DOPERS HIT TOO AS DROUGHT PARCHES POT

The drought that has parched cotton, corn and hay crops around Alabama also
is causing problems for the state's big illegal cash crop -- marijuana --
state lawmen said Monday.

"As with any other crop that's grown in the state, a lack of water would
naturally affect it," said Maj. Ken Hallford, chief of the Alabama Bureau
of Investigation, which manages the state's marijuana eradication program.

Under the program, state trooper and national guard helicopter pilots fly
from county to county spotting distinctive green marijuana plants. Pilots
radio the locations to teams of federal, state, county and city drug
officers on the ground.

So far this year, 31,992 marijuana plants have been located and destroyed
through the program, said Dorris Teague, spokeswoman for the Alabama
Department of Public Safety. The plants were valued at $64 million, she
said.

Last year, 48,700 plants valued at $97.4 million were destroyed. "We hope
to get that many or more by the end of the year," Hallford said.

Many of the marijuana plants officers are finding this year are smaller on
average due to the drought, drug task force officers said, and some of them
are burned from the extreme heat and lack of water.

"We've found plots that had been worked up or planted and didn't come up,
or it did (come up) and died," said Harry McGee, investigator with the
Lauderdale County Drug Task Force.

Some growers are trying to water their plants, he said, and that sometimes
has helped in the detection effort.

"It looks kind of suspicious someone hauling buckets off in the middle of
the woods," said Joe Hester, commander of Cherokee County's drug task
force. Cherokee County was tops in the state last year with 10,431 plants
destroyed in the eradication program.

The Cherokee County task force has gotten calls from citizens who have seen
trucks with buckets of water or 55-gallon drums, Hester said. "The dope
growers are having to do more work to keep their plants alive and keep
their profit margins up," he said.

Hester and McGee said they've seen fewer pot plants in their counties this
year. Lauderdale County ranked third last year with 6,032 pot plants
destroyed.

McGee blames the drop on a combination of the drought and the county's
strong eradication program.

Some growers have gone to what McGee called "bucket dope" -- putting the
marijuana plants in buckets so they can be pulled inside when eradication
helicopters are in the area, McGee said. "One thug calls another and they
hide it," he said.

So far this year 123 marijuana growers have been arrested. That compares to
77 arrested last year.