MARIJUANA INVESTIGATION

SEEDS OF DOUBT

Forget Jesus and the loaves and fish, look what the Mounties can do
with a bag of pot seeds

Following a 14-month investigation, RCMP officers recently uncovered a
Montreal organization selling marijuana seeds via the Internet.
Trumpeting their latest victory against "the scourge of marijuana" -
their term - the Mounties claim that the amount of seeds seized would
fill 500 greenhouses with 400 plants, representing 42 million joints
on the street.

That seems comparable to the infamous "angels on the head of a pin"
query that has forever plagued scholars and barflies alike. Even with
all the CSI toys and tools at their disposal, how could the Mounties
possibly calculate the number of joints in a bag of seeds?

Marijuana being an unregulated industry, there's no such thing as a
standard-sized joint. Size differs in various regions for various
reasons, not the least of which are availability, quality of paper
and, of course, level of individual joint-rolling skills.

Vancouver's super-seed salesman Marc Emery - currently fighting
extradition to the U.S. where he faces a life sentence for selling
marijuana seeds to needy Americans - half a gram is the standard joint
in Western Canada. "A lot, though," he added, "depends on the quality."

Eastern Canadians are surprisingly more conservative. "Here they run
about a third of a gram," said Montreal's Marc Boris St-Maurice,
founder and former leader of the federal Marijuana Party, now with
NORML Canada.

"But that," he noted, "can fluctuate according to circumstance."

Scientists and horticulturalists agree, in a manner of
speaking...

"The RCMP's yield prediction was probably based on average yields for
a typical marijuana plant," explained David Wees, horticulturalist and
faculty lecturer at McGill's Macdonald campus, but he questions the
accuracy of their method. "It's possible the seed won't germinate, in
which case the yield is zero; or the seed germinates but the plant
dies; or the seed germinates and grows 'normally' but because of
factors such as heat, light, water or soil fertility, the yield is
lower - or higher - than expected."

His colleague, Dr. Suha Jabaji-Harem, Associate Dean of Research for
Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, readily concurred.

"It would be extremely difficult," he said. "The age, health and
storage conditions of the seeds would have to be considered, and for
maximum yield, growing conditions have to be perfect so the plant is
not under stress."

Being illegal probably qualifies as being under stress, and - despite
being one of our largest agro-industries - lack of regulation confines
cannabis cultivation to somewhat substandard conditions. But when
asked if one could really tell how much a single seed would yield,
research scientist Daniel C.W. Brown, of London, Ontario's Southern
Crop Protection and Food Research Centre, was very clear:

"Yes and no," he said.

"Generally, a larger seed is an indication of a better developed, more
mature seed which should have stronger growth potential. But many
factors could impact on the yield of the plant, e.g., genetic
potential, nutrition, environment, disease and pest resistance, water
availability, etc."

Julie Plamondon, media relations officer with Agriculture and
Agri-Food Canada, had the final word, and unfortunately for our
beloved Mounties it puts their claim of 42 million joints in serious
doubt, challenging their credibility.

"No," she stated emphatically. "It is not possible to determine plant
yield simply by examining seeds, either by the naked eye or with a
microscope."

She did, however, thank us for our interest in agriculture.