BREAKING THE TWO-POUND BARRIER

Except for a few hundred medical users, who are permitted to grow for
personal use, and some firms like Prairie Plant Systems, a Saskatoon,
Sask. firm with a $4.3 million contract to grow for the Canadian
government, cultivators of weed in Canada are operating outside the
law. You wouldn't know it, though, from a trip to Advanced Nutrients'
fertilizer factory.

"We've got 86 different products, eight labs, 65 employees, and we'll
gross $12 million (Canadian) this year, $20 million in 2004," says
Michael Straumietis, who with partners Robert Higgins and Eugene
Yordanov owns this firm. "I'd say 85% of this is related to the
marijuana industry. We hope it's all for medical, but we can't control
that." The Advanced factory, 50 miles outside of Vancouver, can
produce up to 1.5 million liters of nutrients a month. Products like
Dr. Hornby's Big Bud and Sensipro [as in "sinsemilla"] are distributed
to some 380 stores in the U.S. and Canada, plus another 260 in Australia.

By supplying medical patients with their products for free (and
shipping Voodoo Juice to the University of Mississippi, where
scientists grow marijuana for the U.S. government), they have
generated testimonials and "studies" showing their products produce
bigger, stronger pot plants than the competition.

"Look at this--2.13 pounds per light!" says Yordanov, brandishing a
paper. "We beat them in THC [tetrahydrocannabinol], too. A pound per
light used to be good--we'll do 3."

For the beginner, there is a $375 kit of seven nutrient boxes, one for
each week of a quick grow. "Totally idiot-proof," says Straumietis, a
43-year-old American who fled to Canada from a since-dismissed
marijuana charge. "We've revolutionized marketing and packaging."

The trio began business in 1996 with a hydroponic shop, later moving
into lighting and electrical supplies. In 2001 they were charged by
Canadian authorities with conspiracy to export and conspiracy to
traffic in cannabis, stemming from a 200-pound smuggling bust in
Washington State. Last March the Canadian government halted
prosecution, for reasons unknown, but could start again.

The three deny the charges but also figure increasing liberalization
of the law in Canada makes the nutrients more of a promising line,
anyway. "There's more money in this than in growing," Straumietis
says. "In five to seven years we could gross $100 million. If cannabis
is legal[ized], we'll probably charge less, make it up on volume."