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Trying to corner the market on legal marijuana

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Re: Trying to corner the market on legal marijuana

#61

Post by sethrin »

code_duck wrote: post #58
sethrin wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, growing cannabis isn't quite like growing tomatoes. Growing tomatoes is something that a tomato plant does more or less of its own accord. Cannabis really wants to be 15 feet tall and to produce lots of little seeds. Getting it to exclusively produce flowers requires a bit more effort. The 15 feet tall thing may also require some adjustment. What I'd like to do is to create something about refrigerator-sized whic…

Outdoor varieties do grow that tall, or more. Indicas and modern hybrids tend more towards about 5 feet, but it all depends on training, pruning, whether you use clones (every serious grower uses clones, not flowering a single plant grown from seed). The seeds in your crop only happen if you have male plants, or a problem with hermaphrodites. Most people cull the males or use female clones. If you have a female plant…

What you say is accurate, but I feel like it sort of highlights the difference between cannabis and tomatoes. Cannabis is not difficult to grow; even a modest amount of care and attention can produce good sinsemilla. Tomatoes just seem to set a pretty low bar for effort, I think.

> but herbal varieties have been bred like heck for decades to be easier to grow and productive especially grown indoors.

This is probably what I would consider to be one of the key differences. Because of prohibition, there was a great deal of what we might almost call scientific research into maximizing yields. A tomato is pretty much a tomato any way you slice it, but the hemp growing on the roadside and the product of the expert grower are hardly recognizable as being from the same plant. I don't think humans have quite the same relationship with very many other crops.

I think the main appeal of an automated grow cabinet would be that it's relatively difficult to keep temp/humidity/CO2 at ideal levels without a fair amount of investment in HVAC. Monitoring TDS and pH is almost too easy not to do, and being able to adjust those automatically is probably trickier than it sounds, but tractable. Setting up truly ideal conditions for cannabis cultivation requires a lot of planning, and dedicated space. But as you say, this isn't very different from the home/small batch brewing scene, and there should be a similar market for equipment.

Re: Trying to corner the market on legal marijuana

#62

Post by drewmol »

seattle_spring wrote: post #37
rangibaby wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even the easiest homebrewing requires more knowledge and skill than dumping some seeds in your garden, which is literally all you need to do to get an acceptable crop of weed

Acceptable certainly is relative. If you just "dumped some seeds in your garden", you would get seedy, low-grade crap weed, regardless of what strain you planted. Good weed requires proper attention and care.

In my experience, as long as you select the right seeds/strain (feminized seeds are readily available) and harvest in time, you won't have "low grade crap weed"(obviously that description is subjective) but a very marketable product. Yeild is more difficult to optimize for.

Since other people are comparing rudimentary horticulture to consumable alcohol production for some reason, making market grade alcohol is not nearly as simple. Aside from maybe some parts of West Virginia, basement hooch is not in high demand.

Re: Trying to corner the market on legal marijuana

#63

Post by spraak »

sethrin wrote: post #56
code_duck wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Currently, the black market can provide cannabis in colorado, california or oregon for about half the price of the legal market (and generally, if you wanted half a lb to stock up for personal use, you can't just go buy it at a store anyway). Part of the lower price is due to competition from legal sources, part due to not paying taxes. Personally, I would rather grow it at home exactly like tomatoes, if it's herb. M…

Ah, growing cannabis isn't quite like growing tomatoes. Growing tomatoes is something that a tomato plant does more or less of its own accord. Cannabis really wants to be 15 feet tall and to produce lots of little seeds. Getting it to exclusively produce flowers requires a bit more effort. The 15 feet tall thing may also require some adjustment. What I'd like to do is to create something about refrigerator-sized whic…

I think you missed the analogy. Firstly, it isn't about the amount of work required, because growing good tomatoes requires work as well. Yes, a tomato seed will produce tomatoes on its own, but so will cannabis produce flowers. But in both cases the product might not be as satisfactory as you'd like. You may lose some tomatoes to bugs, and they may not be very big. Same with cannabis, it may be seeded out if there are males around.

Secondly, I think the analogy was more about the enthusiasm a home gardener has, where tomatoes are often something they would grow. So the poster above meant that they'd rather cannabis to be regulated in the same way tomatoes are: you can grow them without regulation at your house, but if you want to sell them commercially (to stores and restaurants) then further licensing is required.

Re: Trying to corner the market on legal marijuana

#64

Post by code_duck »

spraak wrote: post #63
sethrin wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, growing cannabis isn't quite like growing tomatoes. Growing tomatoes is something that a tomato plant does more or less of its own accord. Cannabis really wants to be 15 feet tall and to produce lots of little seeds. Getting it to exclusively produce flowers requires a bit more effort. The 15 feet tall thing may also require some adjustment. What I'd like to do is to create something about refrigerator-sized whic…

I think you missed the analogy. Firstly, it isn't about the amount of work required, because growing good tomatoes requires work as well. Yes, a tomato seed will produce tomatoes on its own, but so will cannabis produce flowers. But in both cases the product might not be as satisfactory as you'd like. You may lose some tomatoes to bugs, and they may not be very big. Same with cannabis, it may be seeded out if there a…

Right, I did mean like tomatoes in a social, cultural and economic sense. Meaning, one could grow it as a special treat for friends and family, and share it freely. Maybe another comparison would be to home-brewing. There are huge breweries, medium breweries, small breweries, but some people love to do it at home.

Re: Trying to corner the market on legal marijuana

#65

Post by Mediterraneo10 »

grecy wrote: post #28
candiodari wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Plus there's the risk factor. If you fuck up distillation of alcohol, even slightly, people may die. You get the temperature control on your distillation wrong by 3 degrees, people will get sick from drinking it. 5 degrees, and it may kill kids who happen to get a hold of it, and starting at about 8 degrees it gets to the point where 2-3 glasses of your homebrew whiskey will kill a full blown adult.

My experiences of home brewed stuff from all over Latin America and West Africa disagree with your theory. Drink it, you'll be fine!

The most common liquor in West Africa is palm wine, which is not distilled and so methanol does not form. However, West African countries fairly regularly see cases of drinkers going blind from homemade distilled beverages, I would be very cautious about the provenance of any strong liquor offered to me.

Re: Trying to corner the market on legal marijuana

#66

Post by sethrin »

spraak wrote: post #63
sethrin wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ah, growing cannabis isn't quite like growing tomatoes. Growing tomatoes is something that a tomato plant does more or less of its own accord. Cannabis really wants to be 15 feet tall and to produce lots of little seeds. Getting it to exclusively produce flowers requires a bit more effort. The 15 feet tall thing may also require some adjustment. What I'd like to do is to create something about refrigerator-sized whic…

I think you missed the analogy. Firstly, it isn't about the amount of work required, because growing good tomatoes requires work as well. Yes, a tomato seed will produce tomatoes on its own, but so will cannabis produce flowers. But in both cases the product might not be as satisfactory as you'd like. You may lose some tomatoes to bugs, and they may not be very big. Same with cannabis, it may be seeded out if there a…

I suppose I wasn't clear enough. I do think that his characterization of the social role of cannabis is accurate, but the technical challenges are a bit different. Which is mostly just an opportunity to mention my personal technological interest in this. Which may not be quite entirely topical.

Re: Trying to corner the market on legal marijuana

#67

Post by spraak »

sethrin wrote: post #66
spraak wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you missed the analogy. Firstly, it isn't about the amount of work required, because growing good tomatoes requires work as well. Yes, a tomato seed will produce tomatoes on its own, but so will cannabis produce flowers. But in both cases the product might not be as satisfactory as you'd like. You may lose some tomatoes to bugs, and they may not be very big. Same with cannabis, it may be seeded out if there a…

I suppose I wasn't clear enough. I do think that his characterization of the social role of cannabis is accurate, but the technical challenges are a bit different. Which is mostly just an opportunity to mention my personal technological interest in this. Which may not be quite entirely topical.

I think that the technical challenges of growing cannabis vs. tomatoes is indeed different, but can be equally difficult or simple, related to the quality of the product you want. There are similar such inventions for growing tomatoes to what you mention for cannabis. Tomatoes too have a long history of breeding for size and other aspects as well, again similar to cannabis. You can grow "ditch weed" just as easily as poor quality tomatoes by not tending the plants etc.

Re: Trying to corner the market on legal marijuana

#68

Post by code_duck »

sethrin wrote: post #66
spraak wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you missed the analogy. Firstly, it isn't about the amount of work required, because growing good tomatoes requires work as well. Yes, a tomato seed will produce tomatoes on its own, but so will cannabis produce flowers. But in both cases the product might not be as satisfactory as you'd like. You may lose some tomatoes to bugs, and they may not be very big. Same with cannabis, it may be seeded out if there a…

I suppose I wasn't clear enough. I do think that his characterization of the social role of cannabis is accurate, but the technical challenges are a bit different. Which is mostly just an opportunity to mention my personal technological interest in this. Which may not be quite entirely topical.

I think a lot of the technical challenge is in that few people try to grow tomatoes indoors. If you try to grow each indoors, or outdoors, the technical aspects are more similar.

I think it's great that you posted about your ideas about it, because there are huge opportunities related to everything about cannabis that most people will overlook due to the various issues from the past still surrounding it.

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