Sam The Skunkman finally admitted to working with GMO marijuana.

[Broseidon]

Nah man, he does know his shit, simply because he had access to all kinds of raided and government toys for decades since he worked for the DEA (I firmly believe that part, it just makes sense/fits) and now with Big AG and Pharma.

I spoke with him about testing equipment and he knew everything, was very friendly, shared his knowledge about the subject and was intrigued by my boldness and my idea and without shooting me down directly, he helped me come to the conclusion that what I wanted to do was not feasible.

The impression I got was quite clear:
Say you as a grower dream of a home-testing-equipment to test your bud for THC, CBD, terps, pathogens etc. etc.

While you dream about it and maybe look if you can aquire this or that used and try to get a general estimate of if it would cost you 10 grand, 100 grand or a million to realize that idea, Sam has already played with such equipment for a decade. How?
Well if you work with the DEA first and now Big AG and Pharma, you have access to stuff...

I imagine it like this:
While he was working with the DEA, he basically had access to seized lab equipment and the like and if you can freely move and know the government won't crack down on you, because you work with them, this gives you a security that no one in that industry had back then.
So he was free to take out a loan and invest 10K into something without worrying if it might be seized the next day in a DEA raid.

Catch my drift?

While the industry was working underground, Sam was working in the open.
While the industry was coming up with DIY solutions and workarounds, Sam could use the "big boy toys" or industry standard as it were.


So while you and I may be dreaming about having a home testing setup for THC, terpenes etc. etc., Sam not only already had that, he had basically all kinds and without telling you a brand to buy or anything, he will tell you exactly what the core technology is called and comes down to and what is essential and what you do and don't need and that it'll run you about 30-50k so you kinda don't want to do that in an illegal framework and without others joining in the investment (or you testing for others as well and charging for your service).


Imho he simply has experience where all of us only have fantasies and dreams and ideas.


Don't think that he is some kind of demigod de canna or something.

Just saying:
With all the hate the guy gets (and I am inclined to believe he deserves at least some of it), don't forget that in terms of knowledge, experience etc. he is very, very valuable to this community.

And up until now, however his cooperation with the DEA, Big AG and Pharma may look like, he has been sharing at least some of that knowledge, openly with the community.


Anyway, regarding CRISPR/GMO light:
I just read that CRISPR is being used in tests, manipulating mice genetically to remove genetic and other illnesses....

So if you can genetically alter a mouse from growing tumors to not growing tumors, I fail to see how that is not genetically modified...

Sounds like a re-labeling attempt by Big AG and Pharma to me and Sam is either drinking their kool aid or saying what he is paid to say.

Broseidon out

 

[Growstone]

his forgotten more than I could ever know. I agree.. his also forgotten more than I ever need to know... yeah, he gives a lot of his time,with massive article like responses, that go deep and are totally irrelevant to my needs and inquiry, lol.. That's what I meant by the confidence thing. But selfish of me, I guess.. others must really appreciate and enjoy the hits of knowledge..

 

[Broseidon]

Don't get me wrong growstone, I don't completely disagree with you.

He definitely speaks with a lot of confidence and I too got the impression of a guy that knows his marketing/sales/confidence speaking etc. and knows how to make himself look even more valuable than he already is.

I was just trying to communicate that I believe below all that is a wealth of knowledge and experience that still dwarfs most of us.
But I am not glorifying this, the way he came to acquire said knowledge and experience is highly dubious and questionable at best.

Stay frosty

 

[PlantManBee]

You only acquire knowledge through work in my experience. Whatever else he has done, he has done the mental work.

Here is a great place to start separating the message from the messanger.

 

[deran]

Just think about ciba-geigy, how mighty it is, even without movements of DNA chunks...
Crispr is indeed a heavy gmo tool

 

[Big Sur]

.

I spoke with Sam personally once or twice and the man is far and beyond what simple amateurs like you and me can hope to achieve in terms of growing and understanding cannabis. He just has that much experience and knowledge and access to things you and I can only dream off.
Kind of like Shanti and Nevil in many ways if you want to go that far.

But I also quickly got the impression from both our few and short conversations and his general posts and expressions on forums and elsewhere, that Sam has, if any, a very limited moral compass.

Pair that all with Sam's shady past and the alleged (or all but proven) cooperation with the DEA....
It all fits.

Interesting. Though I do not attribute his knowledge as being as deep as claimed, by him and many others. To me it seems superficial. Or flat out contradictory. Davis Watson has many aliases, AKA: Sam the Skunkman, Sam Skunkman, Sam Selezney, KnowItAll4Sure, Jingles, Selgnit, Dr Frankenbeanstein, Hemp Guy, and likely a dozen other aliases. Mario Lap, Joe Pietri and Steven Hager have written and posted a lot about him. I have also had several conversations with one of his aliases in print, mainly on IcyRag before I was banned there. What struck me was and is his version of what happened around Monterey Bay in the 60s and 70s, and my own personal experiences there are 180 degrees apart. I was around Santa Cruz, Capitola and Corrolitos a lot in the 70s. I was perplexed by his replies early on, and amused when I dug deep into who he was. The oddities and contradictions added up fast. He has many aliases. I can find no photos of him. No one I know or knew in the Monterey Bay area smoked anything called Haze until later on. No one knew of any Haze Bros growing $250 an oz weed in the 70s. For that matter, no weed there then went for anything near $250 an oz. Not even hashish or Thai sticks sold for that much. One version which I am inclined to agree with is that the real Haze Bros. were in New Jersey, and they sold Haze around NYC for some insane prices in the 70s. But even this is likely inflated from reality.

There was so much good pot around NorCal then, including Thai, Panama Red, Cambodian Red, top grade Colombian and Mexican, Hashish from Lebanon, Afghanistan and Morocco, Ganja from India, Sinsemilia from Mexico after the paraquat spraying, Kona Gold and Maui Waui, and African (now called African Black Magic). Then in the later 70s all kinds of local weed popped up, including skunk, purple, SAGE and others. From my notes, nothing sold for over $100 an oz until 1980, and then prices soared (thanks to F'ing High Times posting regional prices). Anyway, Sam the Skunk told me that Haze was the only thing he smoked then, and the rest was all bunk, including Big Sur Holy Weed/Zacatecas Purple. Well, that is a load of shit right there. Zac purple kicked ass. Kerala Ganja kicked ass. I had people literally knocking on my door asking if I had any ganja left 2 months after it was gone. The same thing happened with African. That stuff was intense. And every year we all ran low or out of weed in late summer, before the harvests. No one smoked just one strain of weed, and if it was selling for $250 an oz in the 70's, as claimed? It would be LONG GONE by March. Who would sit on something that valuable? The average oz. of good Colombian was $40 then, and I was buying early NorCal sinsemilia for $60 an oz. Top grade Mexi sinsemilia was $50 an oz. I sent that to my brother on Maui in '77, and NO ONE believed him that it was weed from the mainland. So he said it was from Kauai and they believed him. The later 70s were the golden era of good and cheap weed in NorCal. You did not have to grow any, it was cheap and it was everywhere from all over the globe.

Personally I do not believe that he bred anything in California, and used other's work and claimed it as his own. Ie., California Orange. Jerry Kamstra bred that strain and wrote about it in 1973. David claimed he developed it. He also claimed to have personally developed Skunk, but I knew several that grew that and skunkweed was ALL over NorCal by 1977, and it was highly variable. As for Haze... who knows. The version that seems most believable to me is that Haze was bred by a Santa Cruz surfer and one or two other guys that were not brothers and not named Haze. David simply lifted their genetics and sold the seeds, like he did other strains. He seems to be good at marketing and empire building. I do not know any that are good scientists, engineers or technicians, AND good at empire building. The people that develop technology are ALWAYS ripped off by someone else, and the ones that rip them off are always the ones that make the killing. There is what Watson claims, and what the rest of the world claim. Of course he says that he was ripped off by Nevil, but I believe Nevil on that score. Nevil paid David for the goods. I say touche' for outsmarting the fox in the hen house. David went on to make a killing as well, several times over. And avoided any prosecution in Holland, which is... well, unbelievable without some sort of divine intervention.

 

[Broseidon]

To clarify:
Just because I think the man is knowledgeable, doesn't mean I necessarily believe he deserves the credit he gets for stuff like breeding skunk etc.
I too am inclined to believe that he is more of a marketer than a breeder, like the Greenhouse crew et al.

It's all very dubious at best. But he does know a lot, which, again, I attribute to him being able to play with big boy toys out in the open while everyone else had to make due with makeshift DIY solutions underground.


Anyway, while reading your post Big Sur, I had an epiphany of sorts:
Can anyone even be sure that Sam the Skunkman or David Watson as it were, actually exists?
I have asked myself before if it isn't several entities/people posting under the one alias (and the several others).
Also a possibility at least.


Anyway, I don't think he is that important of a character anyway. I doubt he ever really was.
From what I gathered, I am tempted to believe he was just the one willing to sell out in order to protect his own interests, time and again.
While others like Shanti or Nevil rather took the fall and did their time.


The only thing I wanted to make sure is not lost in all the (probably justified) hate/animosity the guy (or guys?/gals?) gets, he does know a lot and is somewhat freely sharing.
So however shady you think the guy is (and I would probably agree with you), don't underestimate his experience/knowledge and value to the community.

Although he might be a net-negative for the cannabis community come to think of it.

I mean if he shares his experience/knowledge with one hand and then enables and defends Big AG/Pharma with the other (through his GMO cooperation), then I suppose he is not valuable to the community after all.
But even that wouldn't change the fact that he has knowledge and experience that most all of us can't match.


I mean if Nevil would come out of the woodwork and be available on this board again for example or if Shanti would have more time for us, I guess Sam's value would go towards 0.

But from what I could gather, Sam is the most "available" of the "old legends" and the one you are most likely to get an answer from.
Which has to count for something.

I for one was a bit Starstruck when talking with Shanti by mail. I had read Mr. Nice by Howard Marks what 20 years ago or so and I couldn't believe I was actually speaking to someone connected to the whole thing (even though their collaboration came after the events in Mr. Nice).
And I wasn't mad or sad or anything when the replies stopped coming.
After all, the man must be busy as hell and who am I to take up his time. I was flattered to even get a word in so to speak.

When I spoke with Sam, I couldn't believe that (at least for the scope of the conversation) it felt like we are talking on eye-level and he took all the time in the world to write lengthy replies and even responded to more obscure stuff or questions where I was way off base.


Since then I have often wondered how a conversation with Nevil would be like.
From what I gathered online, I imagine him as being slightly eccentric and overall not an easy person to deal/converse with. Kind of like myself ha

But it doesn't look like I will ever talk much with the man, so I gotta say, my conversation with Sam was more than I had hoped for and I personally don't expect anyone else from these "legends" to be as available and happy to talk with a no-one like myself.

Stay frosty Bros and Brodettes

 

[jack hairy]

It was nice to talk to nevil while he was here.
The only problem i ran into was that he doesnt like to type i guess.
you pretty much had to ask him one question at a time, so his response wouldnt have to be a whole paragraph. start asking too much all at once, and most of it wouldnt get answered.

 

[Growstone]

That's what i like and more inclined to trust? Or at least side to.. It might be an Aussie thing or not but if your got to put that much effort into a response, your making up stories.. add in a lack of credit given to others and your realise your reading fairytales.

 

[Big Sur]

To clarify:

Anyway, while reading your post Big Sur, I had an epiphany of sorts:
Can anyone even be sure that Sam the Skunkman or David Watson as it were, actually exists?
I have asked myself before if it isn't several entities/people posting under the one alias (and the several others).
Also a possibility at least.

Well, there is one Dave Watson. Too many have met him that I know in person. As for his multiple online personae? They multiplicity of Watson's aliases pre-date the internet by a long shot. Jingles in NorCal, selgnij on High Times, Sam Selezney (likely easier to say than Selgnij) in Holland, which seemingly became his moniker Sam Skunkman later. They kind of flow. Some others online like Hemp Guy and Knowitall4sure could be clones or imposters. I am sure that he also has multiple alternate aliases to support himself on some forums like IcyRag though. He is a moderator there. I find it odd that there are zero photos of him online. Everyone else is there, including Shanti, Nevil, Clarke, Cervantes (a media hog), Rosenthal, Pietri, Hager, Lap, Big Ed, yadda yadda. But no Watson. Just some scratched out face photos of him and his wife (supposedly) in Asia someplace.

The only thing I wanted to make sure is not lost in all the (probably justified) hate/animosity the guy (or guys?/gals?) gets, he does know a lot and is somewhat freely sharing.
So however shady you think the guy is (and I would probably agree with you), don't underestimate his experience/knowledge and value to the community.

Well, my issues is that he is not all knowing, and a lot of what he claims is pure bullshit. I can dispute pretty much most of what he claims as historical fact in the Santa Cruz area in the late 60s to mid 80s era. Never mind his mantra that hybrids are better than landraces, and what he says to have bred, and what he says to have done, and ripping off others for all the credit. I believe that his early High Times posts on genetics were listed from Clarke. Clarke's book was already written at that time. Same with the strains. He lifted them as well. And I believe that his being involved in Pharma later on he just lifted info and details from others and talks about them. I can refute a lot of what he claims on several fronts about growing weed, genetics and other stuff. So in my view he is rather toxic and as you say, will do anything and sell anyone out for a buck, or take credit for stoking his ego. I consider him a pathological liar actually. As such, he is dangerous with any information.

 

[Marcus_in_the_Darkus]

Interesting read. The GMO-CRISPR debate is one I'll stay out of but I am a student of weed history and find a lot of this discussion interesting, and David Watson was and is a key player in the story, no doubt about that. Personally I think he leans a little to the villainous side, he's a bullshitter and a braggart, but he's also lived an extraordinary life immersed in weed culture one way or another and has a lifetime of relevant experience, which is invaluable.

Reading some of the things he's written about Nevil, before Nevil turned up online, I think he was essentially truthful when you compare what he said with what Nevil later wrote. At the core of their dispute, and repeated thousands of times since among marijuana breeders, is jealousy the simple fact that once someone possesses seeds or clones, one has the right to do whatever the fuck they want with the genetics.

I've read everything I can about haze, I've read everything I could find written by or about Nevil, I've read several books and watched documentaries about the Brotherhood of Eternal Love (although most of that media is about the acid, not the weed). I haven't read all or begun to catalogue David Watson's online writing but there's a lot out there, including a lot of ICMag posts and surely thousands of PMs convincing throngs of people to send him their genetics "for the common good." Since many, many threads at IC Mag have been moderated heavily with posts deleted and edited over the years, it's a difficult task. He does seem to be mellowing as he gets older and sometimes providing truly useful historical information, which can be hard to distinguish from well crafted falsification.

Big Sur, you've said some things in this thread that I find really interesting. We're about the same age and I think similar background in a lot of ways, except weed. You grew up in California in the thick of the action in the 1970s and you were, from what I can tell, pretty deeply involved in the weed scene. I grew up in South Jersey and never saw a Thai Stick or much more exotic than Colombian, for the most part. So I really appreciate your first-hand accounts of what was, or was not happening in the California weed scene in the 70s.

I'd love to know more about Sacred Seeds, as I haven't been able to find out anything about that at all. I understand it was a breeding cooperative, probably with some amazingly talented and dedicated people, to whom we owe much, even though so much has probably been lost. You also didn't mention the BOEL in your musings about the weed scene in California; did you ever run across those guys? My guess is the BOEL was intimately involved with the collecting and breeding of cannabis genetics in California and elsewhere along the Pacific coast, and there was probably a BOEL-Sacred Seeds connection somewhere. I think the BOEL weed guys were way smarter and low key than the acid-charged crew in Laguna who drew ridiculous amounts of heat. There are probably a few still left alive who will take their stories to their graves, for fear of Patriot-Act-inspired confiscation of their estates built on crimes committed 40 years ago.

For posterity, I quote below all your posts in this thread.

My issues with David Watson (AKA: Sam the Skunkman, Dr Frankenbeanstein, Sam Selezney, etc. etc.) is that he was supplied the seeds from the DEA busts in California and made a fortune off of them. He also took full credit for developing many of those strains; Cali-O and Skunk, among others. He also claims to have founded Sacred Seeds in 1974, which is a flat out lie. It was established in the late 1930s or early 1940s. He was never the manager there, or head breeder. He was a hanger outer there. Also everyone around him in Santa Cruz and later in Amsterdam wound up getting busted and doing jail time, while he walked every time. Never mind that his arrest record from the Sacred Seeds bust has been mysteriously redacted or removed at the Santa Cruz sheriff's office, even though the earlier Dutch investigation uncovered it's existence earlier with dates and specifics.

While it is true that Watson wound up injecting genetics into the global weed scene, albeit indirectly for rather sinister reasons set up by the DEA, they were not developed by him, at least not in California. I do not know what he did with the seeds in Amsterdam, but I know a lot about what was going on here in the US west, and particularly the Monterey Bay area at that time. Skunk weed was all over the place in the late 1970s. No way one grower developed it or grew it. Cali-O was developed by Jerry Beisler. Also the Haze Bros are a retro-lie that he made up for High Times. They were not brothers, and they were not named Haze. There was no Haze strain around there before 1986 that I am aware of either, nor has anyone else that I knew there heard of it. I lived in the Monterey Bay area from 1966 to 1986, then in Los Gatos and the San Jose area from 1993 to 2003.

As for his GMO stuff, he still denies that he has anything to do with them. He says that he is 'retired' now, obviously fat and living off his profits from the sales of his companies. He also seems to be immune to DEA prosecution, and his arrest record has been wiped clean. He told me that he had over a metric ton of seeds. I dunno what he is going to do with them all. Amusing too, if you post anything negative about him a lot of places online, there are usually instant doubters and supporters of him. Some are obviously him with yet more aliases. I had one person pop up and tell me that I had to be born there to know anyone like the Haze Bros. in Correlitos. Pffft... I knew a LOT of heavies in Morgan Hill, Gilroy, Prunedale, Salinas, Monterey, Big Sur and Santa Cruz in the 70s and 80s. They (and I) were dealing a LOT of weed and other stuff. Big Sur and Prunedale were pretty closed communities, but if you had good weed? Same in Santa Cruz, like at the Old Sash Mill. I got the band Crazy Horse so stoned one night they had to stop playing. That was in 1978 when I had a bag of fresh bud from Carmel Valley, grown from seeds that I had supplied a friend. Niel Young got really pissed and stomped off, as was typical. He was mad that no one was dancing that night anyway.

The shit I stirred up back then. Meh, no one cares any more. Certainly not the millennials. History has been re-written and is vastly different than the era that I lived in.

I have written a lot about my wild days being stoned in NorCal in the 70s and 80s. I was basically a stoner hippie from 1972 through 1986. The Viet Nam War, the race and anti-war riots, Monterey Pop (before my stoner days, but I was there), SDS/The Weather Underground, the weed scene, other drugs, motorcycle gangs, Telegraph Ave in Berzerkley, Mexico trips, Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters at Asilomar and in Eugene, Big Sur as a hippie Mecca, Days on the Green rock concerts, Cannery Row, The Warlocks/Grateful Dead, Santa Cruz, The Kinks, Crazy Horse, Clint Eastwood, yadda yadda. But then there are always these 'experts' that always claim that what actually happened did not happen, as has been posted on this thread. Also many of the things I did many people just do not believe. We were immortal in those days and my brother and I took things to the edge. The heavies that we thought were dangerous told us many years later that they thought that we were the dangerous ones. I guess we were radicals, but it did not feel like it at the time. We were just going with the flow, and amplifying it.

Do not forget about Noriega being a rat for the DEA in Panama long before El Chapo:

Noriega Gave DEA Limited Aid for 5 Years, Officials Say : Drugs: Ex-Panamanian dictator took part in a secret operation, sources acknowledge. Disclosures could help the defense in the Miami narcotics trial. - latimes

I am not a big believer in astrology or any organized religion, but I have seen some of the weirdest fuck-ass things during Mercury retrogrades. The retrograde of Mercury is actually a phenomena explained by Einstein's theory of general relativity, and something that greatly confused scientists until Albert came along.

As for Sammy Skunk, Dr. Beanstein or Dave Watson (if that is his real name) and GMO? If you believe that CRISPR is GMO, as I and many others do (flipping, splicing and editing genes), then I believe he is guilty as charged. If you do not believer that CRISPR is GMO, then I guess you can acquit him. I believe that CRISPR should be labeled as GMO. But 'they' are trying to get around that in a global debate.

I think we have to draw the GMO line someplace. CRISPR is genetic engineering. Mr Watson tries, as others do, to label CRISPR as being "like hybridization". Sorry, but I do not see any similarity, or that standard breeding will ever get you to where CRISPR does. Its like them saying that TEL was great for gasoline. And that global warming is a myth. "Don't worry, modern industry will take care of you." All in the name of profit, and some rich fat cats being retired someplace. Like Mr Watson is now after pawning off his several companies.

Interesting. Though I do not attribute his knowledge as being as deep as claimed, by him and many others. To me it seems superficial. Or flat out contradictory. Davis Watson has many aliases, AKA: Sam the Skunkman, Sam Skunkman, Sam Selezney, KnowItAll4Sure, Jingles, Selgnit, Dr Frankenbeanstein, Hemp Guy, and likely a dozen other aliases. Mario Lap, Joe Pietri and Steven Hager have written and posted a lot about him. I have also had several conversations with one of his aliases in print, mainly on IcyRag before I was banned there. What struck me was and is his version of what happened around Monterey Bay in the 60s and 70s, and my own personal experiences there are 180 degrees apart. I was around Santa Cruz, Capitola and Corrolitos a lot in the 70s. I was perplexed by his replies early on, and amused when I dug deep into who he was. The oddities and contradictions added up fast. He has many aliases. I can find no photos of him. No one I know or knew in the Monterey Bay area smoked anything called Haze until later on. No one knew of any Haze Bros growing $250 an oz weed in the 70s. For that matter, no weed there then went for anything near $250 an oz. Not even hashish or Thai sticks sold for that much. One version which I am inclined to agree with is that the real Haze Bros. were in New Jersey, and they sold Haze around NYC for some insane prices in the 70s. But even this is likely inflated from reality.

There was so much good pot around NorCal then, including Thai, Panama Red, Cambodian Red, top grade Colombian and Mexican, Hashish from Lebanon, Afghanistan and Morocco, Ganja from India, Sinsemilia from Mexico after the paraquat spraying, Kona Gold and Maui Waui, and African (now called African Black Magic). Then in the later 70s all kinds of local weed popped up, including skunk, purple, SAGE and others. From my notes, nothing sold for over $100 an oz until 1980, and then prices soared (thanks to F'ing High Times posting regional prices). Anyway, Sam the Skunk told me that Haze was the only thing he smoked then, and the rest was all bunk, including Big Sur Holy Weed/Zacatecas Purple. Well, that is a load of shit right there. Zac purple kicked ass. Kerala Ganja kicked ass. I had people literally knocking on my door asking if I had any ganja left 2 months after it was gone. The same thing happened with African. That stuff was intense. And every year we all ran low or out of weed in late summer, before the harvests. No one smoked just one strain of weed, and if it was selling for $250 an oz in the 70's, as claimed? It would be LONG GONE by March. Who would sit on something that valuable? The average oz. of good Colombian was $40 then, and I was buying early NorCal sinsemilia for $60 an oz. Top grade Mexi sinsemilia was $50 an oz. I sent that to my brother on Maui in '77, and NO ONE believed him that it was weed from the mainland. So he said it was from Kauai and they believed him. The later 70s were the golden era of good and cheap weed in NorCal. You did not have to grow any, it was cheap and it was everywhere from all over the globe.

Personally I do not believe that he bred anything in California, and used other's work and claimed it as his own. Ie., California Orange. Jerry Kamstra bred that strain and wrote about it in 1973. David claimed he developed it. He also claimed to have personally developed Skunk, but I knew several that grew that and skunkweed was ALL over NorCal by 1977, and it was highly variable. As for Haze... who knows. The version that seems most believable to me is that Haze was bred by a Santa Cruz surfer and one or two other guys that were not brothers and not named Haze. David simply lifted their genetics and sold the seeds, like he did other strains. He seems to be good at marketing and empire building. I do not know any that are good scientists, engineers or technicians, AND good at empire building. The people that develop technology are ALWAYS ripped off by someone else, and the ones that rip them off are always the ones that make the killing. There is what Watson claims, and what the rest of the world claim. Of course he says that he was ripped off by Nevil, but I believe Nevil on that score. Nevil paid David for the goods. I say touche' for outsmarting the fox in the hen house. David went on to make a killing as well, several times over. And avoided any prosecution in Holland, which is... well, unbelievable without some sort of divine intervention.

Well, there is one Dave Watson. Too many have met him that I know in person. As for his multiple online personae? They multiplicity of Watson's aliases pre-date the internet by a long shot. Jingles in NorCal, selgnij on High Times, Sam Selezney (likely easier to say than Selgnij) in Holland, which seemingly became his moniker Sam Skunkman later. They kind of flow. Some others online like Hemp Guy and Knowitall4sure could be clones or imposters. I am sure that he also has multiple alternate aliases to support himself on some forums like IcyRag though. He is a moderator there. I find it odd that there are zero photos of him online. Everyone else is there, including Shanti, Nevil, Clarke, Cervantes (a media hog), Rosenthal, Pietri, Hager, Lap, Big Ed, yadda yadda. But no Watson. Just some scratched out face photos of him and his wife (supposedly) in Asia someplace.



Well, my issues is that he is not all knowing, and a lot of what he claims is pure bullshit. I can dispute pretty much most of what he claims as historical fact in the Santa Cruz area in the late 60s to mid 80s era. Never mind his mantra that hybrids are better than landraces, and what he says to have bred, and what he says to have done, and ripping off others for all the credit. I believe that his early High Times posts on genetics were listed from Clarke. Clarke's book was already written at that time. Same with the strains. He lifted them as well. And I believe that his being involved in Pharma later on he just lifted info and details from others and talks about them. I can refute a lot of what he claims on several fronts about growing weed, genetics and other stuff. So in my view he is rather toxic and as you say, will do anything and sell anyone out for a buck, or take credit for stoking his ego. I consider him a pathological liar actually. As such, he is dangerous with any information.

 

[Broseidon]

Forget all the VICE and Strain hunter crap.

If someone would make an actual, factual, historical documentary about the history of Cannabis, centered around the breeders and showrunners of that time, that would be an epic hit imho.

Just be blunt and direct and speak the truth, call Arjan and people like that out for being liars, expose the AK47 thing, heck you could end the whole thing with Greenhouse and all the other places crawling back to Shanti and CBD Crew and asking them to cross their CBD lines to their own stuff.

That would be an epic watch and it would add something to humanity actually.

Because that whole history remains completely and utterly clouded and full of false flag stuff and lies and cheating.

I bet with the rise of legalization, a great many would be interested in a reputable account of what actually happened instead of all the convoluted stories that don't add up.

 

[PlantManBee]

BOEL did a lot. I didn't know about them. What I did know a LITTLE about was US service men that imported GREAT weed and hash from all over the world. With few exceptions, the best weed I got in the early 80s was through a Vietnam vet.

 

[musashi]

...What I did know a LITTLE about was US service men that imported GREAT weed and hash from all over the world. With few exceptions, the best weed I got in the early 80s was through a Vietnam vet.

Yep yep. So true. I was there. 1969 Detroit. Terry Reid and BB King opened up for the Rolling Stones AND we were out of our minds with Thai Stick! Top 5 concert for sure! And then there was the two grocery bags of peyote buttons hehe.
IMJ, Amerika lost her innocence in the 60’s starting with the coup in ‘63; the sadness was the loss of many friends from death, suicide and addiction due to Nam.

Shaka
M

 

[Big Sur]

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Big Sur, you've said some things in this thread that I find really interesting. We're about the same age and I think similar background in a lot of ways, except weed. You grew up in California in the thick of the action in the 1970s and you were, from what I can tell, pretty deeply involved in the weed scene. I grew up in South Jersey and never saw a Thai Stick or much more exotic than Colombian, for the most part. So I really appreciate your first-hand accounts of what was, or was not happening in the California weed scene in the 70s.

I'd love to know more about Sacred Seeds, as I haven't been able to find out anything about that at all. I understand it was a breeding cooperative, probably with some amazingly talented and dedicated people, to whom we owe much, even though so much has probably been lost. You also didn't mention the BOEL in your musings about the weed scene in California; did you ever run across those guys? My guess is the BOEL was intimately involved with the collecting and breeding of cannabis genetics in California and elsewhere along the Pacific coast, and there was probably a BOEL-Sacred Seeds connection somewhere. I think the BOEL weed guys were way smarter and low key than the acid-charged crew in Laguna who drew ridiculous amounts of heat. There are probably a few still left alive who will take their stories to their graves, for fear of Patriot-Act-inspired confiscation of their estates built on crimes committed 40 years ago.

Amusing to be so quoted. I was born the same year as Nevil. I was in NorCal and Oregon from the late 50s to the present as a participant and observer. I have my memories of many wild times. I guess I am slated to be a chronologist of those events? I have no ego to protect or product to peddle, and the statute of limitations are up and/or weed is legal in the states that I have lived in. I do not sell seeds either. Some people have contacted me on several forums to complain about my seeds! Sorry guys, I have never sold any seeds through any channels (except in bag weed back in the day). Given away or traded seeds? yes. Sales? no. Though that has become a controversy in itself, in that people do not believe that I froze many now otherwise non-existent strains of seeds, or that Cannabis seeds can be frozen and remain viable. You can look on 420rag at my posts there of my older list of strains, and all the flap that those posts have stirred up (google: original source seeds from the 70s). Back in the 70's pretty much every bag of weed had seeds. People threw them away for the most part. Free genetics for the tossing. I collected and froze the better weed seeds. Also in the 70s there were the hippie ideals of he late 60s, free love, peace and understanding. In the 80s he hippies became yuppies grabbing cash, buying houses, and all the rest. Anyway, I am intrigued with people's interests in the weed scene in California in the late 60s/70s/80s. Many keep asking me about it, and I am putting together a book of short stories with a theme similar to In Watermelon Sugar. I am interleaving that with a simple book on growing weed, based on the theme of my first and favorite book on growing weed, called The Complete Cannabis Cultivator by Mary Jane Superweed.

As an aside, I was never exposed to or involved with BOEL. I never saw their logo on any product that I bought or moved. I had an array of drug sources around Monterey Bay, including: Big Sur where truckloads of weed was pouring in from Mexico and where strains like Big Sur Holy/Zac Purple were grown early on; gobs of Thai sticks and hashish from military stationed at Ft Ord; tons of Colombian brought up through Los Angeles; and after the paraquat spraying, lots of local weed grown in Carmel Valley, Big Sur, the Santa Cruz mountains, the Salinas Valley, the Santa Clara Valley, and last but not least, the Lost Coast. Which is another interesting area. I was never involved in the grow scene in Humboldt or Mendocino until much much later. They became dominant starting in the 1980s. The Lost Coast to me became more of a story of disrupted economy and disheveled population as weed took over the local economy, much to the area's detriment in my view. The Monterey Bay area was always expensive, so the impact of the weed grow scene was never that great on the local economy there, if at all. I was also never involved in Sacred Seeds or any seed company or collective, though I was aware of some of them. My oldest brother was involved with breeders in the South Coast/Big Sur area, and they focused on hybridizing African strains (rather than Afghani strains that most people were). I supplied a lot of landrace sativa seeds to them, as well as to some other independent growers in the area that grew landrace weed like I did. Some of that weed was quite spectacular. What Sacred Seeds was and what David Watson did? I am trying to sift through the bread crumbs of those entities myself. Most of what is said about SSSC is through Watson or one of his many aliases. When I was there in the 70s I never heard of SSSC, Watson, or the Haze Bros. I never saw any Haze weed there either until much much later.

 

[bluntmassa]

For the ones trying to stick up for Chimera, you can read from the horses mouth he sold out to the corporations yourselves.

https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=348375

I'll post the article again if Shantibaba gives me permission, but he deleted my thread because I had it all. Not sure if it's just because his real name was in the article or what? He did give me permission to speak of GMO marijuana but I'd have to check out the PM I was sent since I don't remember exactly what Shantibaba said.

 

[Growstone]

strange.. why would shanti delete something that's out there already? Why the need to hide shit.. pisses me off this shit industry..

 

[sensient]

Hi all, to tell you the truth I'm starting to think Sacred seeds never even existed, the only info available is from high times and Watson. All the people I've chatted with from the states and who were around at the time haven't heard a thing about it, and those heavily involved in the scene at the time have never heard of them. The seed catalog in high times has been said to have been made up and high times have said this themselves, including "R" the old high times writer, who I do know who he actually is, not just by his "R" alias. It seems sacred seeds was just another one of Watsons marketing ploys, there very well may have been a while crew who were busted who were cannabis breeders and seed collectors, but were they even called sacred seeds, I've seen the package of seeds that says sacred seeds, but did Watson just make the pack up himself? Has anyone seen a other pack or have a seed catalog besides the fake one in high times, the 20th anniversary edition book even States the catalog is fake. There may of very well have been the strains in the catalog out there, but is it just Watsons bullshit, because no one seems to know anything about Sacred seeds or have any dealings with them. I would love to see some proof! Who knows, maybe I'm tripping, but high times was just a joke magazine and most of the story's were made up rubbish. Any way, Watsons a wanker, and Chimera is the same. It's all bullshit. Big Sur knows what he's talking about and I believe what he writes is fact. We need more like him around. I was in Australia in those days so I don't know the story over there, but one thing I do know is Watson is full of it. Take care.. Sensient

 

[PlantManBee]

A rose would smell as sweet by another name.

A cadre of growers and breeders existed UNDERGROUND. That is the way that they wanted it. Except for the ones who were trying to get rich or corner the market. I'm old enough to have seen the stories shift. Like "haze"; a marketing ploy of using a Jimi Hendrix song about a particular batch of Owsley acid.

It doesn't really matter. Follow the plants that work with you.

 

[bluntmassa]

strange.. why would shanti delete something that's out there already? Why the need to hide shit.. pisses me off this shit industry..

The original article was deleted too. Not sure why he deleted the thread. Guess I'll just post it and delete Chimeras name.

.
**** ***
Founder
Chimera Genetic Resource Management
**** *** is a Cannabis breeder, author, and researcher specializing in Cannabis genetic resources – with a unique emphasis on developing custom cultivars of desired cannabinoid and terpene composition.
Renown in the industry for his broad understanding of cannabis genetics and metabolites, **** is an expert in manipulating the plant’s biosynthetic pathways. Through intensive laboratory research into the chemotypic grouping of cannabis varieties, and the mechanisms of inheritance for the metabolites produced by the plant, **** makes a a recognized international speaker in the fields of Cannabis genetics and breeding.
Founder of the European company Chimera Genetic Resource Management, and Canadian Chemovar Consulting, **** has worked with the most advanced cannabis groups to develop tissue culture protocols for standardized plantlet production, and to design and implement breeding programs focused on the development of unique medicinal and adult use varieties. **** was the lead breeder in the program to develop the first cannabis cultivars to have obtained patent protection through the USPTO, is a registered founding member of the Federal Marijuana Party and now operates a consultancy based in developing and improving cannabis’ genetic potential.

Shouldn't be any problem I just put stars over Chimera's real name. Of course he doesn't hold any patents, the corporations he worked for does.