I discovered cannabis back in the 8o’s and started growing in about 1989 with seeds that I had purchased from Holland. It felt like the start of something great back then, lots of new varieties coming out, flowers with colours I hadn’t seen before and some genuine new tastes and smells..
Those particular seeds did not do too well, out of the 12 seeds I think I ended up with about 3 finished plants in various conditions. That year I spent a fortune on seeds and I can clearly remember thinking “I’m not very good at this”
I didn’t grow at all then for a few years, instead I began selling the seeds to freinds and aquaintences who had the growing game down ten times better than I did; seeds that I would bring back from Amsterdam and altho not growing myself I was fortunate enough to meet a few interesting characters along the way, some who went on to commercial success, either as breeders or cafe/grow shop owners, some who dabbled in the wrong area and paid for the error of their ways, myself included.
Towards the middle of the 90′s I got involved with growing again. A very very close friend of mine was diagnosed with MS and over a period of time it was painful for everybody involved as you can imagine. After not being a cannabis user since we had known each other I talked her into trying it for the first time. The relief that it brought to her was a real eye opener. Cannabis in my eyes was no longer just an enjoyable social recreational pastime, it was now a bloody miracle medicine too!
So, that week we built our first proper indoor grow house, totally taking over the spare room and we started growing again. As many growers will know, the more experience you have, the better you get and this time around I had spent lots of time with some great teachers so I knew that it was going to better then the previous attempts and indeed it was. That room was my second home for the next couple of years and indeed I did get it down eventually.
I grew so many strains back then, I would have like 20 individual strains in one grow in that single room, just one seed per strain. Haha, it is funny looking back now; It was hard work, all different sizes and flowering times, a complete mess compared to todays tidy little grows we are normally around but I learned so much; the differences with indicas and sativas and harvesting by using the thrichomes as the guide, things we take for granted nowadays and of course the interest in the cannabinoids and strains and the different medicinal properties.
Altho I was selling a few packets of seeds per month and sorting out a few friends with weed it was certainly not enough to put food on the table and with my passionate interest in this it was actually costing money as oppose to making me money. I wasn’t selling any weed either by now, I had done a little here and there but at some point I got busted, lets say I have experienced life behind bars and I wasn’t going back! Crime didn’t pay, for me at least. (If you class growing weed and sorting out yer mates at cost as a crime) so my bread and butter money comes from my events company that I set up many moons ago, bring incoming groups to Spain for things like company events, expos and conferences etc.
I did have other passions apart from cannabis, one of these being the sun! Being English we don’t get a great deal of it so I always wanted to run off and chase it and so I did for a year or two in my own strain hunter style hehe; spending some time in both Africa and in the USA where I have a few friends. My love for the sun tho inevitably brought me here to sunny Spain in the beginning of 2003. I am pretty normal blokey bloke, also liking the usual boys toys like cars and football and I am the soppiest animal lover you could ever meet, right now I have about 5 cats, 3 dogs and 2 chickens.
Since being in Spain I have continued growing of course with the freedom and the beautiful mild weather have produced some great crops, indoors and out and have met many great people. I totally love the country and cannot ever imagine going back to blighty. Even if things are shitty, its shitty with the sun shining and that makes everything a little easier I think.. I have met with many of the Spanish breeders over the last ten years and have grown dozens of Spanish strains, the better ones I recommend for the online shop.
My passion for cannabis and in particular, its medicinal properties, remains high. My interests nowadays really lie in helping new growers get started and be able to grow on their own without having to rely on dealers or crappy pharmaceutical drugs that are peddled on the masses for profits. I am also in discussions with lawyers about turning our community into a non profit organisation so that we are to reach more people.
Growing this plant is such a pleasure, a hobby, a medicine in different ways, a tolerance enhancer, it offers so much to so many. If you are thinking about starting to grow I am happy to talk to you, particularly if you are here in Spain.
Peace y Saludos
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