Crop-tober in New Mexico: A Visit to Tumbleweed Farms in Ojo Caliente
Photos Courtesy of Author
It is early morning and first light is dawning over the tops of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. It is soft and purple, a beautiful pastel start to this Saturday in early October. I am up for the first time before the sun to visit a cannabis farm in the nearby town of Ojo Caliente.
I am outside with my dog, a freshly packed bowl waiting to be lit while she takes in the smells of the yard from the nocturnal visitors that are common on the edge of town. I’ve heard coyotes in the distance before and my neighbor shares excitedly about the garter snakes and skunks that pass through. All of this is, I assume, what Diamond is looking for as she sniffs the yard in the dim light spilling over the mountains to the east.
In my bowl is Burmese Mimosa, a sativa-dominant hybrid strain I got earlier this year during my visit to Sol Spirit Farms, a cannabis farm in the Emerald Triangle of California. The landscape here in New Mexico couldn’t be more different to grow cannabis in, and yet I am on my way to Tumbleweed Farm, here cannabis is grown in the same way, rooted deep down in the soil, thriving under the tarp canopy of a greenhouse.
The Cannabis Market in New Mexico
The New Mexico cannabis market is vastly different than California in many ways. Here, the market is young and just getting started. It’s also (already) oversaturated.
The New Mexico cannabis market is not one that’s gotten much attention. Recreational cannabis was legalized in 2021, just a month after New York. But while the Empire State has captured headlines for the slow roll-out and numerous issues with the program. New Mexico has snuck under the radar with an industry that unfolded almost instantly.
There are over 1,000 dispensaries in New Mexico. The state population hovers around 2.1 million. If you do the math, that’s over 22 dispensaries per 100,000 residents. That’s over a third more than Colorado, New Mexico’s northern neighbor where weed has been legal for seven years longer.
So where to go from here? That is the question.
Getting to Know New Mexico Weed
I’ve been in town, for just over two weeks, getting my bearings in the small mountain town of Taos. On my first visit to a dispensary, the budtender mentioned outdoor grows in Ojo Caliente, a town just south of here in the mountains, famous for its hot springs. I was intrigued and went home to Google it and stumbled upon this farm in the top of the search results. A few emails later, Tara and Peter invited me, a complete stranger, to their farm which was also their home.
I hadn’t been up this early before, but morning in the mountains is the best time. Watching the sunlight creep inch by inch up the hills, the soft purple light fading to white, I breathe in my bowl hits with the cool morning air.
Snow will fall just a few weeks after this, but today it is a stunning fall day. The air is cool and crisp, a bluebird day drawing in. A gorgeous day to harvest some cannabis plants. It is Crop-tober, the most exciting time of the year for cannabis cultivators. I am on my way to see plants at their peak, days (or hours) before harvest.
I’m on the road to the farm by 8 am, driving my 2015 Ford Transit 350 XLT, a vehicle so large I’ve named her Behemoth, or Bevy for short. I’m accustomed to driving her at this point, but exiting the highway takes me down narrow roads of broken asphalt and finally, to a sight I’ve come to both love and dread: the dirt road.
I encountered many of these while driving the van across the country. Bevy does not have a lift kit nor re-enforced suspension, which makes navigating 5 tons of diesel machine on uneven roads slow goings. Still, if you’re looking to get off-grid in America these days, you need to navigate more than one dirt road.
I drive slowly, braking for dogs running through the road and axel-braking potholes until I come to a turn that really has me stumped. Google Maps has led me wrong on more than one occasion and if I have to turn around past here, it’s not going to be a good time.
A text from Tara assures me that I’m headed in the right direction, so I navigate down the road, narrowed to a single land and banked steeply on one side. A little more than a half mile later I arrive, Tara pulling open the gate that encloses their property. Bevy clears the fence with an inch to spare on either side.
Tumbleweed Farm: A Microcultivator with a Macro Lens
The property is beautiful. We’re in the hills of Ojo Caliente, with dry, crumbling volcanic soil, stained various shades of red. A steep set of hills cuts this rural neighborhood off from the highway on the other side. Fruit trees; apple, almond, apricot, mulberry, and more, stretch back as far as the eye can see from the driveway, which is U-shaped and has a gorgeous center planting area with scrub brushes and cacti poking out. The air is still cool but the rising sun is heating up quickly, beating down on us. This is the landscape where you would expect to see a tumbleweed passing through.
But instead, I’m here for weed-weed. The cannabis greenhouse is tucked back from sight and as we walk there, Peter tells me how the couple bought the property back in 2009 and immediately started farming the land. The fruit trees went in first, to provide shade for the dogs, food for them, and a root system to help hold water in the ground. He points out the layers of mulch covering the soil, and explains how it helps hold what little rainwater falls here. Taos, on the edge of the mountains, gets over 20 inches of rain and snow a year. Just an hour south, less than 10 inches annually is common. The climate changes quickly in these hills, and Ojo Caliente is hot and dry.
On the edge of the greenhouse, I can hear fans whirling inside, keeping the rapidly warming air moving around. Peter tells me that the fans are solar-powered and actually, the entire grow works on an almost-closed loop system.
It is an impressive commitment, but a necessary one. Water is a scarce resource out here and cannabis is a notoriously thirsty plant. Combine the water bill with the lights bills (up to 18 hours a day of light) and it’s easy to see how quickly the environmental impact of an indoor grow adds up. Out here, Peter and Tara can offset some of that. The electrical equipment in the greenhouse is solar-powered, the plants are watered from the rainwater cistern outside, and all of their fertilizers come from within the bioregion here, if it’s not made directly on the property.
They focus on Korean Natural Farming for fertilizer production and permaculture techniques to bring a balance of nutrients to the soil. Tara worked with Bill Mollison, the Father of permaculture, for years and learned many of the techniques they apply here today.
Inside the greenhouse, the plants are huge. They soar over my head, brushing the top of the greenhouse, thick, resinous flowers protruding from every branch. The stalks are thick as bushes and the long branches are trellised to the ceiling with string, like tomatoes. It smells like heaven, earthy and rich and dank, life blossoming all around.
In the greenhouse, all the plants are put into the ground as seeds. The growing season here is blessed with bountiful sun, but temperatures still swing toward freezing in the winter and spring, and in 2023, the growing season at Tumbleweed Farms was just 110 days. Plants are placed on the Spring Equinox, Peter tells me. He likes to start them where they’ll stay to encourage root growth before plant growth.
And clearly, there’s a healthy root system in this greenhouse. Not just the cannabis plants: the marigolds, tomatoes, and yellow hot peppers co-planted. In addition to vital nutrient exchange, the plants also provide habitats for the team of biological pest control: praying mantis, lacewings, and minute paitue bugs patrol the plants, keeping them clear of pests that could harm flower production.
Despite the lack of rain, cannabis grows well here. Plants thrive, Peter tells me, in the diluted light of the greenhouse. Scented Marker, the first strain we walk past, is nearly 11 feet tall. Any taller and it will start growing sideways against the roof. What stands out to me as we walk the path is how thick the flowers are on all sides. Giant, resinous nugs hang over the path and when I touch them, my fingers are sticky and aromatic.
Peter has been growing cannabis for most of his life. He started in the medical market in New Mexico in 2016, but spent his life helping his dad grow medicine after serving in Vietnam. His flowers bear the touch of an experienced cultivator, who knows how to work with the climate.
The nights are cool and the lack of humidity means there’s not as much risk of problems with powdery mildew near harvest. The temperature swings from the peak of the day to cool early morning encourage resin production (something I first learned in New York, where October mornings are equally cool.)
The greenhouse, rich though it is in life and as much as I want to stay here all day, is just one place Tara and Peter are growing. Their property is 2 acres and it is incredibly productive. They grow corn and raise horses down by the creek, and the horse waste is composted and then turned to fertilizer for the many plants here, including the flower beds. Beyond the flowers are another section of cannabis, this one growing bushy and exposed in the sun.
It’s several kinds of Kush: short, stocky, and generously thick nugs. Peter tells me that Kushes tend to do well in New Mexico because the growing conditions are similar to the mountain ranges in Afghanistan where it originated: the elevation, arid climate, and temperature swings from the hot sun to the cold nights. These plants are so thick with flowers that Peter tells me he’s considering trying something new this year: drying them with the colas points up.
What Does it Take to Grow High-Quality Cannabis?
As I walk and talk with Tara and Peter through the property, we inevitably come across one of my favorite topics: the chemical diversity of sun-grown cannabis plants. The plants here are gorgeously aromatic, indicative of a rich terpene profile. And research shows that cannabis plants grown in the sun have more terpenes and a greater range of minor cannabinoids.
But more than that, and what it’s clear that both Peter and Tara fervently believe, is that nature got it right: the sun, the soil, and the rainwater create a combination that no LED in the world can replicate. And beyond that, indoor weed does not set the standard for quality. It is possible to grow quality weed that is also environmentally friendly.
That caveat to this is that there’s a limit to the size of the organization that can do so. Tumbleweed Farms holds a micro-cultivation license, which gives them the ability to grow up to 200 plants at once. They are growing 70 plants this year. 70 plants is, they feel, the limit to what they can sustainably support from a resources perspective and from a hands-on cultivation perspective.
In the Flower Issue of Fat Nugs Magazine, we asked cultivators across the country: what makes flower craft and high-quality? With answers from over a dozen industry professionals, a theme emerged: the ability to be hands-on with each plant, every day.
I am amazed by the results of Tara and Peter’s hands-on work here. These cannabis plants are thriving and I can hardly wait until the day these flowers are ready for purchase at my local dispensary. Just one though, because cultivators here are responsible for their own distribution - a tall task for a business owner running a farm and working another job full time.
The Evolution of Cannabis in the Land of Enchantment
Things are challenging in New Mexico. Prices are inevitably plummeting. In Santa Fe, I got 9 grams for $45. Dispensaries (which are the only disproportionate aspect of the supply chain in New Mexico, where testing labs, processors, and consumption businesses are far and few between) are closing left and right, flashing signs for 50% off all products. There’s also the business side of running a cannabis company: recent regulation changes meant Tara and Peter had to get a county business license they didn’t originally need to operate.
But all is not lost. Tara, who has lived in the Land of Enchantment for decades, talks about a cannabis culture ingrained in the larger culture. There is a market for products with higher amounts of CBD than I’ve seen in many other states. Tara told me that their first strain to sell out from the 2023 harvest had 15 - 18% CBD and less THC. I’ve been able to find low THC flower at nearly every dispensary I’ve visited - a welcome reprieve from the Oregon and California markets where you’re lucky to find a strain under 25%.
Peter and Tara sent me home with a joint of Grape Stomper, Tara’s favorite strain from the 2023 harvest. It hit smooth and resinous, the gentle uplifting high of sungrown cannabis I’ve come to know and love. I shared it with my husband in our backyard, watching the sunset behind the apple trees in my new favorite smoke spot.
The land, this state, this market are so underrated. And truly, there is still so much room for growth in cannabis in New Mexico. With any luck, it will be led by people like Tara and Peter, who do this for the love the plant and the community.
