Flower COAs
To All my Flower Folks…
In regards to questions about COAs:
I expect to be held to the same standards as all other flower producers in the marketplace. I don’t want special treatment and I don’t expect it. I believe flower should be judged on several things; most notably: appearance, structure, smell, flavor, smoothness, affect, medicinal qualities, cleanliness, as well as price and customer service. In essence, flower is no different than any other product you buy and consume. It’s easy to tell right off the bat whether you got scammed or not. But even then, sometimes you don’t know till you try it. The proof is in the pudding as they say.
For me, I wouldn’t grow anything and I wouldn’t sell anything that I wouldn’t ingest myself. I don’t buy and resell other’s hemp products. Every flower related product I sell comes from a seed I germinated or a cutting I took. In the end, there is no one to blame for the quality of my product but myself. I sample everything before It hits the customer to ensure quality control. I know my lines and I know what they contain even without a COA.
If you require a COA for everything you ingest, then you probably won’t be buying from me. It’s not that I don’t care what my flower tests at. In fact, its quite the opposite. The simple truth is that I grow between 500-600 plants every cycle. At $40 a test, that’s $20,000 in testing, 4 times a year. It’s just not an option at my scale. I must pick and choose where I spend my money when it comes to testing. I choose to test my own lines first, because those are the ones that invariably stick around. Sometimes I’ll test every phenotype in a line, which might cost me $1000 for each line. Out of those plants, I’ll be keeping one or two, rarely three to move forward with.
I don’t have COA’s for all my flower because 80% of it will never see my farm again. If you buy flower from me, chances are you’re buying R & D flower runs. The whole intention behind these runs is to find better selections to create new and unique cultivars. I will always be a breeder first and my interest lies in unlocking the genetic potential of this plant. If I can sell some flower while I’m at it, then so be it.
What folks need to realize is that a COA is nothing more than a false sense of security. Do you trust your flower supplier to be 100% transparent with you? Do you know there is no way to validate that your COA is accurate unless you test the flower yourself. Do you know that when you grow from seed every plant will have a different level of potency regardless if it’s the same chemotype? And did you know that a single cultivar can contain multiple chemotypes?
For example, when someone grows my OC CBG, they’ll get three main chemotypes. There is CBG dominant, CBD dominant, and mixed ratio plants. That means if I took a COA for a CBG dominant chemotype and slapped it on that flower, I would be misleading folks by leaving out half of the population. Now, I can sample the CBD chemotypes, the CBG chemotypes and the mixed ratios to see what levels of potency they each contain. Out of a large enough sample size, I could tell you approximately what is within that population. And I can do that because I’ve done the testing and sampling with that line. But to think that a COA is 100% representative of the flower you buy, is to be naive.
Which brings me back to my first point. Judging flower based on flower. I understand the need to know chemotype as consumer. One needs to know that when you smoke your flower, it is, what you expect it is. Is it a pure Type III CBD strain, a pure type IV CBG strain, or a mixed chemotype II, rich in THCA? To me, these are the more important questions.
With all that said, I will be dedicating 3/4 of my grow space to clone only runs from here on out. These will be selections that we have made that will be true to their COA’s. That is the only case I see where a COA is accurate. And even then, potency from a clone can vary by grower. Just know that by the end of the year, we will have COAs for our clone runs that I can stand by 100%. I will not however, mislead folks with COAs that don’t accurately represent the flower I sell. I would much rather be honest and tell you the truth. And the truth is, I’m not wasting my money and integrity pushing inaccurate COA’s. I get every batch of flower tested by my department of agriculture for compliance and that is all I need to receive a fit for commerce certificate to sell across state lines.
I appreciate all those that have supported us and given us a chance despite being new to the scene. I know we won’t be for everyone. But for those that want to come along for the ride, the more the merrier. We are a small family farm with only four souls at the heart of it. We get up everyday and work hard to give you the best experience we can. I make my self available through Email, personal cell, and Instagram. I try my best to answer questions and provide help when I can. But I also do most of the day to day farm work and my schedule is incredibly full. Like they say, I quite a 9-5 to work 24/7. I wouldn’t change it for the world.