Adventures In The Growing Trade

The Christening​

It was 1993. The location: an hour north of Kamloops in a semi-arid land known as Barrier. A wonderful place to grow dope.

Our projected take that year was a million plus. But big dreams die hard in the de facto realm of the grower. A stark truth that was about to bonk me straight on the head and leave me dazed - for the rest of my career.

The official name for the place was "The River Patch" because it sat nestled in a clearing a few meters from a snaking bend in the mighty Columbia River, miles from nowhere. Off an inactive logging road, on foot over kilometers of punishing terrain, impenetrable bug and leach infested swamps, treacherous portages, and thicket that left you gnashing your teeth in stinging pain and indignation over not being able to make a damned bit of headway. The newly initiated were rendered almost useless getting to the River Patch. When they finally arrived on site and plunked down to catch their breath, feet bleeding and blistered, forlorn was written all over their faces as they realized the excruciating work had not yet even begun.

It was absolute hell getting there. Preparing yourself for it required a full game face and the acceptance you would be scraped, bruised, soaking wet and certainly ready for a nap by the time you arrived. I had my own name for this place, and would mutter it from time to time en route: The Hell Patch.
You could get to the Hell Patch by motorboat despite the pull of the river, but that risky mode of transportation was only used to bring in huge amounts of payload for growing. With illegal pot farming, hardship is your best insurance policy. The spot was super remote, but every spot has its Achilles heel, and this was no exception. The river was dotted with cabins every couple of kilometers. One cabin in particular was nestled at the top of the gorge around the river bend, just up from where we were growing. Even though it was out of sight, we suspected the water-filled gorge acted like a megaphone and any loud sounds we made would be funneled up and down the river.

Being heard by someone visiting the cabin was always a concern when we went in by boat. Consequently, we used the boat entry only during the week, late in the day, when there was less likelihood of anyone visiting.
The plot was only supposed to have one hundred holes. All plots should have no more than one hundred holes (to diversify) but we went in late, and, with illegal outdoor growing, things always get compromised in unsuspecting ways when you get behind the eight ball.

So the spot ended up with four hundred holes, one hundred of which I dug myself in one day as the crew looked on in stunned amazement. I tore up thick roots and dug huge 3x3 holes all day long without a break. By the end of that first day, my forearms had seized from swinging the pickaxe, and my fingers were so stiff and cramped up I could no longer grip. They hadn't yet devised the name Brown Dirt Warrior, but they would.

And with every hole I dug, every shovel full of hard won dirt, that Achilles' heel cabin gnawed on my mind like flesh-eating disease.
That year, many growers came and went on Hell Patch; in fact, we used it as a litmus test to see if the help had "the right stuff". If you got to Hell Patch and did an honest day's work, you gained instant respect and were welcomed into the "brotherhood of the guerrilla".

By mid-summer, the plants on Hell Patch had grown to six feet tall. Our conservative estimate on this strain was a thousand bucks per plant if they reached maturity, which added up to four hundred thousand bucks.
The anticipation was palpable as we approached the opening to the Patch after two weeks away, bristling with excitement over how big the plants might have grown. When we broke into the opening and saw them, still there and much bigger, a self-satisfied euphoria swept over us. The mood elevated instantly; smiling eyes and glistening faces roamed the patch for the initial inspection, the fun time we got to observe and enjoy. Then we got to work, pumped and enthused, the promise of a bumper crop coursing through our veins, feeding the adrenalin rush.

After all that punishing work throughout the seasons, it was indeed a thing of beauty to arrive at the Patch and see what amounted to a Christmas tree farm of maturing, high-grade marijuana, worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Fall snuck up on us like a caravan of nomadic thieves and, before we knew it, leaves were crunching underfoot and breaths were steamy. The promise of harvest lingered in the back of our minds in a place we dared not linger, lest the fates intervene and snatch it all away with cold indifference. I'd always been told not to count my chickens before they hatched, but a glistening black Heritage Soft Tail all covered in chrome danced across my mind to mask the pain about to be endured on Hell Patch.
It was our last day in before harvest and we had to go in to inspect and gather supplies. The river, low from a dry summer, had formed lots of mud holes to negotiate off the banks where the woods were just too thick to hike. My feet were covered in muck from my boots being sucked off again and again, and my legs ached from the heavy trudging. By the time we got on patch, I was sticky with dried sweat, soaked from head to toe with swamp water, covered in blood-sucking leaches, bug-bitten - and spent.

The first signature plant signals you are on patch. Entering the plot, it didn't immediately register in my mind that it wasn‘t there. Then I noticed the empty hole. I checked my bearings to ensure I was in the right place. Stunned, I went to the next empty hole. Scurrying into the patch, I stopped dead. All that was visible was a huge, open swath where the marijuana had been.
One of the crew yelled out what no one else wanted to hear - a blood-curdling "IT'S FUCKIN' GONE!" One of the tougher guys in the crew began to whimper, and I looked over to see him shaking his head and beating his fist into a rotted stump. Slowly and stiffly, I planted myself and exhaled, too stunned to swat away the giant mosquitoes gorging on my face. I looked around at this now violated space, which once had held such sanctity, and thought about my punishing year here. "Why was I doing this," I pondered, "subjecting myself to such a ridiculous crapshoot?"

There would be some serious soul-searching done before the year was out. Everything had changed. But it would be getting dark soon. No point staying in this godforsaken place.