Pubdate: Fri, 06 Jul 2001
Source: Munster Times (IN)
Copyright: 2001 The Munster Times
Contact:  http://www.thetimesonline.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/832
Author: Carmen Mccollum
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)

STATE COPS, COUNTY OFFICIALS FIGHT DITCH WEED

Wild--Growing Marijuana Targeted With Herbicides

WHEATFIELD -- It's marijuana season again, and that means law 
enforcement officials have begun searching trenches, roadways and 
farm fields in Northwest Indiana for the ditch weed.

Marijuana was a government-subsidized crop during World Wars I and II 
when authorities used the hemp to make rope.

Eventually the government didn't need it for rope, but marijuana 
became the most widely used and readily available drug in the United 
States.

As a result, the Drug Enforcement Administration initiated a program 
to aggressively halt the spread of ditch weed and cultivated 
marijuana through an eradication program where it targets the weed 
and cultivated marijuana grown indoors and outdoors in the middle of 
farm fields from May to November.

Last year, the DEA spent $13 million to support 96 state and local 
agencies actively trying to get rid of the drug. Locally, state 
police get $330,000 each year to fight the drug.

Indiana State Police Trooper Don Hartman and Tom Korniak, a Barkley 
Township farmer who works with the Jasper County Weed Board 
Eradication program, began spraying the weed in Jasper County last 
month.

"This is a very hardy plant," Hartman said, adding the seed can lay 
dormant 7 to 10 years then sprout.

"It's very difficult to kill," he said. "Once it goes to seed, it's 
spread by animals, birds or the wind. You have to actually destroy 
the seed and sterilize it, but it's not possible. We spray the plant 
but we have to keep checking the same area to see if it's really 
gone."

Police said people used to come from across the country, armed with a 
handwritten map, to pick the weed in Newton and Jasper counties. 
Police also said it used to be possible to drive along a country road 
and reach out and grab an armload of the weed.

Now finding the plants involves detective work.

Wild marijuana looks much like any other weed -- it's emerald green 
in color with small, jagged-teeth leaves.

Although state police said there is not much ditch weed in Lake, 
Porter and LaPorte counties, they'll search for cultivated plants 
later in the summer. Authorities are even more concerned about 
cultivated plants, those grown indoors and transplanted to farm 
fields hidden among corn and soybeans, growing 15 to 18 feet tall and 
only visible by helicopter.

Police said about a pound of cultivated marijuana is worth about 
$1,500 on the street.

"A few years ago, the jails were packed with people who came to pick 
ditch weed," Hartman said. "We'd get phone calls about strange cars 
in the area or a hotel manager would call and say that someone from a 
different state was there, and we'd do a surveillance the next day. 
That's not true anymore. You don't see people coming from all over 
the country. We believe we've had some success."

Almost 10 years ago, police destroyed about 23 million hemp plants in 
the state with a street value of $10 billion.

At least one Wheatfield farm family was surprised to see the ditch 
weed growing along the fence next to their corn crop. They said they 
had heard from police that people were coming to their farm searching 
for the ditch weed.

"We can't see them from the house," said the wife, who wished to 
remain anonymous. "They go between the bins and if it's dark outside, 
we never know they've been here. We don't go looking for it 
ourselves."

Dawn Patrick, 20, of Wheatfield, a junior at Southern Indiana 
University, was helping police spray for the second consecutive year. 
"I don't know anyone who has come to pick it, but we had heard that 
people would come look for it," she said.

Patrick is part of a crew of college students working each summer to 
spray the plants. The students work in pairs with one driving and the 
other hosing the plants down with the herbicide.

It takes about four to five hours for the plants to shrivel and die 
once they're sprayed.

Hartman said if someone picked the ditch weed after it's sprayed they 
won't die -- but they'll definitely be pretty sick.

"They won't get the same high," Hartman said, with a chuckle.
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