Dutch pilot experiment: LEGALLY growing organic female hemp flowers high in CBD

[oldchuck]

Interesting information on the CBD dosing, Dutch. I would like to read a more detailed paper on the subject. I wonder if you could provide a reference?

I'm guessing that I take in roughly 200-300 mg of CBD a day which almost controls my seizures. If I had adequate raw material I would like to double that and may very well be able to do that if I have a good season. My costs are not quite zero but vastly less than what those rip off artist, hemp juice salesmen are getting. Cannabis, in my view, ought to be a way to reduce health care costs, not jack them up even higher.

On another note, I caught a short uTube video yesterday of an enormous hemp harvester chopping a huge hemp field. It is a double deck cutter with the tops funneled into a hopper and the lower stems chopped and laid in windrows on the ground. It would probably strip a 1 Ha field in about ten minutes.

Looking forward to your photos, Karl.

 

[karl.uk]

oldchuck, how do you extract you CBD product ?
Also now Thinking of producing feminised Finola seeds for planting out 2016 season, would do this under lights indoors to control male/female, anyone done this before with Finola.
1st Pic of sowing 2 acres Finola 26/05.
More pics to follow as we progress.
K

 

[karl.uk]

Hi All,
In your experiences with Finola, when can we expect, after sowing, the males to start showing themselves ?? And how long will this occur for ? (just so i Can ensure we get them all)
Thanks in advance

 

[oldchuck]

Your males should show up in less than a month, Karl. It is one of the remarkable things about Finola.

I make a simple kitchen chemistry ethanol extraction and then concentrate it about 10 to 1. My dosing is purely guesswork at this point. I'd like to refine it some.

 

[Santalum]

Why aren't any of you looking to feminizing programs for your seed? surely it would be cheaper than using regulated European labour rates to weed out males? Offshore the feminizing where it is both legal and cheap to produce such seed? Not sure how this would be viewed by the owners of the varietal rights but I'm sure they would be open to exploring all sorts of commercial arrangements?

 

[urrrrr]

I'm at this point where soon going to ask manufacturing permission from my agricultural ministry, and I hope there are no setbacks. I have thought a lot about the technology, I'm going to build a like a regular alcohol distillation machine about 500L , so I can collect the alcohol back, and a large sealable plastic tub where cannabis and alcohol are.

But if the screen would be metallic and has spiral inside where the material can go through, and it would be spinning all the time. All time feed and other side drop out, and inside there would be small nodules that spray, small but efficient amount of nitrogen.
But CO2 and N2 are expensive, a lot of calculation needed to profitability.

Still isopropyl is a kind of safe bet(distillation is with electronic ceramic heater somewhere at 140C and if needed a little bit more to evaporate THC, (if the officials know, and require ). After dissolving the oil to lower percentage the THC % is not noticeable at all.

Soon I will get my first small batch ready, and then I hope that after GC-MS it will be good numbers.

 

[VonBudí]

bump

 

[karl.uk]

Hey Guys whats happening ?

 

[oldchuck]

I've got some Finola growing, legally this year. Unfortunately, it is on poor ground and small. Hemp does not like clay and lots of water. Also have some Finola X Ciskei (F2s) maturing in the greenhouse. They are interesting and quite diverse. Making seed. This forum has gotten kind of slow for my taste.

 

[Only Ornamental]

Hemp LOVES clay rich soil (at least, that's what's written in every hemp growing literature I've seen so far). Sure, very wet clay is poor in oxygen and that's poison for the roots.
I hope the F2's are doing fine cause mine don't cope well with the heat/drought wave we had till a week ago...

 

[oldchuck]

Clay and wet ground kind of go together, OO. We've had a lot of rain this season too.

The F2s are doing fine. I have five females maturing seeds. I hope the father was the six foot male I just chopped a couple of days ago. The girls are all different, tall, short, bushy, thin, quite interesting.

 

[karl.uk]

Dutch,
Any further news on your extraction techniques ?

 

[Santalum]

The best ameliorant for heavy clays which drain poorly is gypsum. Calcium opens soils up to facilitate better drainage. Even if your topsoil clay is non responsive to this treatment, the subsoil clays usually are. You want to be shooting at 4-6t/ha (or 1.6-4t/acre) as a basal rate. Most clays are calcium deficient even if lime has been applied as it takes significant time for lime to solubilise in a high pH environment.

 

[oldchuck]

Gypsum is more soluble than lime? How does calcium make for better drainage? How you doin', Sant? I keep planting seeds. Finola matures in 90 days. I still got time.

 

[Santalum]

All good OC. Well not really but we keep smilin anyway.

Lime really needs H+ ions to pull the Ca2+ cation into solution. Clays are typically not acidic so you can add lime but it won't solubilise. Calcium will displace magnesium which is usually in abundance in clay and it has a large hydration sphere in effect 'opening' up the soil profile. Clays deficient in calcium are generally poor draining. Gypsum will release the calcium cation regardless of high pH. Also gives you loads of plant available sulphur. We've been renovating our clay soils with gypsum for the last 5 years with good success albeit growing grain crops.

Hemp may love clay but it doesn't like wet, so you better have your clay well fertilised with Calcium.

 

[Only Ornamental]

Gypsum is more soluble than lime?

Yes
You may find the following links helpful:
1
2

 

[oldchuck]

Okay, guys, I think I am getting the chemistry, at least vaguely. I read in that IPNI pamphlet:

"Where gypsum is used in the remediation of high Na soils, it generally results in the enhancement of soil physical properties – such as reducing bulk density, increasing permeability and water infiltration, and decreasing soil crusting. In most conditions, adding gypsum by itself will not loosen compacted or heavy clay soils."

My dirt is heavy and wet, not solid clay. There's some sand and organic forest debris. I saved a stem and root from one of last year's tiny Finola plants. The tap root extends down about an inch and then hangs a 90 degree angle for most of it's 4 or 5 inch length. It couldn't penetrate any deeper so tried to grow sideways. Gypsum seems to help with the chemistry but it is not going to solve my hard ground problem. I'm thinking add wood chips which I can produce in abundance but wood chips will suck N.

Congratulations, Sant on getting to 50 posts. You are now a member of the elite.

 

[mexcurandero420]

Gypsum is great to improve your clay soil, but lava dust would be better because of the minerales and trace elements, which could give your harvest a boost.

Keep on growing

 

[DutchHempCBD]

Hi All,

We finally processed the dried harvest of last year by using a combine to strip the leaves and flowers from the stem. Though this worked we noticed an obvious loss in trichomes. The leaves and flowers we processed using a 2 mm rotary sieve followed up by a 250 micron sieve. Though this technique worked, as in we produced some 'hemp hash' like material we have a very poor understanding of how much we actually gained and or lost from this processing method and how much it would cost if you would scale it up. Ahh well, the focus now is on our new crop, and to see if we can process this crop while it's still fresh to avoid trichome loss.

@Karl.Uk ->
- Did you manage to cull the males?
- How are you planning to harvest and proces your plants into an actual extract/concentrate?
- Can you also post some pictures of your field?

 

[karl.uk]

No we didnt manage to cull all the males !!
We are also looking at producing feminised Finola seeds for next year ( indoor grow) to eleviate the above problem with the males.
Harvest will be done with a cutter on the tractor, all green materials stripped from the plant, some will be juiced and frozen immediatly, the other will be dried, and oil produced (alcohol extraction technique)
Pictures to follow..