Underground Farmer

In 2020, I was in way over my head . I had eight thousand cannabis plants in the ground with no license , riding in my life savings. 

I’ll never forget getting a phone call from my partner in crime late afternoon as the sun was setting, he said,

“I’m sorry but I need you to pull all the plants out. OLCC is coming on Monday and we are using “xyz”’s information. I won’t be back until next week but get a crew and get started.”

To make a long story short, someone gave us a heads up we were going to get a surprise visit from some cherries and berries. At the time it would have meant potential loss of property and a recreational license to grow hemp or cannabis. I threw everything in my vicinity (shovels, bamboo) like a javelin , spitting and cursing. I kicked the straw next to me and ripped a few bales open with my bare hands. The plants were overhead (mid July) and almost flowering. “For fuck sake what am I going to do now?!” I screamed.  I laid down in the soil and it felt hard, like dry clay. Talk about a temper tantrum I know…

The soil spoke to me that day, and I acknowledged I had been taking advantage of a plant, a process far greater than myself . Green greed, cash crop stuff.

I started thinking back to the JADAM farming class I took the year before. I began to dig deeper into food and cannabis production. I guess I felt like I owed the Earth a season but ended up becoming dedicated to soil growth, mycelium and worms.

“If the problem of high cost organic farming cannot be solved, it will be difficult to popularize organic agriculture and the restoration of the global environment.”  -Youngsang Cho 

I met a group of people during a workshop designed by Youngsang Cho, who had developed farming techniques based on his father's methods. These folks were involved in something incredible. A different way of saying regenerative farming, JADAM and Korean farming techniques far exceeded what is happening in the Pacific Northwest and overall US agriculture. 

JADAM uses plant material, compost, a combination of fermented teas and pesticides. None of them require purchasing from your local empire.

I should specify when I say “US” because I am referring to mono cropping, pesticide plane dropping, toxic food and “recreational” / black market cannabis.

Large scale farming companies and underground grows are similar in many ways. If we acknowledge and put forth effort into our inputs. if we treat the soil the same as we treat our bodies, we will see results immediately.  And yet I witness depleting  topsoil, bug life, leaving dust bowls and damage, sucking water from creeks.  Growing too much of anything offsets a delicate yet hearty balance.

 “JADAM is a living, feeling being…. Farmers have the responsibility to cultivate the power to survive on their own. Where they can save themselves from exploitation, and become more like nature themselves” - Youngsang Cho

This class and group of people gave me fresh perspectives. Illustrated a new painting on how I could be growing cannabis and food, I started looking in the forest for leaf mold soil (smells good too). Harvested nettles, horsetails and bracken. Turned it all, including my veggie scraps into a liquid plant tea. 

I dug trenches, filled them with wood material (carbon) grass collected after mowing (nitrogen) biochar, and egg shells (soluble calcium). Hugelkultur was my intention, through the process and the more I learned, the more I realized how much waste was produced by growers buying watered down products to feed their plants and individually packaged soil to feed their monocrop needs with no nutrients to feed worms.. stuck in a system of consuming with no conscious returns. 

“Some people think I’m gross, telling me to take a shower. But funny enough, their perfumes and colognes make me nauseous. No bother, I take a whiff of my armpit, pull straw from my hair and splinters from my fingers. Step in chicken shit three times by 9 am and still greet you with a smile. Wearing boots in the house, dogs in my bed , hair on my toast. Spare room filled with veggies, random squash eventually rots. Hell I even had a chicken there last week, posted up next to the bed.

A friend out here said to me once “My entire life is basically a giant pile of compost.” in reference to his veggie and seed farm. I thought that sounded like a badass super power.

Compost toilets, outdoor showers, hanging clothes to dry outside next to flowers.

Is it gross to live in oneself, within nature? Our own smell, worm castings and manure? Are we so far fucking removed from reality that we cannot accept a dead body? The nutrients, cells, makeup of a living entity that keeps us maneuvering? Am I crazy to plunge in a cold creek in mid winter? Or is it the freshest water we could find but you won’t accept because you seek comfort? 

All I have to say in the meantime, is Earth is my home, keeper, lover and mama. Thank 6lb sweet baby Jesus I was born here”

It’s easy to think that we could all live in a community and grow our own food, medicine and cannabis, that we could avoid these larger corporation farming techniques. Unfortunately the system in place is not supporting consumers or farmers. Oftentimes jargon complicates things, especially when parties involved have “investments” they consider “profits”. 

I think it is important we understand as future farmers (and people who eat food / smoke weed/ use any plant material) that the current food production here in the US is not as peachy keen as the bright colored packaging it comes in. I realize now that production methods, harvest methods, effect nutritional value.

 Defined by “Oxnard’s Dictionary”

 Organic -

 1. Relating to or derived from living matter 

 2.(of food or farming methods) produced or involving production without the use of chemical fertilizers, pesticides, or other artificial agents.

Bio dynamic 

1.      the study of physical motion or dynamics in living systems. 

2.      a method of organic farming involving such factors as the observation of lunar phases and planetary cycles and the use of incantations and ritual substance

Regenerative-  adjective

1.    tending to or characterized by regeneration.
"natural regenerative processes"

I am a literate hound, and maybe I chew over terms too much but this seems pretty vague to place an entire food system on.. 

“Ritual substance” and observing planet cycles I can understand. But how people twist these phrases is what I’m getting at.

Even the word “natural” has been put on blast to products on the shelf that have no life in them. Processed to the nine, compressed powders mixed up into a noodle shape. Cheese is powdered and ice cream astronaut food fed to children as school lunch.

“Derived from living matter” would technically mean cannibalism is FDA “organic” , because every human came from a womb. Nothing more organic than some afterbirth and a placenta…nutritious beyond belief but something tells me we are not quite there.

Breakdown:

FDA does not define “organic” though foods that are FDA approved may say “organic” or something like "all natural ingredients."

USDA organic requirements are more strict and Oregon Till even more so," The use of genetic engineering, or genetically modified organisms (GMOs), is prohibited in organic products. This means an organic farmer can’t plant GMO seeds, an organic cow can’t eat GMO alfalfa or corn, and an organic soup producer can’t use any GMO ingredients”.

As I move forward as a farmer, grower, and tender of soil I will continue to utilize my knowledge of these standards and share with everyone who wants to learn. Unless we grow it ourselves, and we know where the seeds came from, it’s highly likely we are being fed chemical compounds. Cannabis is the same way, in mass production it’s impossible to produce anything without the use of pesticides and low quality ingredients. Otherwise they wouldn’t need to substitute quantity over quality or confuse consumers with regulations and labels. I don’t think it’s an easy pill to swallow, we want to believe the laws and regulations help us but it is becoming obvious that is not the case. I would go so far as to say that a multitude of today's “disease” and “illness” stems from low quality inputs. To the soil and our own bodies. 

“Look at farm inputs from a nutritional standpoint. How productive is the contribution of the nutrient and in what balance? The best inputs (are the ones) with minimal nutritional losses. (It is the same with food), if the cooking method destroys vitamins and amino acids it is useless.” -Youngsang

One of the most inspiring things about Cho and his methods is his desire to share this type of  knowledge instead of keeping it from one another. I believe we are going to reach a point where it is difficult to find truly organic, well cared for vegetables, cannabis, and seeds. We will have to rely on methods that do not require us to exist within a system but perhaps in another, underground way. A way in which we are still maneuvering as farmers and consumers, but it is health oriented, preventative of illness, and valued.

Perhaps we can live in a world where we are connected with soil and soul by participating in any way we can. To some it is sharing knowledge, others may be the moving hands to tend, and some may be in the middle of it all but still willing, WANTING, to be aware of body/soil inputs.

Lesson from the Underground:

Everything earthly is alive, the further away from soil we move eventually becomes oxygen deprived.

 Article and photos by:

Medusa G Rilla