Brick Weed - How it's made

[Moldy Dreads]

I found an interesting article from an Argentinian Canna Magazine that details the trip of a journalist to a huge Paraguayan plantation. He added photos and descriptions of how the "weed" is harvested and handled/pressed. Apparently they are trying to say that no ammonia is added at the point of pressing, the actual wet weed that rots in the bricks, in the hot sun and the resulting mold is what causes the formation of ammonia and that nasty ammonia smell..
I'm still skeptical about some of the bricks I've seen tho, I wonder if some do add the ammonia or if it really all natural, you decide -

Ghetto presses- Note how they hollow out part of the tree to use a jack to press down on the wood! The old man also mentions that he lets the buds dry for a couple days to retain the aroma, but most greedy farmers press it wet for weight and that's what causes the nitrogen to form ammonia byproducts as the bricks rot..

At one point they say the smaller ones are a hybrid of some sort and the tall ones are "Brazilian" genetics..

 

[pounds]

I personally think its the rotting buds that produces that smell.

 

[Aeroguerilla]

brick weed is weed that has been compressed with trash compactors for easy shipment. by the time it reaches the states im sure its months old and thats why it dont smell as good. gets u fucked up tho... ever keep a bag of sour d for over a year? then take it out an smell it... im talking like a qt oz. when u take it out, it will smell like mids. brick weed is just old compressed weed. any weed sits around long enough it will smell like mids

 

[pounds]

brick weed will get you fucked up no doubt! thats why they sell sooooo much of it in the usa. $300 a lb in my area wholesale lol

 

[Moldy Dreads]

brick weed is weed that has been compressed with trash compactors for easy shipment. by the time it reaches the states im sure its months old and thats why it dont smell as good. gets u fucked up tho... ever keep a bag of sour d for over a year? then take it out an smell it... im talking like a qt oz. when u take it out, it will smell like mids. brick weed is just old compressed weed. any weed sits around long enough it will smell like mids

It's way worse than old weed, the brick weed from Paraguay is pressed mostly wet, dripping wet, then it rots and turns black and stinks of ammonia, and is still wet when you try to break it up, truly disgusting. Regular brick weed is like Ripple Wine, and this wet brick weed is like pruno, BIG difference LOL jk.

 

[Julian]

Ammonia smell is due to Anaerobic bacteria. Ammonia is not added.

Actually, pressing an art.....(how dry, when to, how much compression, etc). Sure many have seen absolutely beautiful product and absolutely horrid. If done right way, time it sits is actually a good cure. (ie:? If not too tight, if dry enough, right time, size of package, etc.....)

(most of the "brick" I see is nicely done seedless NL, AK's, c99's, etc, etc, low compression, good dry, etc, and such from Mexican border)

 

[dkmonk]

Julian you must be real close to the border to see those strains, up in the mid west we get good bricked, but it is 90% mexican sative, which I still do enjoy the good batches, but wish i could get some bricked strains like nl, c99, and ak.

 

[Moldy Dreads]

Actually, pressing an art.....(how dry, when to, how much compression, etc). Sure many have seen absolutely beautiful product and absolutely horrid. If done right way, time it sits is actually a good cure. (ie:? If not too tight, if dry enough, right time, size of package, etc.....)

(most of the "brick" I see is nicely done seedless NL, AK's, c99's, etc, etc, low compression, good dry, etc, and such from Mexican border)

Exactly. Most Americans have never seen the disgusting brick that South Americans are forced to live with. The shit is actually black, wet and stinks and makes your eyes water like ammonia, really nasty stuff. The brick I see here in socal is amazing compared to that crap, some is even green and like Julian said, many are from US bred seeds..Paraguayan brick is truly disgusting..

 

[MtnKuSh]

THIS IS THE FIRST I EVER HURD OF SOME1 THINKING THEY ADD AMMONIA TO WEED.. if your any kinda weed grower,smoker etc one should no that if buds are still wet or just not fully dry that when you put the weed in a bag with no air that they will get an ammonia smell..come on people alittle CS goes along way. most nuggs from brick are pretty decent from the start..but then they get compressed and sit in humid,dry rooms etc for months at a time turning the weed to a shitty dirty ammonia smelling schwag ditch weed.

 

[Greyskull]

many are from US bred seeds..Paraguayan brick is truly disgusting..

cough... cough... reeferman... cough ...cough

 

[Julian]

Nah, but spend/have spent a lot of time over last 25yrs down there, so.....

Worldwide routes and number of farms misunderstood......people tend to make blanket statements.....it's quite possible, Mexico alone has......fuck......300,000 farms alone...

Lot of different things, different ops operating simultaneously....and, quite a few take not only take their operations serious, but their product as well.....

Different things flowing from many sources in different quantities....sometimes the entire crops and batches from any one go to a single group, etc, etc....(ie: Best stuff rarely makes it out into the open...it's taken (already spoken for) even before it's ready)

Lot of superior product being produced in many places, areas....but, as with anything, anytime...best stuff goes either to A. The longest term buyers, B. to who pays the most, C. To a single source it was made for to begin with.......(ie: You have groups who own a piece of ops, specifically for their supply...investors, partners,and on and on and on and on....ie:fuck, give me 2MM right now and I'll set one up and guarantee you 50 tons of SSH per year for $800 per unit (or we split net).... and on and on...........

Not to mention (and, people should listen but never do.......), the only reason inferior exists is because someone took it...ie: That's the game...you want to unload the worst first, and you sit on the nicest for your special people, etc.......(eventually, they don't even bother to show you the shit.....but once you take the shit....well, guess what your going to be getting from then on first ...

Lot of angles to it.....

 

[MMAJAY]

A very good percentage of brick we get here in the south is most often seedy and quality is very good most of the time. There is a large hispanic population here and prices are between 900-1200 bux a LB. At one time i used to pick up a QP every week to dispence amongst close friends and maybe 1 time did i get shit that i took back. I would say 90% of the brick in NC comes from mexico via the general population who lives here. Weekly you hear on the news of hispanics getting busted with large amounts of bud as well as coke. Between grows some decent squeezed green will get you threw in a pinch. They squeeze that brick in any way they can to smuggle the largest amount of bud possible in kilo bricks or larger bricks. You would be surprised how small they can squeeze a 20 lb brick. The buzz is always there but the taste , smell , freshness and potency will never compare to all the sticky well cured bud we all have grown to enjoy.

 

[MtnKuSh]

900-1200 lb for schwag..? im lucky if its more then $400lb year round here and quality is from piss poor to pretty decent green skunky mids and still 400lb

 

[Aeroguerilla]

900-1200 lb for schwag..? im lucky if its more then $400lb year round here and quality is from piss poor to pretty decent green skunky mids and still 400lb

400lb? we lucky if we see em for a g round my parts, load up the tractor trailer mang will double up lol

 

[Moldy Dreads]

THIS IS THE FIRST I EVER HURD OF SOME1 THINKING THEY ADD AMMONIA TO WEED.. if your any kinda weed grower,smoker etc one should no that if buds are still wet or just not fully dry that when you put the weed in a bag with no air that they will get an ammonia smell..come on people alittle CS goes along way. most nuggs from brick are pretty decent from the start..but then they get compressed and sit in humid,dry rooms etc for months at a time turning the weed to a shitty dirty ammonia smelling schwag ditch weed.

If you can't understand Spanish to read the article and have never been to S. America, you are clueless man, seriously. The author himself went to do the article based on the common notion or "myth" in South America that the shit has ammonia added to cross borders etc..Brick down there is not the same as brick here, down in Paraguay, like the article states, the bricks are wet, black and smell way different than "old" brick weed that was made from buds that were semi-dry. The bricks discussed in the article, and the 20 different bricks I saw a couple months ago while down there were far different from bricks in the USA. They were black, wet and smelled so foul your eyes water. You just have never seen that nasty crap, or you too would swear it was dipped in engine oil with ammonia..

 

[B.C.]

Imo, alot of brickweed is dried enough to be smoked, but that doesn't mean it's plum dry. The stems will have a lot of moisture still in them. Those bricks will tend mold right where those stems are cut on the ends of the bricks first. Most of those guys are strickly out to make cash, so they want some water weight left. But, it can't be a green ball of fuzz by the time it hits middle america either.

Some ( but not enough ) of these guys -are- smart enough to know if you want top dollar, you need a top of the line product. They go the whole 9 yards, good genetics and they dry it out completly before packing it. These bricks will store away for months, only to get better because of the curring they go through. They also fetch top dollar in the "brick weed" world. But still, it's brickweed, so it's very affordable for the end consumer. Especially when compared to shit that's being labled as "Dank" or "Dro" and being sold for up to 20$ a gram. lol... BC

 

[Hazy Lady]

If you can't understand Spanish to read the article and have never been to S. America, you are clueless man, seriously. The author himself went to do the article based on the common notion or "myth" in South America that the shit has ammonia added to cross borders etc..Brick down there is not the same as brick here, down in Paraguay, like the article states, the bricks are wet, black and smell way different than "old" brick weed that was made from buds that were semi-dry. The bricks discussed in the article, and the 20 different bricks I saw a couple months ago while down there were far different from bricks in the USA. They were black, wet and smelled so foul your eyes water. You just have never seen that nasty crap, or you too would swear it was dipped in engine oil with ammonia..

Moldy, how does this stuff smoke? i assume it at least works or how has a market developed? Ta.

 

[dkmonk]

Well guess I am glad, I dont live there, because here our brick is usually drier than a desert. Even though I grow my own I still like brick weed, it is a different high imo, and I cant get hazy buds w/o buying it unless I want to wait forever to grow some.

 

[MMAJAY]

900-1200 lb for schwag..? im lucky if its more then $400lb year round here and quality is from piss poor to pretty decent green skunky mids and still 400lb

I do not deal per say any more but if i could get good green mids for that i would probably be back in buisiness, i don't doubt what you said i just know i cant touch that price for the better of the mexi schwag. Me myself if i have to seed in a shoe box with a card cuz its full of seeds and smells like ammonia i will wait till i can get the icky sticky. There is great demand for the mids here but i will stick to 2 hit chronic if at all possible.

 

[bobblehead]

Not only is Paraguayan brick the worst weed in the world, it's difficult to get any quantity unless you know the right people. I was recently in argentina for 2 months, and it's just as horrible as everyone says. I bought "20 grams" which really turned out to be more like 7-10 grams... of black, wet, seedy bullshit. So compact and wet you couldn't break it up easily, and most of the seeds were crushed. I had some great sativa bud in Peru. Mexican brick is the bomb compared to Paraguayan. Unfortunately the Argentines don't know much about quality bud, unless they grow it themselves. Weird since personal use has been decriminalized. They can smell it coming from your house, and they won't do anything. You can even grow a personal amount without any problems... However if you have a tree, and they find out, they'll come chop that shit down. Anyway, 3 pesos, a little less than a dollar, will buy you a pinner of their bullshit weed. I had an offer for an interview for that magazine, THC, after introducing vertical growing on one of their forums. I didn't go through with it though. I don't really care for the idea of being published, no matter what country it's in.