Marijuana Business Magazine August 2019

August 2019 | mjbizdaily.com 53 N early every marijuana cultivator wants to call its cannabis craft. Whether the plant is grown indoors or outside, with a hydroponic irrigation system or a watering can, under the sun or high-tech LED lights, few growers want their flower to be considered corporate cannabis. A marijuana company that appeals to the masses on a large scale with lower quality and cheaper prices is probably well on its way to becoming a reality in the industry, but few companies will admit aspiring to that as an ambition. As a general philosophy, a cannabis grower looking to brand its flower as craft needs to show the consumer that the flower was grown with mindfulness and close attention paid to each plant. Although their methods may differ, growers can come to a closer consensus on what the final product should look like. More specifically, several growers agree that for flower to be called craft cannabis, it should smell “clean,” like the terpenes that the strain ought to contain, not like the nutrients or media it was grown in. The crystals on the flower that generate terpenes, known as trichomes, should be intact after the harvest is completed. Hand-trimmed cannabis is generally preferred over machine-trimmed flower, with connoisseurs often believing the former better expresses the characteristic structure of the plant. “You have to represent the most sought-after expression of the strain,” said Kristin Nevedal, a Garberville, California-based cultivation expert and executive director of the International Cannabis Farmers Association. “This is a seed-to-package mindfulness all the way through. You’re shooting for a very high- end luxury product that people are going to come back to time and time again.” A QUESTION OF LIGHTING While it can be tempting to declare that only cannabis grown under the sun can be called craft, the regulations of many states don’t allow outdoor marijuana cultivation. Scott Reach, a master grower and owner of Denver-based Rare Dankness, doesn’t believe the type of lighting or cultivation structure—or lack thereof— is as important as a cultivator’s attitude toward the business. “It’s the intention of what you’re doing with that plant and how mindful and respectful you are to proper harvest dates and handling instead of just treating it as a commodity,” he added. At Sol Spirit Farm in Willow Creek, California, part of the famed Emerald Triangle, owner and lead cultivator Walter Wood uses a light-deprivation system with minimal supplemental lighting. Wood had been using the sun for his only light, but he found that the new sys- tem produces higher-quality flower and plants that are a more manageable size. “When we were growing those full- season monsters, you had to move a 14-foot ladder to each plant to really check them out,” Wood said. Now, “we can walk along and none of them are taller than my eyeballs, so I can keep a much closer eye on them. (It’s) more manageable that way.” PLANT ARRANGEMENT IS KEY Careful canopy arrangement is essential in creating a craft product. Growers agree that giving plants as much space as possible helps to improve the quality of the flower because they get maximum light exposure and increased airflow. Ryan Tonsberg, head of cultivation for Oakland, California-based Nug, spaces out his plants much farther apart than the industry standard. Whereas many grow rooms will have 14-24 plants under one light, Tonsberg has only seven plants per light. Nug places approximately 15 plants on each 4-foot-by-8-foot tray, which leaves about 1 foot of spacing around each plant. “We like to have more space and more airflow between the plants,” he said. That helps to reduce the potential for growth in microbials, including mold and powdery mildew. At The Farm, a vertically integrated cannabis company in Boulder, Colorado, Head of Cultivation John Billings runs two 10,000-square-foot canopies. With smaller batches of plants, he’s able to thoroughly sterilize and clean Ryan Tonsberg spaces plants at a ratio of seven plants per light at Oakland, California-based Nug, where he is the head of cultivation. Courtesy Photo