MARIJUANA FARM FOUND IN HOUSE AUTHORITIES DISCOVER 435 PLANTS

Except for the smell of marijuana, Friday was an unremarkable day in a
quiet, middle-class neighborhood off Wekiva Springs Road.

Residents said the usual things about their new neighbor. He was a
quiet man who kept to himself. They were surprised, they said.

None recalled smelling the peculiar odor until Orange County deputy
sheriffs opened the front doors of 2335 Ashington Park Drive to let in
a little fresh air.

The plants inside - 435 in two bedrooms - perspired seemingly as much
as a high school track-and-field team in May. Faint at a distance, the
escaping fumes grew close to overpowering.

``My joy was a lot higher than I expected,'' Deputy Chuck Stallings
said of finding more plants than anyone had thought possible. ``A
location such as this was not likely to raise police
suspicion.''

In early January, a tipster told the sheriff's Sector One Bike Unit in
northwest Orange County that the three-bedroom house was being turned
into a nursery for potent home-grown marijuana.

Raymond Jones, 38, rented the house in January after moving from West
Virginia, deputies said. He refused Friday to speak to deputies, who
charged him with conspiracy to traffic in cannabis and possession with
intent to distribute.

``There's obviously a chain of command here, and we need to get to the
top of it,'' Stallings said. ``I'm sure there's someone today who is
kind of upset.

Deputies said the house was about to produce its first harvest, worth
an estimated $300,000. The house was set up to harvest a crop every 90
days, they said.

Marijuana grown with a hydroponic irrigation method, special lights,
liquid fertilizers, tanks of carbon dioxide to enhance growth and
high-volume ventilation systems often is 10 to 15 times more potent
than marijuana from the 1960s and 1970s. Costs have increased as a
result. A pound of ``super pot'' sells for up to $8,000.

Unlike normally cultivated marijuana that grows to 8 feet and higher,
hydroponic plants are trimmed like bonsai. The plants seized Friday
were about 2 feet tall. Pruning helps to increase each plant's amount
of THC, the intoxicant in marijuana.

A sheriff's official said the leaves were sticky with
resin.

All the high-technology farming techniques, including a ventilation
system installed in each of the grow rooms, used up a great deal of
electricity, deputies said. Florida Power Corp. reported that Jones
was using more than twice the electricity that is expected for his
residence, a deputy said.

``I never saw anything strange except the helicopter that was flying
over the house two nights ago,'' neighbor Norma Green said.

Authorities use infrared imaging equipment aboard helicopters to
identify pot farms by tracking the amount of hot air escaping from a
house. The number of lights needed to cultivate marijuana indoors
produces excessive amounts of heat.

Jones was sent without bail to the Orange County Jail.