Back in the long gone days of my youth, when I was working long hours as a nurseryman at a wholesale nursery in Kent, Washington, there were certain plants I admired greatly. This place had a small greenhouse just for bonsai that the owners tended carefully just about every day (mere laborers like me couldn’t touch those.) They sold lace maples, which were probably my favorite tree at that time — I bought one for my parents. But by far the most beautiful plants in the whole place were these big, gloriously bushy, vividly green plants raised out back, secretly, by a couple of the workers. These were the healthiest plants I’ve ever seen, lovingly tended by the crew on breaks, initially raised illicitly under the benches in a hothouse and then transplanted to a sunny spot in an empty field.
You can guess what kind of plant they were. Unfortunately, just as they were reaching peak growth, the owner discovered them and took a machete to them.
There will be no machetes in Minnesota this summer!
Minnesota’s foray into legal marijuana reached the first major decision point as the state House considered a bill Monday that establishes a seed-to-sale program and streamlines a process for clearing prior criminal offenses off records.
The vote – along with one set for Friday in the Senate – won’t end the debate. Differences in the two versions would have to be reconciled before anything reaches Gov. Tim Walz, who supports permitting adults over 21 to buy, possess and use cannabis.
But if a bill passes before May 22, Minnesota’s marijuana landscape would change starting this summer.
“Cannabis will be no longer illegal this summer,” said the bill’s lead sponsor, Rep. Zack Stephenson, DFL-Coon Rapids. “The regulation, rulemaking and licensing process will take many more months. Beyond that you will of course also be able to home grow starting this summer so it will be a while before Minnesotans can expect to see a dispensary open up.”
I should mention my least favorite plant: kinnikinik. They had acres of that potted stuff that I had to shuffle around and weed and load on trucks — it’s a popular, low growing ground cover that may have been the bread and butter of the nursery, but I just found it boring.
One word: triffids.
C’mon, PZ – It’s obvious for you: “Spider plant!
Well, there are two primary cultivars of cannibis, one with THC and the other, a very modest trace that has no psychoactive effects.
I prefer the latter, although that’s because I’m allergic to the smoke from burning parts of that plant. The fiber is quite excellent though and the CBD oil is wonderful for various and sundry joint pains.
Still, for me, I tend to prefer edible plants, such as various types of peppers, roma tomatoes, fava beans, green beans, radishes, etc. I’d order the window planters, soil and seeds, but alas, I need to spend that money on a replacement hell phone, as I dropped and broke mine. :/
It’s fun to grow. I managed to turn a dresser into an enclosed ebb and flow hydroponics setup once. That was fun.
Kinnikinik?
(Wikis) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bearberry
Huh.
One invasive weed we don’t have yet. Good.
Does seem like its the American equiovalent of “Bushtucker”which is in its favour but still.
wzrd1@3: Hemp seed is actually edible and IMO quite tasty.
Legalising Cannabis has been one of the promises of our current government, but this being Germany the whole thing turns out to be much more complicated than I would have imagined…
And of course talk shows and opinion pieces all through the media are presenting “experts” warning of the devastating effect legalising something that practically everybody has access to anyway will have on the adolescents.
StevoR & PZ — I won’t mention your distain for Arctostaphylos and it’s many varieties to my partner. Those could be fighting words with her…like when our neighbor described our front garden as “full of weeds.” As an avid native plant person, she has several varieties of Arctostaphylos growing in our garden. Though I barely know one plant from another, I find it quit pleasant overall. To each his own, I suppose.
My favorite plant is kudzu.
As long as it is somewhere else.
Fun to look at and talk about but I wouldn’t want to have any.
Ahh, Kinnickinnick. It’s all over the place up at my family’s summer cabin, which shouldn’t be surprising because, well, sandy rough terrain surrounding an old glacial finger lake in British Columbia. Perfect for a cold-adapted sand-loving ground cover plant. We actively encouraged it to grow in some areas because our cabin is on a pretty steep hillside and the plant helps keep any of the other sand and dirt from sliding down into the lake.
I’ve saw some nutritional data on hemp seeds, I might check them out eventually. They’d move up on my list to try items if they were about double the fiber they currently have. Protein and fiber are always a winning combination!
I spent quite some time ripping out invasive Himalayan blackberry and English ivy on a steep, yellow jacket-infested hillside on our property and replaced it with native kinnickinnic. Sue me, I say “invasive” and “native,” and I like boring ground cover.
The real reason to like kinnikinnick is the leafgall aphids, Tamalia coweni and a few others, which turn the leaves bright red. They’re especially happy to slurp up the over-popular Vancouver Jade cultivar. The aphids are partly social, and have a soldier morph as gate keeper. The life cycle is entertainingly complex, and there are about 25 other arthropod species associated with the galls.
I didn’t do a lot of pot when I was young, but it is the best thing around when you’re 60+. It helps a lot with sleep, and also w aches and pains.
along w protein and fiber (noted earlier), hemp seeds also have great omega 3 content.
Also hemp plants themselves are phenomenally useful, for cordage, textiles, building materials, etc. It’s a native plant that we should be encouraging lots of cultivation of.
@11. charley : “I spent quite some time ripping out invasive Himalayan blackberry and English ivy on a steep, yellow jacket-infested hillside on our property and replaced it with native kinnickinnic.”
Ivy – english, Irish and other (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedera#Invasive_exotic ) – is indeed an incredibly invasive plant here in Oz which I’ve spent time ripping out more inprivate gardens as a weed growing further than wanted and and seen some the damage it can do in our bushland too. Respect.
@7. robro :
Okay that’s fair enough to a degree but the problem is when you get plants that change ecologies and reduce biodiversity driving native species into local or even complete extinction, changing the landscape for the poorer and less diverse. Buffel grass ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cenchrus_ciliaris ) has done huge damage in large parts of Australia driving Indigneous People todespiar because the ecology, the environment that was there before it took over has gone. It burns hotter killing the seeds of natives and damaging things like rock art and cultural site and has transformed the landscape in ways I don’t fully appreciate let alone most others but ar ehorific for those who knew and sang Country.
Prickly Pear before that was also devastating in the past although it’s now controlled ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prickly_pears_in_Australia ) but still a problem in some areas.
In my local area Boneseed ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boneseed_in_Australia ) is horrendously invasive and can take over whole hillsides and keeps spreading; able to invade pristine bush and transform biodiverse, prisitine native bushland that is special in numinous* ways I can’t even begin to put into words into dull, sad monocultures thatcompletyely take over and where very little else then grows ditto Olea europea (European Olive) and Sollya (Billardiera heterophylla ) and a handful of other invasive weeds. My personal least favourite being spiky Gorse. (Ulex europaeus.) Anyhow, thing is some of these weeds are seriosuly ecologically harmful and kill other species and yeah, that’s aserious, greivous problem and harm. Think of them as the vegetative equivalent of Murdoch media or Trumpists.
Where your Arctostaphylos sp are native then fine. I’ve no issue with it and good for it. Where it harms the ecologies of other areas – yeah, that’s not cool or okay. I know there’s the whole “new nature” thing and evolution and all but yeah, no. As a volunmterr bushcarer who has spent a lot of my life in it, there is something special* that is well, ..yeah..
.* Yes not a typo. For once.