These days, growing food hydroponically is big business. Check your local grocery, it’s likely got hydroponic lettuce, and very likely other things as well.
Not so much in the 90’s, of course. But even then, there were a lot of us starting vegetable transplants under lights. I did know one market farmer who said his basement setup had been raided two or three times – police in his area were having trouble believing that yes, he was growing entirely legal plants down there. (I don’t remember whether he thought he’d gotten on a list by buying fancy grow lights, or whether he thought the neighbors had misunderstood what they could see through basement windows and called the police.)
Not really. Like I tell my kids, I gave up smoking pot in high school.
Sure, I ingest about 10 gummies per year the past 3-4 years. Like when I got my 2nd covid shot and felt like crap. Or backpacking when I can feel my decades on this planet. But that’s about it.
As a friend in the know explained, a simple hydroponic set up will yield multiple ounces of good week. I would prolly go that route if I could use that much.
I’ve brewed my own beer, I buy concentrates for the vape at the dispensary, I grow some flower along with zucchini, cucumbers and strawberries. Everything grows outside and take little effort, plus I have many seeds from dispensary flower, some quality strains.
Yeah, the last time a friend and I did hydroponics my friend gave a heads-up to the local sheriff’s and offered to let them check it out . Sure enough, neighbors accused us twice of having a grow operation. A deputy would show up, we’d let him into the garden, he’d look around, we’d offer him some lettuce or radishes, he’d decline, and we’d all go on our way.
It’s like some people really have trouble wrapping their heads around the notion that some of us really do use hydroponics for things other than pot.
I think if I actually smoked weed, I’d have been concerned. But since it was used for very mundane things like tomato and pepper seedlings, I figured I was ok.
I think if it was legal where I live, I’d probably give it a try, and if I was to like it, I’d probably give growing my own a shot, since I’m a decent enough gardener.
For about 5 years I used an aerogarden as a bedside light, full spectrum, on 16 hours a day, kept SAD away. And I got to pluck my own lettuce every few days for putting on a sandwich =) Romaine grows really well, and if you pluck the young leaves before they get huge, they stay tender and the plants don’t get huge, I had a 7 hole aerogarden and grew 3 romaines, planted about a month apart.
I will point out that Genovese Basil grows like a son-of-a-bitch in an aerogarden, once every week and a half you have to chop about 4 inches of growth off the damned things, so we did a lot of stuff calling for basil - enough that we got tired of pesto, most basil heavy italian recipes, and the basil/mozzarella/tomato salad for about 2 years afterwards [that is why I changed to growing Romaine =) ]
Would I grow? Maybe. I have around 2 assorted lights for indoor growing, my brother was running a personal grow op in the house when i moved in, I let everything finish growing, harvested and dried it out and for 5 years my roomie hasn’t had to buy any weed. Would we start again? Maybe - 6 plants total would fit nicely in one end of the living room, it would supply her with all the weed she wanted and me with all the cannibutter I would want to bake with for my own edibles - though right now I would only buy my edibles at a dispensary if I didn’t have a pain control contract going with my doctor that I don’t want to screw up.
Way back when, virtually all weed came with seeds in it. In college we cleaned it on an open album jacket (Close to Edge comes to mind) using a playing card. The seeds were tossed out the window and sure enough, in the spring there would be many plants growing three floors down. None survived the first mowing, however. Its legal in NJ but not for sale in stores just yet. I’ll go with the home brewing analogy. Maybe just for kicks but there will be so much to choose from in the store, why bother?
It seems likely to me (don’t know for sure, honest) that connoisseur varieties of cannabis would need to be propagated by cuttings, as seeds produced by hybrid plants in general are notorious for being highly variable in the next generation(s) and may lack desirable characteristics. So if Burpee got into the game, it would probably be selling plants, not seeds.
To continue the basil hijack a bit, if you want to grow a highly ornamental and tasty basil, Basil herbalea “Wild Magic” is a great variety. Cutting-grown plants are vigorous in pots under lights indoors, and just by pinching the tops to keep growth under control, you have plenty of fresh basil to season food (I previously harvested and dried plenty from outdoor plants).
The new Missouri law allows one to pay $100 to the state to grow personal marijuana and “must be in a locked, secured area, and that the plants not be visible to the public”. Columbia Attorney Dan Viets said, “Just like people can grow their own tomatoes". In retrospect, a secured area may have saved some of my tomatoes from rabbits but I still didn’t have to pay $100 to the state. On the plus side it’s 18 plants.
18 PLANTS? WooHooo, I once grew more than I could go through including giving out bags left and right doing intensive growing with 10 plants; 6 under a 600 watt HPS and 4 under a 400 watt HPS. I’d add another 1000 watt light with 8 plants and go mad!
My lights were air cooled, with a Dayton blower pulling room air through the hoods. The exhaust left the house through a big charcoal filter so there was no odor outside.
But the grow-room itself absolutely reeked.
ETA: all the time, not really. During vegetative growth odor was minimal. During flowering is when they smell.
My house, passive solar would be perfect for growing. I think the police thought so too. Once a DARE car with a dog came with two cops and they wanted to ‘look around’. Totally false pretenses I think. They said someone from a town over 100 miles away used my address and jumped bail.
I RELLY doubt someone is going to pick my address out of thin air. I don’t even live in a town. Nor was I in any phone book, and back then it did not show up on google maps. I still don’t get mail delivery. Everything is a POB.
I was so relieved that they weren’t there to report my wife was in an accident (pre cell phones and she was late) that I let them in. Wasn’t thinking clearly.
