# How come you never hear of "home grown" cocaine? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 27, 2002, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391 "2002-03-27T16:09:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![KidCharlemagne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed8c4c/32.png) [@KidCharlemagne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KidCharlemagne)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/1 "2002-03-27T16:09:37Z")
I know that cocaine production is much more involved than marijauna but im still surprised ive never heard of US coca growing facilities. I looked it up on the net and saw that it took roughly 250 lbs of coca leaves to make 22 lbs. of cocaine. Im not sure how many coca plants it would take to yield that, but it;s an awful lot of cocaine in any case. The other question is why coca plants arent genetically engineered to produce more alkaloid? ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Dave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/46a35a/32.png) [@Great\_Dave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Dave)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/2 "2002-03-27T16:53:49Z")
Maybe because it’s too hard to recreate the conditions under which coca is grown. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 4:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/3 "2002-03-27T16:55:30Z")
I doubt this thread will survive long. But, FWIW, I heard somewhere that the seeds keep their viability only for a short while. And they don’t grow well in most places…apart from the legal aspects, when’s the last time you heard of American cacao or coffee plantations? ---
**Author:** ![zwaldd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a9adbd/32.png) [@zwaldd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zwaldd)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/4 "2002-03-27T16:57:30Z")
Plus you don’t get the seeds with your 8 ball. And the Columbian Cartel might cut your thumbs off. ---
**Author:** ![zwaldd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a9adbd/32.png) [@zwaldd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zwaldd)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/5 "2002-03-27T16:58:59Z")
Or is that the Col **o** mbian cartel. ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/6 "2002-03-27T17:19:48Z")
Who needs home grown coca? Methamphetamines are the equivilent of home grown cocaine. Support your local biker gangs and buy American. ---
**Author:** ![KidCharlemagne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed8c4c/32.png) [@KidCharlemagne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KidCharlemagne)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 5:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/7 "2002-03-27T17:28:10Z")
First off, I don’t see how this thread violates any policies but I could be wrong. It’s not like im asking how to setup a facility. - As far as coffee - it just doesnt have the same profit margins. I also can’t imagine you cant recreate the coca growing conditions in a greenhouse. - Loved the comment about not getting the seeds with your 8ball - priceless. ---
**Author:** ![meta-x](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f04885/32.png) [@meta-x](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/meta-x)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/8 "2002-03-27T17:53:41Z")
First of you do need to grow coca plant in your basement. The condition required to grow good coca are hot and dry air. Also, you need to grow quite a few to produce cocaine, you would need quite a big basement. Also, the energy you use to grow such a quantity of coca plant will get noticed as suspicious ( unlike growing a few marijuana plant for you 🙂 ) After you get your plant here’s what you do. (recipe removed - manhattan) ---
**Author:** ![Silentgoldfish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@Silentgoldfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silentgoldfish)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 6:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/9 "2002-03-27T18:26:00Z")
Way to get a potentially interesting thread shut down. ---
**Author:** ![RiverRunner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/977dab/32.png) [@RiverRunner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RiverRunner)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/10 "2002-03-27T18:36:55Z")
OK, I’ll bite. What’s an 8-ball? RR ---
**Author:** ![Ike\_Witt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ike_witt/32/283_2.png) [@Ike\_Witt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ike_Witt)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/11 "2002-03-27T18:37:17Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by meta-x \* > \*\*First of you do need to grow coca plant in your basement. The condition required to grow good coca are hot and dry air. \*\* I guess that you didn’t read your own cite. > [@](#): > > Typically, coca thrives in warm, moist valleys between 1500 and 6000 metres above sea level. A hot, dry basement is not ideal growing conditions for most things, let alone something that is associated with mountain valleys. ---
**Author:** ![zwaldd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a9adbd/32.png) [@zwaldd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zwaldd)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/12 "2002-03-27T19:51:19Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by RiverRunner \* > **OK, I’ll bite. What’s an 8-ball?** 8-ball…eighth ounce. Typical ‘party pack’ back in the day - enough to keep four or five friends in bathroom rotation for the night. ---
**Author:** ![Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/50afbb/32.png) [@Duck\_Duck\_Goose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Duck_Duck_Goose)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/13 "2002-03-27T20:19:50Z")
Everything you always wanted to know about growing coca plants, courtesy of the CIA. Your tax dollars at work. [http://www.cia.gov/saynotodrugs/cocaine\_q.html](http://www.cia.gov/saynotodrugs/cocaine_q.html) To address the OP: it’s a bush, you can’t really grow it in your basement as it’s too big and needs too much light and if you use halogens, they’re a dead giveaway to local law enforcement (same as with marijuana), it takes a long time (months) to grow before you can start picking leaves, and then it takes a LOT of leaves (i.e. a lot of bushes) to get anything like usable quantities of cocaine. Then it has to be processed before you can market it, unlike marijuana, which is immediately usable. Coca leaves are a Schedule II Controlled Substance, same as cocaine, codeine, amphetamine, methamphetamine, and opium extracts and tinctures. [http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/schedules/listby\_sched/sched2.htm](http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/schedules/listby_sched/sched2.htm) Marijuana is a Schedule I Controlled Substance, same as PCP, Ecstasy, mescaline, peyote, and morphine and heroin. [http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/schedules/listby\_sched/sched1.htm](http://www.deadiversion.usdoj.gov/schedules/listby_sched/sched1.htm) And the DOJ would like to point out: > [@](#): > > Please note that a substance need not be listed as a controlled substance to be treated as a Schedule I substance for criminal prosecution. As for why coca plants haven’t been genetically engineered to produce more alkaloid, well, it generally takes a big gentech corporation like Monsanto or somebody, to get behind a program of genetic engineering, and I’d have to wonder if they’d be able to get much R & D funding for coca. 😃 As for why the Ecuadorians and Colombians and Peruvians don’t select for “more alkaloid”, well, why should they? If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. If they did come up with a coca variety that produced alkaloid the way a corn plant produces fructose, they’d flood the market with cheap cocaine, profits would plummet, and they’d be out of a job and back to growing coffee for Folger’s. They’re not stupid. ---
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/14 "2002-03-27T20:52:00Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by KidCharlemagne \* > \*\*I know that cocaine production is much more involved than marijauna but im still surprised ive never heard of US coca growing facilities. I looked it up on the net and saw that it took roughly 250 lbs of coca leaves to make 22 lbs. of cocaine. Im not sure how many coca plants it would take to yield that, but it;s an awful lot of cocaine in any case. The other question is why coca plants arent genetically engineered to produce more alkaloid? \*\* Your leaf to cocaine source is wrong, the ratio is closer to 1000 lbs of coca leaf to about 2 lbs of cocaine and the intermediate processing steps are potentially hazardous and involve noxious and dangerous solvents and related chemicals. This (in addition to the other difficulties mentioned by other posters) might change the economic feasability of the cost/benefit ratio for most people who want to “grow their own.” ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/15 "2002-03-27T21:03:40Z")
homework assignment: Gather up enough little leaves to make what you **think** would equal a pound. weigh it. Gather up more leaves (since you most likely underestimated by quite a bit) multiply the amount of **space** you need by 1000. imagine trying to conceal that. It’d be similar to attempting to shoplift a grand piano by sticking it in your pants pocket, I suspect. ---
**Author:** ![chula](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a4c791/32.png) [@chula](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chula)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/16 "2002-03-27T21:07:16Z")
As I learned on another thread, cocaine is legally produced in the United States from imported coca leaves. Apparently it’s OK for big US corporations to profit from the plant but not South American peasants. So why _wouldn’t_ Monsanto get in on the action? [“The Legal Importation of Cocaine”](http://www.uic.edu/classes/osci/osci590/9_3%20The%20Legal%20Importation%20of%20Coca%20Leaf.htm) [A good article from the Guardian on cocaine](http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1536/a12.html) ---
**Author:** ![chula](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a4c791/32.png) [@chula](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chula)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 9:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/17 "2002-03-27T21:08:58Z")
As I learned on another thread, cocaine is legally produced in the United States from imported coca leaves. Apparently it’s OK for big US corporations to profit from the plant but not South American peasants. So why _wouldn’t_ Monsanto get in on the action? [“The Legal Importation of the Coca Leaf”](http://www.uic.edu/classes/osci/osci590/9_3%20The%20Legal%20Importation%20of%20Coca%20Leaf.htm) [A good article from the Guardian on cocaine](http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v00/n1536/a12.html) ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Dave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/46a35a/32.png) [@Great\_Dave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Dave)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/18 "2002-03-27T21:21:47Z")
DDG said- > [@](#): > > Coca leaves are a Schedule II Controlled Substance, same as cocaine, codeine, amphetamine, methamphetamine, and opium extracts and tinctures. Coca tea, too? ---
**Author:** ![Jimbrowski](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9a140/32.png) [@Jimbrowski](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jimbrowski)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 9:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/19 "2002-03-27T21:38:16Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by wring \* > \*\*It’d be similar to attempting to shoplift a grand piano by sticking it in your pants pocket, I suspect. \*\* I am terribly, terribly ashamed for what I am about to do, but I am unable to stop myself. Please get me help. “Is that a grand piano in your pocket, or …?” “Nope, just glad to see you.” ---
**Author:** ![Robb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/a183cd/32.png) [@Robb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robb)\ **Post date:** [March 27, 2002, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/20 "2002-03-27T22:10:11Z")
**Jimbrowski** , you’ve just changed what it means “to tickle the ivories”. I don’t think that we can help you. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391.md?page=2)