Identifying strains

[gocryemokid]

Is there any way to identify strains simply by look, smell, taste, etc., other than knowing what it is ?

gocryemokid Reviewed by gocryemokid on 01-30-2008. Identifying strains Is there any way to identify strains simply by look, smell, taste, etc., other than knowing what it is ? Rating: 5

[psteve]

ABSOLUTELY NOT!!!
DO NOT ATTEMPT TO IDENTIFY UNKNOWN PLANTS!!!!

Please mark them as 'mystery' or 'unknown'.
Otherwise the strains mean NOTHING.

[stinkyattic]

http://boards.cannabis.com/medical-s...lant-pics.html
There ya go!

[BudGrower]

The only way to know a strain is if you ordered the seeds from a seed company and you grow it yourself. Everything else is BS.:smokin:

[beowulfgreen]

I wonder what gives the seed company the ultimate unquestionable authority of which strain is which. One can order seeds of the same "strain" from several different seed companies and end up with several completely different plants with completely different charactaristics. I was under the impression that a "strain" was a stabilized variety of plants with very similar charactaristics (potency, growth pattern, type of "high" produced, maturation time). I had been curious about the reasoning behind this(numerous seed companies having the same "strain" but very different products) and did a little research. According to Ed Rosenthal's "Best of Ask Ed" book during the eighties and part of the early nineties many breeders were crossing different varieties and creating their own hybrid strains, but most did not focus on stabilizing their new strains, thus creating a large variance in the charictaristics of the offspring of these "strains". It seems to me that by definition, the large variances in the charactaristics of the plants of the same strain kind of defeat the purpose of a "strain" and thus they only an unstabilized hybrid to me at that point.

Of the breeders that did work on stabilizing their strains many would start off with similar strains (usually skunk or haze at that time), but through selective breeding for the charactaristics that each breeder preferred(often the preferred charactaristics differed from breeder to breeder) you would end up with very different plants with the same name and the same(or similar) geneology, but were called the same strain. Thus you have one version of a strain from company and a different version of the strain(with very different traits) from a different company, although they are called the same strain. Again, as with earlier, by definition you cannot have plants with very differing characteristics and call them a single strain, although in this case they may have been stabilized, the same "strain" from different breeders is, in fact, not the same strain or different versions of the same strain, but many different strains with the same name(like i said earlier they may have the same or similar geneology, but the preferred charactaristics from breeder to breeder changed, thus changing the genetic traits which were brought forward from generation to generation, thus creating entirely different strains)

If you plan on breeding and know the name of the strain, make sure you include the original source of the strain you have with the name of the strain so people know which kush, skunk, haze etc your talking about and so the correct breeder gets credit. If you don't know the name of the strain don't name it until you have bred it(through crossing) and stabilized it(through backcrossing normally) to the chractaristics that you prefer, developing your own variety. I also suggest NOT naming it the same as a known strain you think it is similar to(no matter how close) because although the charactaristics might be very similar, the genetics are, more than likely, vastly different, and trying to cross it with the known strain would produce an entirely different hybrid, thus showing you it is not the same strain. Come up with a completely original name, that way there is minimal confusion as to which is which and so that credit(good or bad) is not incorrectly directed toward a breeder/s who had nothing to do with genetic history of your strain.

For those who may disagree, I welcome your comments. just think about this for a moment, the original breeders of many strains were not able to work with stabilized varieties in the first place, they took feral plants and crossbred them and eventually stabilized them for the charactaristics they preferred thus creating their own strains. The principle behind my argument follows the same basis. You are taking plants with varied traits
(just like feral plants) and selectively breeding and stabilizing them for the charactaristics you prefer, thus creating YOUR own strain. For those who may say "what about the original mexican, afghani, thai, hawaiian strains that were used as the basis for modern stabilized strains?" They were not strains, they were groupings of feral(although cultivated) plants based primarily on geographical location. The reasoning for the specific groupings were that a broad range of characteristics may have been common or specific to one group and not the others. However, within each grouping there is also a huge variance of traits from plant to plant. Therefore they were not really a strain, they were more or less simply a group of plants of the same species which share geographical location and a few similar traits, but in reality have vastly charactaristics within that grouping.

[beowulfgreen]

i guess for a more direct answer to the question, the only way to know the correct name for the strain you have is to purchase it from the breeder. but to me the main issue is, does it get you "high" in the manner you prefer? In the end, is the name more important or the quality of the product? A rose by any other name is still a rose.

[OahuLocal]

^ Or its to actually grow it your self. :thumbsup:

[Breukelen advocaat]

Famous outdoor-grown imported varieties can be identified, even by a photo, by those who have had them.

[psteve]

Famous outdoor-grown imported varieties can be identified, even by a photo, by those who have had them.

No, they can't.
There are too many variants in phenotype and affects of various climates. Even within a single strain, you can have two completely different looking plants. Even clones from the same mother can look completely different from each other.

[ninevolt99]

Is it possible to identify a strain by some sort of DNA testing or something along the lines of that? It's not like we could just test anything and say "this is a x x cross" but i don't think it sounds too farfetched to compare two different versions of the same strain and see the results.