Hemp Vision Becomes Reality for Lower Sioux

Lancaster Farming Industrial Hemp Podcast

This week’s podcast is a follow-up to a story we brought to you in April about the Lower Sioux Indian Community in Morton, Minnesota, where members of the tribe have been busy this summer building with hempcrete.

With special permission, we share with you the first episode of the JD Experience, a podcast made by 12-year-old Jesse Desjarlais, who interviews two members of his tribe who have been busy making hemp a reality on the reservation: Earl Pendleton and Joey Goodthunder.

Desjarlais is the son of Danny Desjarlais, the project manager and lead builder for the hemp projects at the Lower Sioux, where this summer the tribe is finishing up a hempcrete duplex that will serve as emergency housing for tribal members in crisis.

Pendleton said he has been working to make his vision for hemp a reality for 15 years.

“It kind of came and went as people laughed in my face for the first few years,” he said. “But in the last four years, it's really gotten the support from the community leadership.”

Goodthunder is a farmer and grows all the hemp for the Lower Sioux.

“This is my fourth growing year now,” he said. “I just really enjoy the plant, I like what it can do. I see the yield bonus that I get from it from the next crop. It's a really good crop.”

Pendleton’s vision is a circular one. The tribe will grow industrial hemp to feed the processing facility on the reservation to produce building-grade hemp hurd which the tribe will use to build housing for the community.

After episode one of the JD Experience, Lancaster Farming interviews Jesse Desjarlais about his experience making the podcast and what he learned.

Then we talk to his father, Danny Desjarlais, who was taking a break from the sweltering Minnesota summer with a heat index of 115.

Once the house was framed, it took the hempcrete crew only four days to install the hempcrete walls using the Ereasy spray applied system.

Danny said the reaction to the first hemp house on the reservation has been overwhelmingly positive. Even the naysayers, he said, have come around.

“All the people that had doubted Earl for the last 15 years, now they're even like, ‘Man, we should have been building with hemp 15 years ago.’,” he said.

The Lower Sioux Hemp project has gotten lots of attention in Minnesota, even prompting a visit from the governor and lieutenant governor, Desjarlais said.

“They came and took a tour of the house and they loved it,” he said. “The lieutenant governor actually wants us to retrofit her house with hempcrete now.”

The tribe worked with Cameron McIntosh from Americhanvre, a Pennsylvania-based hempcrete building company, and with Navid Hatfield from Massachusetts-based HempStone.

McIntosh also joined the call with Jesse and Danny.

“I am still at a loss for words that accurately encompass what we experienced there, what these guys did, how impressive the entire tribe is,” McIntosh said.

Learn more about the Lower Sioux

https://lowersioux.com/

Hear Lancaster Farming's interview with Earl Pendleton and Danny Desjarlais from April 2023

https://www.lancasterfarming.com/farming-news/hemp/hemp-builds-hope-for-lower-sioux-indian-community/article_3c0a0b0a-e458-11ed-823f-271073c790d5.html

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