cannabisnews.com: Manderson Area Family Harvests Hemp Crop





Manderson Area Family Harvests Hemp Crop
Posted by CN Staff on August 03, 2002 at 13:28:18 PT
By Heidi Bell Gease, Journal Staff Writer
Source: Rapid City Journal 
The third time was a charm for Alex White Plume and his family as they quietly harvested their first crop of industrial hemp this week. "It really felt good," White Plume said Friday. "Just like a sense of relief."This was the third straight year the White Plume family planted hemp on their land near Manderson. Two years in a row, federal agents confiscated the plants before they could be harvested, although the U.S. government did not file any charges against any of the White Plumes, who planned to produce and sell hemp oil and other products from the plants.
This time, family members beat government agents to the punch. They harvested most of the 3.5-acre crop Monday night."They weren't that tall, but they were done pollinating," White Plume said. "So we took some out, we cut it and it's dried."The dried hemp already has been sold to Madison Hemp & Flax Co. of Lexington, Ky., which joined with the Kentucky Hemp Growers Cooperative Association to ship a trailer full of Canadian hemp to the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation after the White Plumes' first crop was confiscated in 2000. That hemp was to be used for bricks in a hemp house.Industrial hemp is a form of the cannabis sativa plant, also known as marijuana. Unlike marijuana, hemp cannot be smoked to get high. But it can be used to make everything from rope to paper to cloth to soap to animal feed, and itrequires little water. White Plume said the seeds they planted contained little or no tetrahydrocannabinol, the ingredient in marijuana that produces a "high."Federal laws do not distinguish between hemp and marijuana, making it illegal to grow either one (although hemp can be legally imported). But in 1998, the Oglala Sioux Tribal Council voted to legalize hemp. Tribal members say that because the Oglala Sioux Tribe is a sovereign nation, its laws should apply on the reservation.The Kentucky buyers will visit the White Plumes on Wednesday, Aug. 14, to pick up the hemp. That same day, the public is invited to attend a harvest celebration and symbolic harvest of one small hemp plot.All are welcome, White Plume said, and thanksgiving ceremonies will begin about 10 a.m. He has already heard from people all over the country who are interested in attending. "I can't figure out how they hear about it," he said. "Somebody's spreading the word."This year's hemp crop was not as impressive as in years past, when plants grew to 12 or 13 feet tall. The drought kept this year's plants to half that size.But White Plume pointed out that tall prairie grasses grew only about a foot this year, so the hemp plants "still outgrew everything around." "I think they were meant to be here," he said.White Plume would not say how much hemp was harvested, but he said it was basically a symbolic amount. "This was a contract between our family and that company from Kentucky," he said. "We just wanted to keep our word that we could deliver. It took a long time, but we kept our word."There was at least one benefit to the raids of 2000 and 2001. When it came time to harvest this year's crop, the White Plumes knew what to do. "I used a Weed Eater," White Plume said. "I learned that from the Bureau of Indian Affairs and the FBI."Source: Rapid City Journal (SD)Author: Heidi Bell Gease, Journal Staff WriterPublished: August 3, 2002Copyright: 2002 Rapid City Journal Contact: denise.ross rapidcityjournal.comWebsite: http://www.rapidcityjournal.com Related Articles & Web Site:Kentucky Hemp Growers Cooperativehttp://www.hempgrowers.com/White Plumes Relinquish Hemp Crophttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread10616.shtmlHemp Grower Defiant After Crop Takenhttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread10524.shtmlThe Drug War Comes To The Rez http://cannabisnews.com/news/thread8646.shtml
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Comment #4 posted by culebra on August 04, 2002 at 08:23:23 PT
Hooray!
Here I was, skeptically awaiting the annual search-and-destroy mission on the White Plume crop. Perhaps the thugs are concentrating on things that actually matter? Probably not.
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Comment #3 posted by i420 on August 03, 2002 at 16:32:18 PT
Yay, Yay Yay..
Three cheers !!!! You gotta rename your new impement "hemp wacker" instead of "weed wacker".
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Comment #2 posted by gloovins on August 03, 2002 at 14:27:09 PT
God Bless the White Plume Nation
This symbolic harvest is very important for it shows the strength of the Native American spirit. Alive & well it is -- far away is a selected "president" hell bent on going against natures ways of providing organic bio-mass for its people. Clean bio-mass. Not fossil fuel. No, this is the fuel for the real people -- the NATIVE Americans. The ones who where here FIRST, famously mis-labled as "Indians". Native Americans MUST HAVE THEIR SOVERINTY RESPECTED. Any government of the US that does not respect their "reservation" & autonomy is not that of the american people, but that of treasonists. May Gods gift of cannabis reach all the lands of the US eventually......Our planet depends on it....God truly blessed the White Plume this year I believe. 
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Comment #1 posted by The GCW on August 03, 2002 at 13:45:03 PT
Something to learn from the FBI?
You can sense the accomplishment.This is some of Our poor, simply trying to exist. Unless Bush and his freak show are willing to kill every last one of Us. This will continue and manifold.But don't count on Bush allowing others this comfort. He is the predominate American killer in America, willing to give drugs to His killers, to be able to kill more. His druged killers He will request be able to kill those growing a plant.His family is of the genealogy that kills the most Americans.The W. is the leader. The Jeb is currently running in 2nd. How did their Father fair?It would be nice to be there offering Thanksgiving together.
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