SECRET GARDENS YIELD DESIGNER CROPS AND OUTLAW CULTIVATORS

By John Pacenti, Associated Press Writer

MIAMI (AP) Growing marijuana in attics, in closets, in basements
has become an American obsession. Nooks and crannies in homes from here to
California harbor secret gardens that could draw prison terms for those who
tend them.

Three growers spoke to The Associated Press about their cottage industries.
Two asked for anonymity because of the risk involved since the official war
on pot was launched with the federal "Marihuana Tax Act" of 1937.

Marijuana had been used to treat everything from teething pain to epilepsy,
but the tax law made it too costly as medicine. Some states already had
similar laws on the books, but federal action encouraged more to make the
drug illegal.

Last year, state or local police arrested an estimated 642,000 Americans
for possession, use or sale, according to the FBI's Uniform Crime Reports
released in September.

But that apparently hasn't stopped the growers' ingenuity, rooted literally
and figuratively in the '60s counterculture.

To understand today's hightech strategists, look into hall closets aglow
with highwatt sodium lamps. Some growers cultivate the crop at home and
keep it there.

For one hobbyist in the Boston area, the crop is a personal hedge against
high street prices. "It's more for me and my friends," he says.

Others cultivate for quick cash. Potent indoor pot can fetch more than
$4,000 a pound, compared with $800 for outdoor crops, says Pam Brown,
spokeswoman for the Drug Enforcement Agency in Miami.

In either case, it's not cheap to produce. Just to break even, beginners
often spend thousands of dollars.

Consult High Times, the 23yearold magazine out of New York City that
endorses widespread cultivation and use of marijuana. Its editor, Steve
Hager, tries to warn "those who think they are going to profiteer growing
marijuana at home. They just end up getting themselves in trouble."

A Miami grower who began operations last spring agrees. "It's an expensive
hobby," he says, citing startup costs. "I would say we have spent at least
$8,000."

Many growathomers rely on hydroponics, plugging plants into potting trays
and pumping water and nutrients through the roots. To get the biggest
bounty in the smallest space, they also rely on highpowered lights and
cuttings from mother plants.

But connoisseurs prefer oldfashioned soil, swearing that hydroponic pot is
not as tasty. In water or in soil, it's not always easy to go hightech.

"We left it growing too long, and then we tried to put in bloom," the Miami
grower says. "A lot of the plants grew too tall. They were hitting the
roof." He ended up with hemp the industrial version of marijuana grown
until World War II and used to produce oils, paper and clothing.

Today's pot is clearly not the seedy Colombian Gold of the '60s and '70s.
Consider the exotic names of designer plants: Strawberry Water, Master
Blaster, White Rhino, Bubble Gum. Each has a particular taste, smell, color
and consistency.

The DEA's Brown compares the desire for fine marijuana to that for fine
wine. "I would rather drink a great bottle of wine ... and I'm willing to
pay more," she says. "Same thing with marijuana. You have a special market
for that professionals, yuppies. They're in wellestablished jobs,
making a lot of money. Those are the ones who can pay for this type of
marijuana."

The special draw the potency involves concentrations of
tetrahydrocannabinol. The chemical, commonly known as THC, is what creates
the smoker's high.

Super hybrids confiscated indoors in Alaska registered a 28 percent THC
level, though pot grown indoors generally ranges in the low teens,
according David Broadway, head of Florida's Department of Law Enforcement
marijuana eradication program.

For plants grown outdoors, THC levels dip to single digits, he says.

Medicinal use provides some protection from the law.

Among San Francisco growers, Hazel Rodgers is known for cultivating
marijuana to treat her glaucoma and other ailments. Now 78, she tended her
plot long before November 1996, when California voters passed Proposition
215 allowing sale and use of marijuanato treat ailments such as AIDS and
cancer.

"It wasn't a misdemeanor, it was a felony for me to grow it at the time,"
Hazel says. "I felt if they arrest a woman my age with glaucoma and a bunch
of other things, they are going to look officially silly."

Her recent crop turned out to be all male plants, stunted without female
producers. Now she relies on the Cannabis Cultivators Club, a bistro in San
Francisco that sells marijuana at reasonable prices to those in medical need.

Outside of California, growing marijuana is still very much against the
law. Under most state laws, mandatory prison sentences are not unusual for
firsttime offenders with even a few plants.

At the federal level, operations in homes, stockrooms and greenhouses with
at least 100 plants carry mandatory sentences of at least five years for
even a first offense.

Between 1989 to 1992, arrests tied to indoor operations doubled to 2,848,
the DEA says. Last year, 3,812 such operations were uncovered.

Seizures of indoor marijuana have become more frequent in South Florida.
With 131, Florida placed sixth on the nation's roster of indoor pot busts
in 1996. California, with 608, and Oregon's 429 topped the list.

How do authorities find these? Disgruntled neighbors, relatives and lovers
offer tips. Power companies often report an excessive use of electricity,
called spikes. And police sometimes hover over residential areas, using
infrared devices mounted in helicopters.

If the garden is big enough, marijuana will generate heat and trigger a
thermal detector. Despite legal challenges, the Supreme Court has upheld
such searches.

Authorities also look for accessories where there should be none such as
an airconditioner on top of a shed.

In one case, authorities in Palm Beach County, Fla., moved shovels and
rakes in a farm shed and uncovered a floor panel with a hydraulic lift.
They followed stairs into a cavern and an escape tunnel. And police
often target horticulture centers and gardening stores where agents may go
undercover to sell equipment for marijuana farming.

Sometimes cooperation comes from unexpected sources. One cultivator who had
been busted didn't like the way the DEA agent was narrating the video to be
used as evidence. So basically he provided the voiceover in proper
terminology for him.

Boasting undoes others. "They like to take pictures of themselves with
their plants," says one agent. "Man, does that have jury appeal!"

Despite the risk, marijuana and the culture surrounding it remains
attractive to entrepreneurs.

Listen to the Miami grower who declines to join the Dilbert workforce. "We
got into this so we wouldn't have to work for somebody else," he says.
Shaking off initial failure, he harvested two months later.

Though growers cultivate for different reasons, they share a passion for
their plants. "I call them my babies," says a Boston resident who tends an
attic plot. "When you have a bad crop, it bums you out."