Grower already has tree-sized cannabis plants
Under Canada’s new Cannabis Act, which takes effect next week, adults will be able to legally grow up to four of their own pot plants for personal use.
But while the framers of the new legislation probably had a modest idea of what that meant, longtime growers like Windsor’s Leo Lucier can generate an enormous amount of weed with just four plants.
Almost coinciding with the Oct. 17 legalization date, Lucier will be harvesting a small number of plants growing in the backyard of a friend’s modest home along a typical street in a town of Amherstburg residential neighbourhood.
Each of these particular potted plants, however, is a monster — taller than an adult with arms stretched upward and wider than an adult with arms spread out. “There are three types of growers: the novice, the intermediate and the advanced — this is advanced,” Lucier told the Star on a recent pre-harvest tour.
The trained and pruned branches are dense with buds laden with trichomes, the resiny crystals that will cover the plant like frost and provide the mind-altering high or the pain relief being sought by the marijuana user.
Each of the enormous plants here is a different strain — Hash Bomb, Jack Herer, Train Wreck, Charlotte’s Web.
Lucier estimates each plant will generate about four pounds of usable bud, most of which will be converted into cannabis oils, all of which, he adds, is for personal use. “For me, it’s not about getting high, it’s about relieving pain,” said the former Ontario champion boxer and Detroit Golden Glove holder who obtained a medical marijuana licence that predates by years the Oct. 17 date making pot legal for all adults. Health Canada, which, officially, still advises Canadians not to consume marijuana, had originally set a 36-inch-tall limit on grow-yourown plants, but Lucier said that restriction was soon abandoned: “I could grow a 36-inch plant vertically — for 20 feet.”
It’s called weed for a reason. Lucier, a machinist at a Windsor tool shop, said he uses marijuana for its medicinal properties, in his case to combat inflammation and chronic pain stemming from sports and workplace injuries. To help celebrate legalization, Lucier — who has organized illegal 420 pot events in the past — is organizing a “Compassion House” block party in the parking lot of several businesses at 405 Tecumseh Rd. W. Running from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. on Oct. 17. He’s promising music, cannabis counselling for the curious and “lots of freebies.” The adults-only event will be fenced off to prevent anyone under the age of 19 from entering. Organizers are asking anyone who wants to attend to bring non-perishable food items or a $5 donation for the Downtown Mission or Welcome Centre Shelter for Women.
Ontario will only legally permit online retail sales of cannabis until spring.
According to Government of Canada leaflets mailed to every Canadian household in recent days, the Cannabis Act is “designed to better protect the health and safety of Canadians, to keep cannabis out of the hands of youth and to keep profits out of the hands of criminals and organized crime.” The Windsor-Essex County Health Unit has launched its own campaign — Cannabis: Your Questions, Answered — to help educate the public about the coming changes.
Lucier said he switched to growing in a friend’s Amherstburg backyard after his own Windsor home was targeted by pot thieves.