A sprawling compound of greenhouses produces beautiful buds year-round in Sequim’s Blue Hole, taking advantage of a microclimate and a team of owners and friends whose passion for Cannabis has never dimmed.
Founded by a group of high school buddies who grew up locally in town and grew weed in California together, the friends were called back home in 2013 for a chance to operate a legal Cannabis facility. In the decade since opening doors, they’ve built and expanded a sustainable greenhouse operation filled with in-house genetics. With natural sun and supplemental lights growing terpene-rich plants for the processing facility and huge demand for infused pre-rolls, the Canna Organix team of 43 is focused on the farm-to-rolling-table process. Selling over 100,000 units a month, the infused pre-rolls are the largest seller among the 52 products in the Canna Organix brand lineup.
“The laboratory sprays the bulk ground flower for a first infusion of terpene-infused oil, before loading joints into knockboxes that are hand twisted. Then they are sprayed on the outside with more terpene juice and rolled in diamond dust, THCA crystals, so each joint is triple infused and each unit contains two half-gram joints,” company “CEBro” Ryan Klock explained. “All of our flower and oil come from plants grown year-round in our sustainable greenhouses, here in the Blue Hole.”
The blue hole effect in Sequim is caused by a rain shadow from the Olympic Mountains, ensuring a window of land where there are 250 days of clear sky a year and only 16 inches of rainfall each year. Just 40 miles away, the Pacific National Rainforest receives over 200 inches of annual rain, drawing a striking comparison from Sequim. Touring on an October day that was rainy and windy in Seattle revealed blue skies, soft sunlight and a mid-60s temperature that felt otherworldly after a drive around the slick Tacoma Narrows.
Inside hand-constructed greenhouses are rows of tall plants that stretch happily to the sky, with roots in boxes set atop the local soil. On sunny days the lights inside are running as a supplement, but the technology is ready to add to nature, delivering a controlled environment with natural elements. They’ve bred unique strains that love the greenhouse environment, like Plu-Dough (Secret x Gelato 41), Rainshadow Runtz and the deliciously gassy Offendo (GMO x Gelato 41), plus a whole lineup of sativa strains like Super Silver Haze and Headbanger (Headband x Biker Kush) that are given more time to finish.
“Fifty-two products start in the garden with all in-house inputs for everything, and growing our own genetics and breeding is where our passion connects and makes the process super satisfying,” Co-owner Steve Olson said.
While most farms and labs have to buy outside flower from other locations to keep their products flowing, Canna Organix harnesses the power of the sun to keep everything in-house, allowing for consistent quality control that has propelled the brand around the state. It’s still a surprise for dispensaries and other farmers that a greenhouse farm is lit up and delivering fire flower from Sequim.
“Growing outdoors, intuitively you would think of Spokane because it’s sunnier, but you’re fighting extremes on both ends — harsher summers and colder winters. The idea of the greenhouses is to keep a steady environment, so Sequim is the perfect place on the west side, the most stable year-round climate,” Kyle Canty, lead grower and co-owner, explained as we walked through the warm, double-walled greenhouses that felt alive with the mixing of air and plants gently waving under the sun and supplemental lights.
An employee garden of reclaimed 65-gallon pots is also outside, in a place where the team can take a break and grab fresh offerings from the earth. “This garden is for our family here, so anybody can pick fresh herbs. The team didn’t like eating fresh veggies, but they love the herbs, so you’ll see lemon balm, oregano, sage, rosemary, green beans, Thai basil, cilantro, chives, mint and a shitty little lavender plant,” Klock said with an infectious laugh, adding that the facility has a $12,000 annual budget for provided snacks, plus endless juice and java to keep the team jacked up. “Food insecurity is a real problem in this world, and everyone struggles to pay bills. So while we can’t provide everything, we do want to provide a little something extra for our amazing team.”
With five flowering greenhouses, two for mothers and clones, and an outside chilled curing container, there’s a lot of action under the sun. The team started with two greenhouses and a main building that was half the size, with expansions coming through reinvestment and hard work.
“It was a bare lot, so we built everything ourselves — from the fences to the camera lines to the original warehouse, and then the warehouse expansion. Our other partner, Tim Humiston, designs the environmental control systems for the greenhouses, all the coding and programming of controllers, so there’s lots of science and nerding out behind the weed,” partner Steve Olson said. “We’ve been able to grow into funding the expansion and finding the capacity we shot for in the beginning, but it’s been a process of growing, getting efficient, getting to scale and improving. Doing it in phases has been a good move. Being established for 10 years now, I think we’re figuring out all the lanes to use our resources, bringing terpy products to market, and we’ve got other new things in the works.”
As the Cannabis market continues to adapt and develop in Washington, Canna Organix has built an island of sustainability in the Blue Hole, using greenhouses to grow high-terpene flower that feeds the entire operation. The company pushes tens of thousands of terpene- and diamond-covered joints, tasty concentrates and top-shelf flower into 52 different products for the state each month.
“I love it and take satisfaction as long as it’s going well. It’s the exact opposite if it turns to shit, and there’s no growers out there that are batting 1,000. I’ve been growing weed now for 24 years, so I’ve seen a lot of change,” Canty explained passionately. When asked why he continues to grind through the highs and lows, he had a simple response.
“Because this is what we do. I could have been a framer or a plumber, but this is the path I chose. Running a Tier 3 operation, there’s a certain level of ADD you have to have to maintain. It takes a lot of focus to dive in and have it dialed, and the grow becomes a part of you. There are no holidays here. I’ve got a wife and four kids too, so juggling a commercial operation is a lot, but it’s what I love to do. Every day I come to work, I’m happy I’m in the garden.”
