DROUGHT LEAVES MARIJUANA GROWERS HIGH AND DRY

The drought that's aggravating home gardeners, pool owners and golf course
caretakers has been a boon to at least one group: police officers who hunt
out marijuana plants.

With the shrubs and underbrush that generally conceal marijuana turning
brown in the sweltering heat, especially in Maryland, carefully tended--and
religiously watered--pot plants are sticking out like very sore, very green
thumbs, law enforcement officials say.

Police in Maryland and Virginia regularly embark on airplane flights over
private property and public parks in search of illicitly grown marijuana.
Sgt. Kirk Holub, head of the Montgomery County Police Department's narcotics
division, said that from above, the "emerald green" of marijuana stands out
in a field turned barren from lack of rain.

"It's made it easier to identify the crops. It's just a lot harder to find
cover," Holub said. This week alone, officials in Maryland have seized more
than 100 marijuana plants. Arrests have nearly doubled, from 54 last year to
about 100 so far this year.

So far this year, about 2,500 marijuana plants have been found in Maryland,
up from 2,200--or $4 million worth--at this time last year.

In Virginia, which hasn't suffered the same rainfall deficits this summer as
Maryland, officials have seized more than 7,500 plants, compared with about
10,000 seized in the same period last year, said First Sgt. J.C. Lewis, head
of the Virginia State Police Marijuana Eradication Program.

The problem for marijuana farmers has to do with the stubby root structure
of their chosen crop. The University of Mississippi's Mamhoud Elsohly, who
researches marijuana for the National Institute on Drug Abuse, the nation's
only legal provider of marijuana for research, said cannabis roots extend a
scant six inches into the ground, unlike the roots of, say, cotton plants,
which grow far deeper and require less water.

"In order to survive, [marijuana plants] need to be attended to. And if
they're attended to, they'll be more visible," Elsohly said.

The problem has attracted the attention of the National Organization for the
Reform of Marijuana Laws Foundation, a Washington-based pot-advocacy group.
Marijuana growers "know if they go out and water the crops, it'll draw
attention," said Allen St. Pierre, the group's executive director, who added
that several pot farmers have told him that they are "definitely concerned
about their outdoor crops."

Narcotics detectives, meanwhile, say the dilemma has forced some creative
solutions. Some marijuana growers have moved their crops indoors. Others
have resorted to growing the plants in pots put on the limbs of trees.

"They're using different tactics . . . [and] are more discreet in their
growing habits," said Sgt. Harry L. McDaniel, head of the Maryland State
Police Marijuana Eradication Unit.

While marijuana plants grown indoors are often far smaller than their
counterparts, the yield is more potent and thus potentially more profitable,
Montgomery County's Holub said.

Besides being hidden from the eyes of airborne officers, marijuana
cultivated indoors can be grown under a more controlled climate, said
Stephen D'Ovidio, a Montgomery narcotics detective. What's more, he said,
indoor farmers generally don't have to worry about neighbors stealing their
plants or animals eating them.

As for those plants toughing it out outdoors under the summer sun, police
say the word on the street is that they hardly carry the punch of the crops
grown just months ago. "It's not good. It's not good weed," Montgomery
County narcotics detectives said an informant told them recently.