Pubdate: Sun, 30 Jun 2013
Source: Seattle Times (WA)
Copyright: 2013 The Associated Press
Contact:  http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/409
Author: Manuel Valdes, The Associated Press

FARMER FLAVORS PIGS WITH POT

(AP) - The white van with tinted windows pulled up to the Snohomish 
driveway with its cargo - cardboard boxes full of marijuana. And the 
customers eagerly awaited it, grunting and snorting.

The deal was going down for three hungry Berkshire pigs from a farm, 
and a German television crew was there to film it.

Part flavor experiment, part green recycling, part promotion, excess 
pot has been fed to the hogs by their owners, pig farmer Jeremy Gross 
and Seattle butcher William von Schneidau, since earlier this year.

Gross and von Schneidau now sell their "pot pig" cuts at von 
Schneidau's butcher shop in Pike Place Market at a premium price - 
bacon is $17 a pound, while chops go for $16.90 a pound.

"He's like, 'Let's see what kind of flavor it gives it.' So we ran it 
and it gave good flavor," Gross said. "It's like anything else; what 
you feed them is what they're going to taste like. It's almost like a 
savory alfalfa-fed cow or alfalfa-fed pig."

The meat, though, won't get people high. It's just a flavor infusion. 
While the passage of recreational marijuana in Washington state 
inspired the experiment, Gross and von Schneidau get the marijuana 
excess - roots, stems and other parts of the plant that are ground up 
and not used for consumption - from a medical marijuana dispensary.

At the butcher shop, cuts from the pot pigs are signed with a little 
drawing of a marijuana leaf stuck on them with a toothpick.

"It tastes like the best pork chop you've ever had," said Matt 
McAlman, who runs Top Shelf Organic, the dispensary that is providing 
the pot-plant waste for the pigs to eat.

The idea has brought worldwide attention. On a recent afternoon, 
Gross hosted a crew from a German science show, while von Schneidau 
has already been interviewed dozens of times.

The men, though, are relishing the spotlight to advertise von 
Schneidau's idea of locally sourced food. Gross' hogs at his 
Snohomish farm were being fed recycled byproduct before the marijuana idea.

While Gross raises pigs on his property, he works full time as a 
construction foreman. The only way he can stay in the pig business, 
he said, is the free feed he collects from a local distillery and 
brewery. He feeds his pigs barrels of the distillery wheat "mash" 
every day, fortified by a nutrient mix his veterinarian created. 
Gross gets his free pig feed, while the distillery and brewery get 
rid of waste.

Gross is applying that model to the medical marijuana excess, and von 
Schneidau hopes it's an example people use as production of marijuana 
ramps up under the state-approved system.

"Absolutely, it's a good opportunity to help people get rid of their 
waste," said von Schneidau, who is also attempting to start a 
privately owned mobile slaughterhouse.

But the state draft rules say pot-plant waste must be "rendered 
unusable" by either grinding it or mixing it with non-consumable, 
recycled solid waste, such as food waste, compost, soil and paper 
waste. The state's rules for medical marijuana do not say how to get 
rid of marijuana byproducts.

John McNamara, a professor at Washington State University's 
Department of Animal Sciences, doesn't find the experiment amusing.

"Of all the crazy things I've seen in my 37-plus years, this is the 
dumbest thing I've ever seen in my life," he said.

McNamara said in order to introduce a drug or medicine to feed that's 
being given to animals that make part of the food supply, the federal 
government must sign off on it after extensive review. He adds that 
research has shown that cannabis ingested can be transferred onto tissues.

The Food and Drug Administration is the agency that oversees the 
nation's food supply. The agency, on its website, says it "approves 
the additives or drugs that are used in feed products."

Gross is only feeding three pigs the marijuana mix, which on a recent 
afternoon they chomped down on with fervor, sticking their snouts 
into the pile of mash.

Asked if feeding marijuana affects the pigs, such as perhaps giving 
them munchies, Gross said he can see no effect on the pigs.

Already all pigs do is sleep and eat, he said.

But his farm manager mentioned that one of the more salty sows 
mellows out after a feeding.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom