Industrial Hemp in Oregon

Excellent read, really enjoying the thread.

PDX Dopesmoker said:

Are you one of those families where your dad was the guy who got you started growing weed or are yall the type where there was some event a couple decades back where he was giving you hell cause he found out you were smoking drugs?

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Ha ha, great question dude, thanks for asking. Both really. Mom and dad still live in the same spot as we grew up, high in the hills of southern Oregon. Little log cabin, no electricity, no neighbors...we grew and hunted a lot of what we ate. Super conservative politically. Very anti-pot. Dad has a green thumb, but mom instilled the passion for plants. She would give each of us (3) a row in her garden and let us pick out seeds each winter. We were winning flower and veggie competitions at the Josephine county fair in elementary school. Both of my parents' love of gardening was kickstarted by their shared experience with small scale canna farming in the late 70's while logging. Reconnecting with these stories and our growth as growers / breeders has been a true treasure. So thankful to share the journey with them.

Awesome! Thanks for the background! Were they growing canna, or cannabis in the late 70's? Sounds like my kind of folk! How is harvest going?

Hey SE, any updates on how the 2'x5' planting trial performed this year?

The non-psychoactive cannabinoid market is comprised of three categories: (1) trimmed flowers, (2) isolated compounds and (3) “full spectrum” oils (“FSO”). Many farmers are successfully using our heavy yielding, terpene-rich “early” varieties to set the global standard in the rapidly evolving trimmed flower market; this requires low dry temperatures, long cures, and delicate handling. Our farm R&D projects in 2016 and 2017 highlighted the space requirements necessary and now other farmers are successfully optimizing the process, but it is and will always remain space-intensive.

The massive isolate and FSO markets do not require the delicacy in handling, but remain challenging due to throughput-intensiveness; from a farmer’s perspective, never-before seen quantities of cannabis must be handled, dried, and delivered to ensure continued success in an increasingly competitive marketplace. We have seen countless permutations of commercial drying technology over the past 4 seasons deployed with varying levels of success--so far, nothing seems capable of keeping up with material handling requirements. What if we approach the problem with the plant’s plasticity in mind instead of only considering machines?

We created the first publicly available day-neutral (“autoflowering”) high CBD variety in 2016 and followed up with the first pure CBG versions in 2017. The express purpose of these lines is to harness the predictable dry spell in Oregon’s Willamette valley from late July to early August to field-dry cannabis crops destined for isolate/FSO. After 3 years of trials, we can now enthusiastically recommend the process to advanced farmers.

Our R&D farm team planted 16 acres in early June (36” in-row, 5’ between-row), cut mature plants down on August 2nd, and ground up the resulting whole-plant biomass 10 days later (i.e. experimental batch). Our control batches (x2) were hung to concurrently slow dry in the barn; all stems were removed from one batch, then ground down in a food processor, while the other batch was masticated using our field grinder. Results? There was no appreciable CBD loss between the hang-dry and field-dry batches (-0.05% on average, statistically insignificant) owing to cannabidiol’s relative thermal stability. Terpenes were definitely lost (-63.5%) in the field and the remaining composition was dominated by less volatile sesquiterpenes, though appreciable amounts still remained. Stems account for 19.5% of biomass weight (vs. 27.5% in the “early” series). Yields were just over 2100 lbs. per acre, but could be increased with denser planting. The most important take-away: not only did the experiment work, it allows farmers to be out of the field and into the market before September.

The approach is also being used by farmers in locations that enjoy low relative humidity throughout the fall to dry later-finishing varieties as well. It’s a dream-come-true to watch these experiments and the ensuing equipment inventions spring into existence to meet the world’s demand for non-psychoactive cannabinoids. We are stoked to play a small part in the advancement of our collective industry and excited to continue sharing with fellow farmers.

Thanks for the big update and for keeping us all abreast of the ongoings in the hemp world and for sharing all of your hard won numbers. The terpene number is really interesting to see, we all know that drying conditions make a huge difference in how loud & tasty the final product is, but having it quantified is a whole new level of understanding. Seems safe to assume that the varying thermal stability of the different terps means that some strains would be more prone to suffer flavorwise from poor drying conditions more than others. I guess the weight of those lost terpenes must add up to significant weight loss if you're talking about acres or tons too.

Over 21 pounds of terpenes lost per acre using this drying method, but the isolate / FSO markets don't pay you based on your terpene content so...It's really just a matter of educating over time in that regard. Speaking of terpenes...

We had a pretty awesome summer of discovery. In addition to the great field trials and drying research, we also found plants that qualify as "CBC-rich" (i.e. CBC gene turned on) in several unique lines of varying dominant chemotypes (CBD dominant and CBG dominant, respectively). We'll have the field production versions ready for trials in 2019.

More importantly--to me anyway--was confirmation this past week of cannabinoid free plants emerging from our breeding programs. I was aware of their possibility, having read de Meijer's (2009) "The inheritance of chemical phenotype in Cannabis sativa L. (IV): cannabinoid-free plants", but didn't expect to find them. The public reaction so far (Facebook, Instagram) is more disbelief of the results than anything, which is understandable. Someone could send in a sample of basil to the same lab and receive identical results back to share publicly, so I get the lack of belief. For real though: these results came off of fully finished flowers that smoked very nice. It will take some additional work to increase terpene content, but that only requires time and some smelling of flowers (my favorite part of the job).

The possibilities are endless on this one, but, to me, the easiest way to frame this in an understandable way is: this particular finding allows us to take ANY plant with a desirable terpene profile (regardless of chemotype) and convert it into a cannabinoid-free plant. Want the flavor of Sour D (or whatever), but without the THC? Check. Really excited to work with this particular tool moving forward.

Are these cannabinoid-free varieties also non-sticky like the ones published by de Meijer and the Santhica varieties? IIRC those are said to contain just marginal amounts of essential oil due to heavily underdeveloped trichomes.

Only Ornamental said:

Are these cannabinoid-free varieties also non-sticky like the ones published by de Meijer and the Santhica varieties? IIRC those are said to contain just marginal amounts of essential oil due to heavily underdeveloped trichomes.

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I'd say not AS sticky, but still a bit of tack. They are a little stickier than the great, great, great grandma they came from (a terpeneless type IV, our first), but don't require gloves like our "regular" varieties. What was most interesting to me is that the trichomes definitely have smaller heads, but did not seem malformed like the others have reported. Looks "dank". Close ups below.

Raw chromatogram on 4 of the 6 cannabinoid free plants isolated are below. Please note that the spikes leading to the 2 minute mark are terpenes / internal reference standard recovery.

Were the plants fertilized or treated at all?

what kind of terpenes and what percentage did you find of the terpenes in these cannabinoid free plants, you said they smoke nice, do you get altered?

They were treated like all of our other greenhouse plants involved in our regular summer pheno hunts (3.5g pot with Rexius' "Organic Valley" soil, no amendments just water).

They smoke like good herb and definitely made us all calm and focused after two joints shared amongst our staff. Terpene results are another week or so out (labs are backed up with harvest testing), but I will post them once received.

I don't get it. Is this intended to replace cigarette smoking? No THC and no CBD, CBG, etc? Just terps?


Thanks and congrats to socio for an amazing success story.

CBD is good for muscle relaxation and maybe slightly sedative although small if any. THC can be quite strong as a psychoactive compound but not at <.3% like hemp. If a first user tried a thc concentrate you might nearly call it an adverse reaction mental/psych not so much physical.

What application could the cannabinoid-free plants have? Spreading it's pollen on your enemies' plants?

PDX Dopesmoker said:

What application could the cannabinoid-free plants have? Spreading it's pollen on your enemies' plants?

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that's pretty obvious dawg, legal bud sales to school kids FTW! He's only selling females so no pollen, yo...

seriously though if there's 21 pounds of terpenes per acre I'll bet the cannabinoid free weed pays better than corn.

Chunkypigs said:

that's pretty obvious dawg, legal bud sales to school kids FTW! He's only selling females so no pollen, yo...

seriously though if there's 21 pounds of terpenes per acre I'll bet the cannabinoid free weed pays better than corn.

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21 pounds was just the amount lost to the wind in the drying experiment, the full amount must have been more like 33 pounds.

PDX Dopesmoker said:

21 pounds was just the amount lost to the wind in the drying experiment, the full amount must have been more like 33 pounds.

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The main uses of cannabinoid-free plants: (1) smoking for flavor without a cannabinoid experience (terpenes also alter mood); (2) using as a blending material to maintain federal legality (0.3% THC) without losing flavor; (3) an actual placebo that looks and tastes like the "real thing" in the use of clinical studies. Most importantly though...

We are replacing hops with a plant that is much easier to grow, harvest, and breed, while increasing the total relative oil yield per acre. Cannabis for the win.

socioecologist said:

The main uses of cannabinoid-free plants: (1) smoking for flavor without a cannabinoid experience (terpenes also alter mood); (2) using as a blending material to maintain federal legality (0.3% THC) without losing flavor; (3) an actual placebo that looks and tastes like the "real thing" in the use of clinical studies. Most importantly though...

We are replacing hops with a plant that is much easier to grow, harvest, and breed, while increasing the total relative oil yield per acre. Cannabis for the win.

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Growing fields of Terps sounds like a fun crop to grow and smell. Lets see who can grow the stinkiest loudest crop . Hopefully theres a good price point on the pure Terps vs cbd or cbg. Do you think Terps will be wholesaled as blends or isolates?