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Under The Nevada Sun
Rafael Munoz-Vega • Oct 19, 2021
Amargosa Valley becomes home to state’s largest sun-grown cannabis cultivation
Who on earth, besides Mother Nature, of course, would think it a good idea to grow cannabis in the desert? Either someone who was just a little bit crazy or someone who had innovated solutions around the obvious environmental challenges indigenous to a desert clime. Between the obvious heat and water-barren land, Southern Nevada’s Mojave Desert would not seem to offer prime conditions for cultivating cannabis outdoors. Yet, there is a cannabis company that has staked its claim to grow cannabis in the heart of the Armargosa Valley.
Located approximately 88 miles northwest of Las Vegas in Nye County, the Amargosa Desert is sandwiched between U.S. 95 to the north, and the California border to the south. It would seem a fitting place to grow cannabis with Death Valley National Park and Area 51 on opposing sides.
In September, MJ Holdings, Inc. received approval to transfer its recreational and medical cannabis cultivation and production license from its three-acre farm located in Pahrump to The Farm, a 260-acre piece of land in Amargosa Valley. “This milestone marks the beginning of our expansion to becoming one of the largest cultivators in the U.S.,” Roger Bloss, CEO of MJ Holdings, says.
Using innovation, technology, and out-of-the-box thinking, MJ Holdings plans to harness the advantages of outdoor growing—employing the sun, natural airflow, and mineral-dense soil—to benefit cannabis plants. “Mother Nature's going to do over 99 percent of the work. All we're doing is basically just guiding a little bit. And then we might be adding a little bit of light, we might add a little bit of heat, that type of thing,” explains the company’s founder and Chairman Paris Balaouras, who has been growing cannabis for more than 20 years.
Although he has grown cannabis both inside and out, the latter is Balaouras’s preference. “I think that is going to be the true future,” he predicts of outdoor grows. “And that's why we're so excited about it and are doing it this way. It's moving forward but we're actually moving backwards to the way that the plant fundamentally was grown for thousands of years—to actually use the sun and use Mother Nature to get the best result, to get the strongest plant and natural selection.”
You Can’t Replicate the Sun
Balaouras does not consider the cultivation he is building at The Farm to be either an outdoor grow or a greenhouse grow. Instead, he refers to it as hybrid outdoor. “We've built a system using material that cuts out some of the actual harsh rays from the sun which gives you results that are more of a full spectrum type of extraction,” Balaouras explains. “When you start taking too many things away then you get less of what Mother Nature can give you. So, in comparison to an indoor grow, where you have manufactured lights or lightbulbs, you're not getting full spectrum because it's not a full spectrum lightbulb. No one's made that up yet. No one's going to copy the sun.”
Additionally, the presence of bountiful sunlight and heat reduces the need for synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, and it inhibits parasitic growth. “In the desert when you're getting up to 115° that plant can handle it. Number two, there's benefits from the sun that you would never get in a regular indoor grow as far as pest control, as far as mold, yeast—it won't grow. You won't see those type of things out in the desert,” Balaouras says. “Unlike in Florida where you have relative humidities in the 50 or 60 percent range, you're going to get a lot of all those things, you're getting a lot of bugs, you're going to get a lot of mold, yeast, and fungus. Whereas in the desert, you're just not going to see any of that.”
Mother Nature’s rocks stars: Water, Wind & Heat
One of the most precious components critical to any crop’s success is water. In the case of The Farm, they will be utilizing groundwater from Amargosa Valley’s aquifer, rather than the surface water of Lake Mead. “We have the number one thing that you need after the land, obviously, the water. We have the water rights,” says Balaouras. “Because if you don't have water in the desert then you don't have the water anywhere, you're done.”
MJ Holdings has acquired 180-acre feet of water rights. “Paris bought land that sits on an aquifer. Our aquifer is replenished by rainwater so we are not touching any of the consumer water,” adds Bloss.
It might be a bit hard to fathom, but the Mojave’s three-digit temperatures are an advantage to a cannabis cultivation. “The sun is a disinfectant,” offers Balaouras. “The sun is actually a pest control. When the plant is growing at its peak vegetative state, it's 110° out there and the relative humidity is less than 10 percent so mold can’t grow. And in talking about spider mites and different pests, they can't function in that heat.”
The desert’s wind-driven blow dryer effect is another helpful component to the growing process. “Because you're getting full spectrum sunlight, you get that full air exchange. You don't have 30 rotation fans in a room trying to pull out air and moving it around, you've got full air and we’ve always got a breeze out there. The plant loves it,” Balaouras enthuses. “Mother Nature's doing 99 percent. You're not hand watering, you have a watering system, you've got feeding systems. You’re basically just taking care of the plants, your de-leafing so they get a better airflow underneath the plant and that helps it along.”
There is one downside to the heat—the human element. “The only negative thing is that it's hot. As soon as we get over a certain temperature, we just pull our people off. We don't want people working when it spikes right in the middle of the summer, it's just a safety situation at that point,” says Balaouras.
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