Friday, 13 January 2017

Herbicide conspiracy?

By Lloyd Kerry
 
Marion MacCallum’s letter on ‘pot’ is a little off the wall to say the least (“Herbicides ruin marijuana crop.”) 



She should have stated what the two chemical compounds are that she’s referring to. 

For the sake of a little clarity, THC is tetrahydrocannabinol, the physiologically active component in cannabis (pot), which gives you the high. CBD is cannabidiol, the compound which, as she states, helps counter the effects of THC.

CBD has some medicinal benefits, as do many of roughly 700 other compounds in cannabis. Plant breeders will breed to increase one or more compounds to suit their market. Strains used for medicinal purposes tend to have higher levels of CBD to provide medicinal benefits with less of the ‘stoned effect’. Recreational users want higher THC and lower CBD levels.

 My problem with her letter is her ‘theory’ that “the land used to grow the current pot was previously used in commercial farming operations or to grow GMO's and the residue in the soil from the herbicides killed the CBD.”

Does she have a secret list of all fields in Canada now growing cannabis and what herbicides were used in those fields in the past? Usually when someone makes such a bold statement as this would have some kind of facts to back it up. I doubt you could find a cannabis plant with zero CBD.

 Regardless of the levels of THC and CBD in a given variety, I don’t think there is a herbicide conspiracy here.

No comments: