Japanese Police Arrest Man for Growing Bonsai Marijuana
Earlier this month, police in Osaka arrested a 35-year-old janitor named Satoshi Ohashi after discovering that he was secretly cultivating marijuana at home for commercial sale. Ohashi disguised the psychoactive plants as bonsai trees. Instead of using standard cannabis cultivation techniques, Ohashi applied bonsai methods to his plants. As a result, instead of tall, sprawling cannabis bushes, he managed to grow compact plants no taller than 40 centimeters (about 16 inches). Police found 21 cannabis plants in his home in the Higashiyodogawa district. The seized harvest weighed 121 grams, which is worth about 1.2 million yen (approximately $10,050 USD) on the local black market. Ohashi was charged with producing large quantities of drugs for commercial distribution.
Bonsai Cannabis: Techniques and Methods
“Bonsai” literally means “plant grown in a container” in Japanese. The secret of the technique lies in trimming the leaves of young plants during the summer. This prevents the plant from growing tall and instead encourages it to use its nutrients to produce new foliage, keeping it short and compact.
Another important technique for maintaining a plant’s compact size is called “nebari,” which involves creating visible supporting roots. To achieve this, you carefully trim the lower roots, allowing the root system to develop upward, closer to the soil surface. Another method, called “toriki” (air layering), can also be used to create these roots. This technique involves gradually cutting off the nutrient supply to the lower parts of the root system by partially exposing unnecessary roots to oxygen, causing them to die off over time. This method can also be used to control plant growth and to create new shoots for cultivation as separate plants.
Returning to Ohashi’s story, he told police that he started using bonsai techniques to grow marijuana because it helped him keep the plants compact without sacrificing yield. He also claimed that he had only recently started this practice and achieved such interesting results shortly before his arrest.
Marijuana in Japan: Strict Laws and Risks
Simply put, cultivating marijuana in Japan is extremely risky. Local authorities treat the use and distribution of drugs as serious crimes, with penalties as severe as those for robbery or even murder. In other words, even possession of cannabis can result in a lengthy prison sentence.
Recently, another home grower in Japan, Sataru Washimi from Hokkaido, was also imprisoned. Police were alerted by the building’s fire alarm system, which detected fumes from his drying harvest placed over an electric heater in a closet. Notably, Washimi could have avoided the police encounter, as he was in Tokyo on business at the time. He later admitted that he should have listened to another grower’s advice not to leave drying plants unattended.
Japan’s “Mr. Miyagi” of Cannabis
Ohashi has become something of a celebrity in Japan, with the media dubbing him the “Mr. Miyagi of cannabis” (likely because he is Japanese and enjoyed growing bonsai). So far, foreign correspondents have not been able to interview him about his arrest and unusual craft. However, examples of his work can be seen in videos available online from local TV channels.