Landrace Cannabis

With thousands of different strains that are now offering more and more variety to people than ever before, there are few that actually have the pedigree that's known as a landrace strain. These are the originals, and here, I’ll go over what in the world a landrace strain, and why they’re becoming rarer. 

What are they? 

Simply put, a landrace strain is one that is known to never have been changed by a grower, so it’s naturally created the stable genetics that we want from our cannabis. For example, this is the type of strain that many cultures throughout the world have started to use, and it’s something that a large number of different cultures have continuously used to get the medicinal benefits that we expect from cannabis. Some of the most common strains that are landrace include: 

• Acapulco gold 

• Hindu Kush 

• Afghani 

• Panama red 

• Durban poison 

• Chocolate Thai 

• Lamb’s bread 

• Columbian gold 

The History of This 

Cannabis is considered to be one of the oldest domesticated crops ever recorded, first mentioned in the form of writing back in 2900 BC. This was by the emperor Shen-Nung, who had cannabis in his medicinal encyclopedia. It was then discovered that there were some possible traces of the use of hemp rope, in some of the broken pottery that was found during the neolithic period in China. 

Botanists were able to also find that the cannabis that we see today all comes from the Afghanistan Hindu Kush, which you can get in the mountains. This was a cultivar that people used not just for the buds, but also for the clothes and rope that also helped a lot of people live better life. 

Some researchers were then later able to find as well in both ancient Greek, and roman cultures, that cannabis was a part of this.  It then spread further towards the ottoman empire, and then, into Africa. 

Then of course, when the Europeans crossed across the Atlantic, they brought this to central America, and then, it went both south and west. 

Because of this, every single plant was able to flourish in all of these different places, with a variety of different characteristics depending on where this was found. 

The first of the landrace strains, where they ended up, and some of the most distinguished features are now something that cannabis cultivars are also becoming a lot more popular. 

Do they exist? 

The answer: yes, but they’re harder to find, and you won’t’ be able to cultivate them as easily. 

This is due to hybridization, which started in the late 60s and 70s, where the landrace strains were actually created in order to create Skunk #1 and also Chemdawg, two of the main hybrids that many of our current ones come from. 

They continued this hybridization, but the landraces are now a lot more diluted and they’re not as pure as they once were. 

The thing is, the term landrace is also not an easy term, as many of the landrace types all come from the original strain that occurred within the Hindu Kush area. It also is the only landrace item that was found in the Afghanistan mountain area. 

Landrace is something that’s harder to find, and some people use it to discuss the different adaptations that these cannabis strains have had to each environment, so it also depends on the diffenrt types of areas. 

There are also different landrace strains that have started to get mixed together, which makes it even harder, and there are also many who grow these too!