Panda Farms recently entered the NJ adult-use cannabis market with 12 strains of quality craft cannabis flower, ranging from old school strains popular in the 90s to new “exotic” strains.

They were granted a cultivation license as GSCC in the 2019-2021 medical cannabis lottery.

Growing Panda Farms Craft Cannabis Flower

CEO Jason Kabbes described Panda Farms in New Jersey as a craft cannabis operation focused on quality and legacy community.

“We’re not trying to be the biggest. We are trying to put out top-shelf herb that we would be excited to smoke ourselves,” he said. “We will expand in the future when it is right, but for now, we are only focused on making some of the best herb in the NJ legal market.”

Kabbes prides himself on growing quality craft cannabis flower.

The staff is made up of locals. It is a modest-sized team of legacy growers experienced in operating in other legal cannabis states. He noted their small team makes it easier to maintain the high standards of craft.

“Even though we are adult use, we’re all naturalists here. It’s a wellness-focused project,” Kabbes explained. “We don’t spray pesticides ever, and don’t even spray organic oils once plants are flowering.”

He noted they are not using salt-based nutrients that can be more common with larger grows. “We got brown chunky perfectly organic fertilizer, coupled with naturally occurring minerals resulting from biological processes,” Kabbes said.

The Grow Rooms were amazing. A place where there are nearly countless legal weed plants is a wild site due to federal marijuana prohibition. So the state legal exception is awesome. The room was full of giant weed plants that were beautiful.

“We’re going to let it go its full term to where the trichs (trichomes) are actually ready to be harvested. We’re not going to be sacrificing on quality just to rush a harvest,” he explained.

Kabbes noted they have 6 “regions” of the rooms with 3 racks of 2 levels each. So they are growing 6 different strains per room.

High Quality Craft Cannabis

He said it’s important not to rush the growing or curing process too much. They slowly cold cure the flower in a chilly room after it is harvested to ensure quality.

Recently harvested cannabis plants were hanging on lines to be trimmed after they were harvested and cured.

He explained they hand-trim flower off the stems and then cut the stems further. They don’t use machines because trichomes are knocked off plants when they are machine-trimmed, and there is a lot of medicine in trichomes.

“Trimmed by people with love,” Kabbes added.

The process leaves you with very beautiful and colorful cannabis nugs with orange hairs and purple, in addition to green and frosty looking with trichomes.

They grew a range of great-smelling weed, like Blue Dream.

“Blue Dream makes the user feel uplifted. It gets the day going!” Kabbes explained.

Their nugs were wonderfully colorful and smelled great. Some smelled like food since they have the same terpenes.

He noted their jars of 1/8ths of an ounce are white glass with a freshness seal to ensure quality as well.

“I really try to grow for taste more than anything. I love it when the herb looks great, but I more so want it to be smooth and tasty,” Kabbes declared.

Quality Pre-Rolls and Blunts

He noted the great care and consideration goes into Panda Farms pre-rolled cones and glass-tip blunts. Their joints and blunts are hand-stuffed, for example.

“If we scale up, we’ll have to look at other options,” Kabbes said. “I don’t like machine-stuffed pre-rolls; they don’t smoke the best,” he noted.

So to ensure freshness, Panda Farms joints are in tubes with unique cork stoppers, which helps limit terpene loss and keeps them fresh.

“We’re only putting bud in our pre-rolls. Trim goes to extraction,” he explained.

Kabbes also said many companies use non-organic paper that doesn’t taste very good. He noted that sometimes it’s bleached, so they want to use organic hemp paper and unbleached raw cones.

Panda Farms Background

Panda Farms is based in Oxford in Warren County, in rural Northwest Jersey. Kabbes explained they made a deal with a local farmer to grow on the property. It remains a working farm with grazing cattle in a chill atmosphere.

He explained he has a long scientific background, which helps with growing quality. Kabbes said he worked at a lab before and was published in an academic journal. In addition, he is a serial entrepreneur and a longtime cannabis grower with underground legacy roots.

Kabbes has also been trying to open a Bridge City Collective dispensary and art gallery in Franklin Township in Somerset County for some time, which is set to have a grand opening with food and live music on Saturday September 20^th.

The brands are originally based in Oregon, but the NJ company is mostly locally owned. Some of the best weed is from Oregon and California, so it makes sense to welcome a legal cannabis brand cooperating with locals in NJ.

(Full disclosure this is an advertorial paid for as part of an ad deal with Heady NJ.)