THE SECRET GARDEN

Hidden in Basements in the Most Innocuous Looking Suburban Homes,
Ontario's Marijuana Grow-Ops Are Low-Risk, High-Profit Ventures Worth
Billions

On Jan. 22, the senior gardener arrives home to find that his outlawed
crop has finally started to bud.

He has just finished clearing the laneway of snow, and made time to
pitch in on his neighbour's. It is minus 17 with strong winds from the
southwest.

Inside, and 12 steps down into the basement, he walks past the furnace
and into the secret garden. There, it is 28 degrees and fans are whirring.

Standing a few blocks from a nursery school and across the street from
an Ottawa park, this four-bedroom family home is part of Ontario's
indoor marijuana industry. It is a cash-crop business that police
across the province estimate to be worth $12 billion a year. (That's
bigger than the country's wheat and dairy industries.)

And the chances that police will come knocking between now and harvest
are slim. Ottawa has fewer drug cops than before amalgamation (26 in
1992 and just 17 today according to the city), and police say the
number of grow-operations in Ottawa is overwhelming.

The police realize that marijuana is a soft drug, and that most people
would like to see it decriminalized. Still, they routinely demonize
growers for their links to outlaw bikers and Asian gangs, and with
little prodding lug out the guns seized from grow-ops for press
photographers. They'll also talk up hydro theft and public safety --
notably that the chances of a grow-op home catching fire are 40 times
greater than any other on the street.

But not every grow-op is linked to bikers or Asian gangs. Not all
grow-ops are firetraps, and not all growers put immigrant families
with young children at risk by enlisting them as fronts.

We rarely hear the stories, and never see their crops before the
raids. In fact, the Citizen never entered this grow house and
describes it only as it was depicted on a videotape.

"It's a side business and I really like gardening," the small
independent grower tells the Citizen.

He holds an honest day job, has a common-law wife, and his handling of
weapons is limited to video games. When he's not working or gardening,
he's usually playing Xbox Live. He's clocked close to 500 hours, with
140 hours on Rainbow Six alone.

In the evening, he finally removes his headset, which he uses to talk
to online teammates around the world in their anti-terrorist wargame.
It's time to tend to the plants that grow hydroponically in neat rows
from industrial-sized plumbing pipes.

This low-risk, high-profit "side business" or "paying hobby" is
located in a secret room in the basement -- a fully contained separate
room, built specifically for a four-metre-by-six-metre hydroponic
garden. From the outside, when the door is closed, it looks like a
wall. It houses up to 50 plants.

Inside, the grower is mimicking and controlling nature, 24 hours a
day, seven days a week.

The crop-sitter lives upstairs. He keeps a close watch on the
operation in exchange for "extra dough and free pot" (he says he
smokes an ounce every three weeks). He pays no rent and is the only
person who lives in the grow house.

The sitter stops at the edge of the crop, reaches out to touch a plant
and gently thumbs its top bud, or flower.

"It's a nice little crop ... It's about four weeks to magic time
(harvest)."

If this small crop yields good bud, the grower says, he will make
about $18,000.

(The RCMP, however, would estimate this crop at a staggering street
value of $500,000. They calculate value by estimating that 40 plants
yield between 40,000 and 100,000 joints that would sell for up to $5
each. But for a single plant to yield enough bud to roll 2,500
marijuana cigarettes would be extremely rare and dealers, for the most
part, don't sell by the joint. And if they did, it would take roughly
208 hours to roll 2,500 joints.)

This low-risk, high-profit garden starts with these crucial
ingredients: A nondescript house with an absentee landlord and
start-up money.

"You need to look for a landlord who never drops by and about $12,000
in start-up equipment. And pick a house that no one would suspect ...
If my landlord ever dropped by I would have already dropped this
place," the grower says.

This home, set in a high-traffic neighbourhood, looks like any other.
The police drive by the house at least 10 times a day.

While it is true that Ottawa police have fewer drug officers since
amalgamation, Insp. Doug Handy says co-operation with other
law-enforcement agencies has never been better and the drug unit is
supported by patrol officers, including six patrol constables enrolled
in the unit's mentoring program.

But tonight, the grower is making plans to reinforce security -- not
against the police, but against thieves.

"The way I always looked at it is, how many cases do you hear of
people getting convicted for growing their plants? It's always
'charged,' you never hear about the sentencing. It's not a big deal.
You can get a bit of jail time, but you'd have to be a loser or doing
it in a very organized way, doing stupid things like killing people,
stealing your hydro or hurting your neighbours. As long as you take
precautions, there's no way," says the 29-year-old grower.

The grower steps into another room, the size of a walk-in closet, and
unveils the gene stock: "These are the moms. This is where I get all
my little clones."

This current crop began as tiny clones, all snipped in mid-November
from two bushy mother plants that had been grown from mail-order
HempStar seeds.

This gene pool allows a perpetual grow period. By the time the adults
are ready for harvest, the clones -- grown in root cubes -- are ready
to be transplanted in the main grow room.

In the main room, each plant, suspended in clay pellets, grows from
mesh-bottomed pots set every 10 centimetres along industrial plumbing
pipes. These pipes, or grow tubes, are supported by two-by-four beams
laid across the cement floor.

He tricks the plants into non-stop growth by using metal halide and
pressurized sodium lamps to replicate the closest thing to a full
spectrum of light.

"These plants need multiple spectrums of light. A regular light-bulb
does not cut the mustard," says the grower, who learned the trade in
British Columbia.

Rubber hoses run into the main room from an automated feeding tank and
into each of the growing tubes in the garden. The hoses, which run the
length of the tubes, support tiny sprinkler heads that are set between
every second plant.

Liquid nutrients, fertilizer and water are pumped through the grow
tubes. Because the tubes are positioned on a slight decline, gravity
drains the tubes back into the feeding tank. The feeding machine was
fashioned using an 80-litre Rubbermaid storage box, a pump and some
standard plumbing supplies.

This home-built grow-op doesn't leak, and unlike grow-ops that use
soil -- commonly used by Asian gangs -- there's no mould or dirty mess.

By 5 p.m., the traffic outside is picking up. Inside, the grower mixes
the last of the day's liquid feed by hand.

"They don't need to grow anymore; they need only to grow fruit," he
says.

To boost the buds, the part of the plant that is smoked, he uses
and does not cure it for boosted potency. While not high-grade, his
clients say bud produces a "creeper buzz."

And after moving his product, he also moves his operation.

On March 7, the clones are growing fine and fast, but the grower, no
longer comfortable with this location, has decided to pack up shop.
This way, he keeps his operation on the move -- and in turn, seemingly
one step ahead of detection. In the move, he loses 50 per cent of his
cloned cash crop -- an acceptable loss, and one that comes with the
business.

"I don't do this for big cash. I hate buying pot. I think it's wrong,
when it grows on trees. You shouldn't have to buy anything that grows
on trees."

And if the law ever catches up to him?

"I honestly don't care, if it's going to happen, it's going to happen.
I'm growing something I like, and it's another story to tell my
grandkids."