Need advice. My 16-year-old pot-smoking nephew lives in my mom’s house (she’s 71) with his mom (my sister). Today my mom found a box carefully hidden in the garage with a fluorescent light inside, lined inside with aluminum foil and a clay pot filled with soil. Nothing had sprouted, but what else could it be but pot? My sister dumped the soil out in the backyard after it was found.
My entire concern is to protect my mom and her house, which is the only thing she has. What should I do?
You should always germinate the seeds then plant the sprouts.
Try Rapid-Gro as a fertilizer… but don’t be too overzealous or you’ll damage the plants. Follow instructions and increase the amount you use gradually.
Cannabis grows better in a hot, dry climate, and will produce more resin in this type of environment. Use a dehumidifier in your growing room.
If you must use tap water to water your plants, let it stand in a flat, open container for a day to allow the chlorine to dissipate, and also allow it reach to room temperature.
HTH,
-Sweep
If it is indeed pot, I’d confront the kid and let him know that he is not the only one who can get in trouble for this. Explain to him that your mom is liable for stuff like this on her property which could put her in a lot of trouble, and teach him to have some respect for other peoples property. I would not go so far as to call the police on him. That would be the worst thing to do, IMO.
And sweepkick, wtf?
It seems as though your nephew is just experimenting, assuming the box was not car-sized. When I was 16, I was very into paraphernalia – I made all sorts of pipes, bongs, etc., more out of fascination than anything else. My feeling is that a setup like that is based more on risk-taking and curiosity than anything else.
As said above, make sure he knows the possible (though completely improbable) consequences for other people, and he won’t likely be foolish enough to do it again on the same property.
Just to chime in, I’d advise talking to him in a non-judgemental manner. Don’t tell him that smoking pot is bad, or what have you. Do, however, point out that through all sorts of methods (thermal imaging, power company records, stupid highschool friends who talk too damn much, etc…) people can get caught, and then spend a lot of time in jail. Point out that it’s not fair for him to send his gramma to jail for his stupid mistakes.
Bah!
On preview, I agree with FinnAgain.
Don’t be judgemental, just tell him the risks to himself and others in a calm, factual discussion. Good luck to you.
Wait, wait, wait… why are you doing anything?
What about his mother and grandmother? It seems to me that they’re the ones at risk here. Why are they not doing something, such as putting the fear of God into the little so-and-so? My parents woulda kicked my ass (deservedly).
Fortunately they never caught me! :o
(not meant as a condemnation of anyone, so please don’t take offense… I’m just curious as to why you are the one taking action here.)
Uh, dude - I hate to play Amateur Moderator, but I gotta point out that this post is the sort of thing that tends to draw the ire of the real thing. Just a word to the wise.
Knock it off, Sweepkick. We have enough trouble with people who take Straight Dope as an invitation to swap drug lore. No matter anybody’s opinon about laws against pot, growing it is a legal no-no in the US.
Check the registration agreement again. You’re promoting illegal activity and we don’t want any part of it. Do not do this again.
TVeblen
IMHO, mom and grandma need to know. And then ALL of you confront Pothead. don’t be judgmental, but do be firm, that you are not going to tolerate this kind of behavior. Let him know that you will not call the cops THIS TIME, but if you ever find so much as a roach you WILL. Then, stick to your word.
That’s nuts.
Ruin the kid’s life because he has a joint?
If he’s not putting anybody else in jeapordy, and if he stops growing, what’s the harm to them?
Drug laws are draconian and evil in the US, and there may be (hopefully not, I do not know for sure) be a risk of the house being siezed or the grandmother charged with something or other if that kind of thing was caught.
I wouldn’t call the cops either though.
I agree, no need to put this kid through the system for this. I also agree with the non-judgemental approach. I feel the kid will learn more and have more respect with a non-judgemental sensable talking to, instead of the cops or a judge telling him so.
A very good point, but they should figure out what the laws are before they lay into the kid. If it turns out that any number of grams will lead to severe punishment, then they need to make clear that he can’t have anything in another person’s home. But yeah, in any case calling the cops will ruin his life, no need for that.
I’d confront him yourself, without involving your mom or his mom. He’s 16, probably full of piss and vinegar, so confronting him one on one is probably best. Leave the kid a bit of pride.
As a disclaimer, IANAL in Florida and I don’t know their laws. Before you talk to him, you ought to have more information about possible consequences (on preview, this is FinnAgain’s point. Like Wesley Clark said, drug laws are draconian. But a 16 year old won’t believe you if you tell him that growing one small pot of pot ( 
) in grandma’s garage will put grandma, mom and him in jail and will make grandma lose her house. It just sounds so bizarre.
Based on what I could see, he’s looking at a misdemeanor (1 year in jail and up to $1,000 fine) for cultivating, selling or possessing 20g or less of marijuana (a felony is cultivating, selling or possessing any other amount up to 25 pounds and gets you five years and $10,000 in fines).
Sentences are enhanced for activity near a school, day care, church, etc. Also, conviction for a drug offense means he loses his driver’s license for six months to two years.
So it’s likely if he gets caught, he’s looking at a year in jail and no driver’s license for a while. Those are the official, legal consequences. (Generally, asset forfeiture – where your mom could lose her house – is a consequence of trafficking, which requires significantly more pot than your nephew is growing.)
So I would actually focus less on the jail-type consequences of his actions, and more on the things that are important to you: how those actions affect your mom. First, if he’s caught, they’ll search the whole house for drug paraphernalia, going through all your mom’s things. That’s pretty stressful.
Next, he’ll need a lawyer (he can just plead guilty, but you likely love him and want to give him the best opportunity to minimize the impact). The cost will likely be between $5,000 and $20,000. More, if the prosecution fights. Who will pay? Your mom has an asset – the house – that she could put up to get a loan to pay the lawyer.
Is your mom on any kind of public assistance? Some programs say that if the recipient is involved in drugs in some way, she loses benefits. Or if she has a mortgage, there could be a clause in her loan that forbids the property from being used in an illegal way.
Finally, your nephew will have a hard time paying for college; some types of financial aid are simply unavailable to convicted druggies. And if he gets a felony instead of a misdemeanor, he could find himself struggling to find a job.
Bottom line: when the only person he is putting at risk with his behavior is himself, then he can just go for it. But until he is out on his own, he needs to be respectful of the precarious position that his actions can put people in.
I’d just tell him to cut it out with the growing and leave it at that.
Thank Og my dad never made a big deal of such things. What a day and age we live in where kids can’t even play around with a little pot. :rolleyes:
Only one bit of advice to add:
Go out into the backyard and scoop up the soil your sister threw out back there and dump it into the trash. There’s still seed(s) in it. They *will *sprout in the backyard, even if you never water them. (There’s a reason it’s called “weed” - they’re hardy little suckers that are very difficult to kill unless you want them to grow.)
You don’t need Officer Friendly walking by and admiring your grandmother’s roses, only to notice a marijuana plant growing amongst them.
To my knowledge, they include the weight of the plant in the gram limit. In any case, it’s quite likely to go far above 20 grams (some colas get really big). They also can slap an ‘intent to distrubute’ onto whatever charge you get, even if there’s no real proof that he’s a dealer.
Seconded, this is the crux of the issue.
Let him know the real risks that it entails, and why it’s wrong to put other people at risk for his habits.
Personally, I’m a huge fan of “when you live under my roof you’ll abide by my rules”. Take the hard line. No drugs, no growing of drugs. It’s illegal and stupid and he shouldn’t be doing it.
StG
Find some seeds of one of those plants people always mistake for pot. Plant the seeds in the cups. Tell no one. Hilarity will ensue.