Home Cannabis Cultivation by Mrs. Brown-Thumb

Aloha Readers!

During the elections of November 2016, Massachusetts' Residents voted to legalize the personal use of cannabis beyond that of its decriminalization back in 2008 and voting to make medical marijuana available for patients in 2012. The current laws are changing as town representatives and community members meet to decide how they want to regulate this emerging industry, however, personal cultivation and consumption has already been approved and is covered under the Commonwealth of Massachusetts' General Laws, Part 1, Title XV, Chapter 94G, Section 7;

"(a) Notwithstanding any other general or special law to the contrary, except as otherwise provided in this chapter, a person 21 years of age or older shall not be arrested, prosecuted, penalized, sanctioned or disqualified under the laws of the commonwealth in any manner, or denied any right or privilege and shall not be subject to seizure or forfeiture of assets for: 

(1) possessing, using, purchasing, processing or manufacturing 1 ounce or less of marijuana, except that not more than 5 grams of marijuana may be in the form of marijuana concentrate; 

(2) within the person's primary residence, possessing up to 10 ounces of marijuana and any marijuana produced by marijuana plants cultivated on the premises and possessing, cultivating or processing not more than 6 marijuana plants for personal use so long as not more than 12 plants are cultivated on the premises at once; 

(3) assisting another person who is 21 years of age or older in any of the acts described in this section; or 

(4) giving away or otherwise transferring without remuneration up to 1 ounce of marijuana, except that not more than 5 grams of marijuana may be in the form of marijuana concentrate, to a person 21 years of age or older, as long as the transfer is not advertised or promoted to the public." 

That given, my husband and I decided to try out cannabis cultivation on our own at home. Neither of us has any real gardening experience and we both have terrible records when it comes to keeping houseplants alive, however, we figured it was worth a try to theoretically save some money. So in November of 2017, we began the process of creating our own closed-circuit hydroponic reservoir system.

This will be a weekly blog, posted on Mondays, that will describe the process of cannabis cultivation we chose, from set-up through harvest, insights from other cultivators, as well as open discussions about issues encountered along the way. It will be great to hear about your experiences with growing at home as well!

The MA Laws pertaining to the Personal Use of Marijuana quoted in this blog can be found at- 

https://malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartI/TitleXV/Chapter94G/Section7