Upon exhaling a deep drag from a joint of Blueberry Cookies grown by City Farmers BCN the smoke from my hit travels upward into the rafters of a 16th century modernist palace in the heart of Barcelona’s Gothic Quarter. As the smoke rises, I contemplate the significance of the moment and celebrate the freedom of enjoying weed in a country where cannabis still exists within a gray area, decriminalized for personal use and cultivation, but illegal for commercial sales. I’m in Barcelona, Spain for an international gathering focused on cannabis genetics. More specifically, I’m within the Hash Marihuana & Hemp Museum at a party celebrating the collaborative efforts that bridged a domestic-international divide to unite two storied cannabis seed companies, Sensi Seeds and Humboldt Seed Company. Within their collaboration lies the dawning of a new chapter in the history of marijuana, one which continues the tradition of legendary fusions of Californian and European genetics that started in the 1970s when the hybridization of cannabis began.

The collaborative project is called Breeding Grounds and resulted in the release of four new feminized seeds: The Bird (OG Kush x Humboldt Dream x Larry Bird), Auto Pineapple Kush Cake (Pineapple Muffin autoflower x Banana Kush Cake autoflower), Auto Amnesia Jelly (Mint Jelly autoflower x Amnesia autoflower XXL), and one that lies within the highly popular and heavily lauded Z terp family, Purple Berry Muffinz (Purple Bud x Blueberry Muffin x Zkittlez). But arguably more significant than the lineage of the new cannabis cultivars is the symbolism of what they represent. Sensi Seeds, which inherited the genetics of the first cannabis seed bank—Nevil Schoenmakers’s The Seed Bank of Holland—brought the world classic cultivars such as the sativa-dominant Jack Herer and has been in the business of selling cannabis seeds from its home base in Holland since the 1980s. Humboldt Seed Company, founded in California’s Emerald Triangle in 2001, has built a reputation as a trusted breeder via enormous phenohunts and award-winning cannabis such as its signature strain Blueberry Muffin. The fusion of the two companies in 2023 harkens back to the beginnings of cannabis breeding in the 1970s, when people like Sam the Skunkman and Ed Rosenthal became the catalysts for uniting European and Californian cannabis genetics, an action that created the first cannabis hybrids.

“The first time I heard about The Seed Bank, which is the precursor to what is now Sensi Seeds… my uncle had a shed where he would keep all the gardening stuff and in that shed he would stash High Times magazines and I remember sneaking into his shed—because we would sometimes you know, borrow some weed from our uncle—and we’re looking at his High Times and in the back of High Times we saw an advertisement for The Seed Bank,” explains Benjamin Lind, co-founder and chief scientific officer of Humboldt Seed Company. “And it just kind of clicked like, ‘Whoa, you can actually order seeds.’”

From a young age, Lind was observing his family members making their own cannabis crosses and learning about the importance of seeds to ensure the next year’s harvest. Sensi Seeds, he says over an early morning eating lychee fruit acquired from one of Barcelona’s famed food markets, was the first cannabis seed company that ever came into his vision. And, once he met the people behind the company and toured their facility decades later, he learned that the breeding work they had been doing aligned with his own.

“A lot of our processes are very similar,” he says. “All breeders come at breeding cannabis differently and very few have similar beliefs or similar philosophies, but we mesh really well.”

This meshing of two similar minds in the cannabis breeding world was more than a coincidence, it’s the result of years of effort put in by none other than cannabis cultivation expert Ed Rosenthal, who tells me he’s done writing books and is now more interested in acquisitions and mergers. Rosenthal’s relationship with Sensi Seeds goes back years. A mutual friend who had a cannabis club and magazine introduced Rosenthal to Ben Dronkers, the founder of Sensi Seeds, back in the 1980s. Once introduced, the two began to collaborate with each other on a museum in Amsterdam dedicated to the history of the cannabis plant which first opened in 1987.

“At the same time Nevil [Schoenmakers] was indicted so he sold his business, The Seed Bank, to [Sensi Seeds] and he took off for the wilds of Australia and he was never brought to the U.S.,” Rosenthal explains. “We stayed close and then [Dronkers] hired me off and on at different times to do things and then also put in, I think, $50,000 to $100,000 into my defense.”

The defense Rosenthal is referring to was a federal trial that began in the early 2000s when he was found guilty of three felonies related to the cultivation and sale of marijuana. After the trial, the jurors—who had not been provided with the crucial information that Rosenthal had been deputized by the city of Oakland, California to grow medical marijuana—denounced their verdict and in 2003 Rosenthal was ultimately sentenced to a single day in prison, time served.

Rosenthal calls Sensi Seeds, which is now run by Dronkers’s son Ravi Dronkers, a “legacy family,” and says when he saw them interacting with Humboldt Seed Company he realized the “cultures weren’t that different.”

“I knew this was the one to go and I just did everything so that it didn’t get fucked up,” he says. “I’m really excited about this. This is going to be very big.”

The announcement for the collaboration came in mid-March at the Hash Marihuana & Hemp Museum’s second iteration in Barcelona and included flutes of cava alongside a bowl filled with the Spanish-grown Blueberry Cookies so guests could roll their own joints. Guests in attendance included Jack Herer’s son, Dan Herer, who was spotted taking a photograph of a framed picture of his father on display within one of the rooms devoted to hemp. In a country that resides within the legal gray market for cannabis, smoking and enjoying flowers and concentrates takes place within private social clubs and spaces that are cannabis-friendly. This clearly includes the cannabis-themed museum during a private event, but also includes restaurants which will pull down their rollup doors to offer discretion for diners to smoke weed at the table while the waitstaff also lights up.

Over a candid evening conversation after one of those smoky Barcelona dinners, Rosenthal gets in a discussion with Nathaniel Pennington, co-founder and CEO of Humboldt Seed Company, about cannabis breeding. The basics of cannabis breeding involve creating new expressions of the botanical by crossing, or pollinating, the female flower with pollen from a male plant. An F1, or first generation, occurs when breeders cross two landraces—cultivars that are native to specific regions and have not been bred—or when breeders cross two inbred lines. The final hybridized result that’s released by reputable seed companies comes after at least four generations of inbreeding. The reason that the lines are inbred, or bred from plants that share similar genetics, is to stabilize the seeds ensuring that, once the seeds are grown into plants, they retain similar physical characteristics. Cannabis plants have a complex set of DNA and, like two sisters from the same family, when two cultivars are brought together the results will not be genetically identical, but rather, similar but different expressions known as phenotypes. The art of creating cannabis seeds involves the painstaking work of getting to a point where the expression of all the seeds will be the same, a process that is known as stabilizing the genetics.

“With breeding it’s not true science until it’s repeatable,” Pennington explains. “[True breeding doesn’t occur] until you can perform the same experiment, which I would say is the same seed population times the same seed population and find the same phenotypic outcome. And if you can’t reproduce that experiment then you haven’t really accomplished anything except for you’ve made a clone line which can be forever propagated as a clone, but that’s a bit of a handicap if you ask me.”

In a world filled with companies making dubious claims about the stability of their seed lines some companies, like Sensi Seeds and Humboldt Seed Company, stick to the science. In doing so, these seed banks bless humanity with reliable cultivars that cross oceans and territorial boundaries to contribute to the diverse genetic expression of the world’s most favored flower.

“Both of our families have worked for generations to preserve the very best lines and bring them to the modern market,” Lind said through a press release about the Breeding Grounds project. “We both evolved on different continents, with different selective pressures. Even though we live a world apart we have a very similar philosophy based on love and respect for the plant. It was natural we would cross-pollinate the best from Amsterdam with the best of Northern California.”

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By Ed Rosenthal

For a long time, activists have been waiting for NORML to start a political legalization drive. Years ago, California NORML had a functional organization. However, currently it’s in the hands of a Board of Directors who combine the worst qualities; uncreative amateurs who have only a marginal interest in the issue. Activists such as Dennis Peron, Jack Herer and Dr. Todd Mikuriya are consistently barred from any policy-making role. The president of the local, Dale Gerringer, complains about the Board, but for the most part appreciates their hands-off approach to his administration.

In March and April, several pieces of regressive legislation were proposed to the California State Senate and Assembly. One bill would have made it a separate criminal offense to possess any amount of marijuana in three separate packages suitable for sale. For instance, three joints or three containers of seeds. Another bill would have made it a crime to solicit to buy pot.

The third bill, which had versions in both legislative houses, would have limited diversion to growers captured with ten plants or less. In California, diversion is a judicial process for people caught possessing or cultivating marijuana for their own use. Instead of going through the court process, the charges are waived as long as the person stays out of trouble for two years. The court decides eligibility based on a preponderance of evidence. This law has saved California’s taxpayers millions of dollars since its enactment, and has saved thousands of Californians the heartache of judicial proceedings and their aftermath.

As the Senate bills began coming up for a vote, Dale became desperate. He could not get to the capital because of medical reasons, and the Board members who were suitable for legislative duty were either busy or uninterested. As a result, Dale asked me to see what I could do.

First I called up the legislative analyst of the bill and spoke with him at length. (A legislative analyst describes a bill and guesses at its effects on government and society.)

He asked me to write a statement about the proposals and let me know how to register to speak before the legislature. He also gave me advice on procedure.

The analyst asked me to write a statement about the measure and my opinion of its effects. I sent this out to him promptly. Then, searching the back of my closet, I found a serviceable suit, tie, white shirt, and shoes, and made the drive to Sacramento.

The bills were scheduled to come to committee at 1 P.M. I arrived in the hallowed halls at 9 A.M. and immediately started lobbying. I never got to see any legislators, but talked at length with a number of their aides. The first ones I went to see were those who I thought would be opposed to the bills. They were courteous, concerned about the issues, and very helpful in their comments.

Next I went to see the aides of legislators likely to be in favor of the bills. They too were courteous and engaged in frank discussions of the bills and the marijuana issue in general. I was surprised by their willingness to participate in give-and-take conversations.

The discussions with the aides were good practice for speaking before the Senators. First the proponent of the bill spoke. Then came representatives of the police, attorney general’s office, and the CAMP people. Representatives of the California Criminal Lawyers Association and the ACLU spoke against the bill. A concerned NORML lawyer, Bob Cogan, also opposed them.

The bills were fatally flawed and as the speakers discussed them, it became apparent that they would not make it out of committee. All were withdrawn. Three weeks later, the same thing happened in Assembly.

For the most part, I found the legislators abysmally ignorant about the subject of marijuana. Usually they’re led around by the state attorney general, the police, and “parent’s groups” because nobody else speaks up on the issue. Once legislators become more informed, their attitudes loosen up a bit. With concerted work, their votes can be changed.

These experiences have convinced me that continual lobbying efforts in the state legislatures could change the marijuana laws very rapidly. Prohibition is a model. In the spring of 1932, Roosevelt was opposed to a “wet” plank because he thought it would lose him votes. Within a few months, public opinion had turned. The corruption, killings, and lack of liquor made the public disgusted. Roosevelt won not only on anti-Hoover depression votes, but also because of the promise to repeal the 18th Amendment. If that history is too ancient, remember that in 1980 Reagan won partly on an anti-Commie plank. Now the Russians are our best friends.

The anti-pot groups have had a field day for years. They have faced no opposition in the government and media and have been able to deal in hysterics. Now you can help cut short their non-joyride. We need thousands of people to talk until their throats are dry.

I envision an army of lobbyists first descending on the state governments then the federal government. And I mean YOU. Everyone can do it. Simply by reading High Times, you can be an effective citizen-lobbyist.

In order to approach the government most effectively, you have to sort of play their game. Here are some rules and pointers for talking with elected government officials and their aides.

1) Everyone at the legislature is dressed in business clothes. In most legislatures, this means suits or work dresses. Attempting to approach these people in jeans makes their eyes glaze over. I know that this is going to turn a lot of people off, but dress and grooming are important. It’s a signal to them that you are ready to talk the same language.

On the other hand, legislators usually have office days in their local office. You can go visit them there to voice your concerns. These meetings are usually more informal than the ones in the capital. However, going up to the capital emphasizes the “importance” of the issue.

2) Rehearse your arguments so that you know them by heart, and do not have to think about them when you are talking with the representatives.

3) Listen to what they have to say and do not interrupt. Once they have made their argument or asked their question, then answer it or make your rebuttal.

4) Try to de-polarize the issue by first talking about what you agree on. When I was talking to conservatives, I started the discussion by bringing up some areas on which I knew we’d see eye to eye: “There is a tremendous drug problem that is out of control”; “Cocaine, especially crack, is the most dangerous drug around to both society and the people who use it,” or “The government has limited resources, and they should be used where they will do the most good.”

5) Talk in sound bytes. Legislators have a limited attention span. Instead of hearing the whole build-up of an argument, they would prefer a chunk, preferably no longer than 18 seconds.

6) Don’t make an ass out of yourself by blowing up or getting mad if things don’t go your way. The marijuana laws were not made in a day, and they won’t go away in a day. Fighting marijuana laws is a long-term effort.

7) Any comments made about your style should be taken to heart if they are well-intended.

There are six major reasons why marijuana should be legalized—they are criminal, economic, sociological, constitutional, national security and health. In future issues of the magazine, we will cover each of them thoroughly. We will also make room for comments about your experiences fighting these unjust laws in the legislature.

So get ready and get your suit and tie pressed. We’re going to the capital in September and October.

One last experience. I was walking down the hall with the Special Assistant to the Attorney General. He had just given a talk about drugs. He had been talking about rehabilitating drug users and I said to him, “There is one difference between marijuana and almost any other drug, including the legal ones, alcohol and tobacco. If you ask a nicotine addict, alcoholic, junkie, crack freak, or almost any other drug user, ‘If you could wake up tomorrow unaddicted and without cravings, would you take the option?’, for the most part these people would say yes. However, if you ask a marijuana user the same question, s/he will say no thanks, because marijuana users, for the most part, do not think the substance is hurting them.”

He said, “I never thought of that, but most of my friends who smoke it do feel the same way.” A little bit of progress was made at that moment.

Read the full issue here.

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