMT 5ISJMMT ZPV MM GJOE UIF MBSHFTU possible assortment of smart products, Magic Truffles and grow kits for mushrooms. $IJMMT 5ISJMMT PGGFST BO FYUSBPSEJOBSZ variety of high-end vaporizers and smoking accessories for recreational and medical use, for vaporizing weed, hashish, oil, wax and other concentrates.

$IJMMT 5ISJMMT JT MPDBUFE PO /JFVXFOEJKL 17, an excellent location in the heart of Amsterdam’s city centre just two minutes from the Central Station. Dutch and foreign visitors regard Nieuwendijk as one of the most varied, interesting and welcoming streets in Amsterdam.

On Nieuwendijk, tourists can find adventurous restaurant options such as coffee shops, but also a variety of design and high-fashion clothing shops. Young tourists will never have the time to be bored IFSF 0G DPVSTF UIF NVMUJMJOHVBM $IJMMT Thrills staff members are always ready to give visitors all the necessary information PO BOZ QSPEVDU $IJMMT 5ISJMMT XFMDPNFT everyone to the shop, encouraging people to visit in order to raise the level of i.BHJD "NTUFSEBNw T 5ISJMMT $IJMMT BMM together. You can become part of the ambience by consulting the assortment available on our website in eight (!) languages: www.chillsandthrills.com Chills & Thrills is the official dealer for: G-spot Herborizer Magic Truffles Magic Seeds Magic Bubble Bags Chills & Thrills Nieuwendijk 17 1012 LZ Amsterdam 0031-(0)20-6380015 Open every day from 10:00 www.chillsandthrills.com

Index of ads Name

Colofon Page

00 Seeds Bank 14 8 Ball Hydroponics 1 Advanced Seeds 36 Amsterdam Seed Center 49 Atami 56 Big Stone River Indoor Garden Centre 53 Bio Nova 12 Bright Green UK 53 Brit Crops 25 Buddha Seeds 31 CBD Seeds 8 Clever Green 1 Dinafem Seeds 35 Down to Earth Kent 29 Dr. Blooms Hydroponics 1 Dr. Underground 39 Dutch Passion 13 Dutch Passion 22-23 Easy-Grow Wholesale 47 Gowd 19 Gro-Rite Supplies 51 Hesi 2 Humboldt Seed Organization 32 Hydro 2 Grow 26 Indica Sativa Trade 50 Jorge Cervantes 40 Kera Seeds 1 Kroon de 53 Money Tree Hydroponics 33 Mycologics 53 Near Dark 53 Nirvana 10 NPK Technology 53 Paradise Seeds 1 Paradise Seeds 16-17 Plagron 4 Procare 53 Red Eye Headshop 34 Roberts Direct 38 RootCrusher 49 Royal Queen Seeds 50 Smoketower.com 47 Smokin Vinyl 53 Southern Hydro Centre 53 Stanford Hydroponics 1 Sweet Seeds 43 Sweet Seeds 55 TnB Naturals 7 Triple Time 49 UK GroWorks 44 UK Skunkworks 44 Wellingborough Hydro 45

Soft Secrets is published by Discover Publisher BV P.O.Box 362, 5460 AJ, Veghel, Netherlands Telephone: +31-(0)73-5498112 Fax: +31-(0)73-5479732 E-mail: info@softsecrets.nl Editor: Cliff Cremer Contributors: Little Lebowski, Ed Rosenthal, Jorge Cervantes, Dr. John Dee, Grubbycup, the Professor, Kali Mist, Buddy Kush, Sativa Diva, Golgi Apparatus, Ganjah Selecta, Tony and others Comics: Jim Stewart Editorial adress: E-mail: ssuk@softsecrets.nl Advertisements: E-mail: info@softsecrets.nl A word from the publisher: The UK government has embarked on a process of relative liberalisation towards the use of cannabis, and cannabis activists are engaged in broadening this engagement.

Several local councils and police chiefs now actively support a Dutch-style coffeeshop system as a way of separating soft and hard drugs, as it has proven to do in Holland.

Whether they are finding their way to new coffeeshops or growing for their personal supply, cannabis users are a menace to no one, and are causing no discernable social problem. Some politicians and commentators are calling for the outright legalisation of marihuana. Let’s wait and see how the debate develops during a period of relative peace between all sides of the argument.

In the meantime, the publisher hopes Soft Secrets will show the public a positive side to the normalisation of cannabis use, and is anxious to offer a forum to both pro- and anti-legalisation advocates. This assumes that the publisher does not necessarily agree with everything that appears in articles and advertisements. The publisher therefore distances himself explicitly from published statements or images that might give the impression that an endorsement is being made for the use or production of cannabis.

Nothing from this publication may be copied or reproduced in any format without prior permission from the publisher and other copyright holders. The publisher is not responsible for the content and/or point of view of advertisements. The editors take no responsibility for unsolicited submissions.

The publisher has endeavored to reach all copyright holders of photo and/or video material.

Those who still believe they are entitled to these rights are entitled to contact the publisher.

Next issue out: June 27 2014

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C/ Dr. Nicasio Benlloch nº36-38 · 46015 · Valencia · España · +34 963 890 403 / +34 628 593 887 · WHOLESALERS: +34 963 473 730 / +34 963 404 289 · Fax +34 961 939 618 · info@sweetseeds.es Sale prohibited to people under 18 years old. Seed for coleccionist use exclusively. It´s ilegal to make them germinate. They´re not for agriculture purposes. Consult laws about cannabis aplied in your place of residence.

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