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Preservation of an Afghani Landrace from 25 year old seeds

B

Benny106

oh I love it :)


Yes, I played a lot with this genetics in the last 20 years. The affie harmonizes well with all types of my old lines of skunk.

I´m going to report it in another thread I´ll start in january or february 2020.



Greets,
hatman
:tiphat:

I cant wait that long!
 

TheHatman

Active member
1st Chapter: The Purity - An old Afghan Landrace
[Last Update: 15-04-2022]



I. SHORT AND SWEET: WHAT IS THE PROJECT ABOUT?

This retrospective report is about the recovery of an Afghani Landrace from 25yo Afghani Seeds. The variety was about to die out,
as I tried to pop the beans. Despite all hurdes the strain had to be saved! Long ago I preserved this genetics and did a few IBL lines
from it. By an incident I lost much of my seeds. Most of genetics I could save by bringing back from old seeds like these. So I have a
lot to do again - but I´ll make it even better ;-) I intend to write several chapters, that are each dedicated a special topic.

It depends on my free time, how long it takes to upload a post.

In these chapters you read about the problems of germinating and about the hesitant growth of seedlings from vintage seeds.
Then I tell you something about selections, pollinating practice, maturing of flowers and, as a highlight of the effort, the harvesting
of fresh seeds. I always explain the methods I used. But the focus is generally on breeding practice and not on the usual aspects of
cultivation (soil, nutrients, climate e.g), because there are other great threads for that.

I´m always happy about feedback. So if you want something to say, please do it :)


picture.php



II. ABOUT GENE-SHAKES AND THE PURITY

Today really everything is in the mix: All kinds of music sounds equal, buildings all over the world have same architecture, or
supermarkets north to south: All like one egg to another. It´s the same with cannabis an it´s strains. All are mixed together like a
stew. And who can say he is a gourmet, who indiscriminately guzzle everything?!
Among all the guzzlers there are always specialists, who try to look into the rearview mirror to dig up the separate parts of
cannabis genetics like bones from dinosaurs.

It may be that a microbiologist cannot or don´t want to distinguish old indian from southafrican genetics. But due to local isolation,
different genotypes were formed, that we like to describe as sub types of cannabis. The genetic tourism and aspects of economy
(it means globalization) are reasons, that isolation in countries of origin is more and more broken up. So the local flora incessantly
could cheat with foreign genes. Each mixes with everything.

That´s why landrace genetics become more rare. It is undisputed that old always is becoming new, because everywhere varieties
continue to develop under changing conditions. And that without human intervention, too. But pollen never doesn´t blow on it´s own
from USA to Afghanistan. In the past pioneers purposefully collected seeds from landraces and took them to our countries.
Most genetics which is no longer available in these origin areas , a few of us still have in their stables.

By setbacks of unforgivable politics and a loss of species by changing interests of breeders and the aspiration for even more
resinous buds (and the resulting delusion of hybridization) up to rigorous capital-driven ignorant with it´s „without special knowledge I
still mix all great genetics and call it ´Hardcore-THC-Brainfucker Strain´ “-mentality and all their lies for business, more and more
oldschool genetics get lost. Especially genetics with beneficial homozygous traits are replaced by multi-hybrids (puh, I made this
sentence :lol: ).

For sure you can guess now what I think about feminized seeds ;-) But I don´t criticize the experimentation itself nor do i criticize the
general grower who likes to make it easy going (But are they really easier to grow?). No, I only exhort breeder's responsibility to the
preservation of genetics of origin and diversity. In addition the consumer also should be a little bit aware of the fact, that he has an
influence on the breeder´s policy.
Oh, I´m writing so much ! Let´s swing over to the Oldschool Afghanica.


picture.php

Here you can see Afghanis at the beginning of the millennium. Sorry for bad photo quality, the time is to blame..



III. THE VARIETY: AN AFGHAN LANDRACE

In case of my species, it is an afghan landrace, which was collected in in the 1970´s in the area around Mazar-e-Sharif (Afghanistan).
In the early 90s I got these seeds from older friends of mine. Then in mid-90s I got my first equipment for doing an open pollination. I
harvested my first seeds (many thousands of beans). Of course I always ever worked on separated lines. I´ve selected mother plants
and did back-crosses and I created homogeneous lines. After a lost many seeds I had to bring back now these 25yo seeds.


Generally the properties of the Affies could be described as follows:
>> Rather small (27-40 inches at 4 weeks in growth stage) and strong plant
>> Wide and often leathery leaves that are middle to dark green (indica like)
>> Thick stems, vigorous root growth, partially strong branching in the lower plant
>> Buds sometimes are more or less dense, yield varied but mostly it is usually average
>> A quarter to a third of them becomes purple in the end
>> The aroma is earthy-hashy with light citrus and sometimes bit fuel. It often has a hint of passion fruit or clementine and marzipan
>> Generally very potent, even with small trichomes the effect is strong, It´s a classic KO, If you´re not careful. My wife could smack
me, but my grin is cemented on my face. :lol:

Of course, these points are average information. Because of the genetical variance traits could vary a bit.

picture.php

Two plants with different genotypes. The left one has thinner leaves and longer leaf stalks. It grows more compact as the plant on the right,
even the right plant looks like that. The right has the typical afghani-leaves, has a darker green and fewer side branches.



3 main genotypes could be classified (later in the report, the categories will be more specified):
Type 1a: very dark green leaves with a small to medium top-bud; all in all a compact growth.
Type 1b: very dark green, strong overlapping, lathery leaves with a small to medium top-bud; all in all a compact growth
Type 2a: dark green leaves that are indica-like but thinner than Type 1; leaf:bud ratio is higher
Type 2b: dark green leaves that are indica-like but thinner than Type 1; leaf:bud ratio is better
Type 3: fewer side branches but there are big, wide sails and a big topbud.

There are other differences, that are unpredictable: roughly vs. finely jagged leaves with beautiful double jags; thin vs. thigger
pistils. Regardless of the type a few have about the 5th node a partial genetic malformation (skeletal, crumpled). But after 2-3 leaf
pairs it disappears (photos coming soon). There are also few that have rolled leaves. It looks like too much nitrogen, but it isn´t.

My tests on climate and fertilizer shows: it´s simply a genetic peculiarity. It has no influence on the development.
Landraces often produces bananas (an anomaly of flowering like hermaphrodites) if they are grow indoors. This variety sometimes so
it as well around the day 35 of flowering. But real hermaphrodites are very seldom. Of course later at IBL runs, this tendency can be
bred out.

picture.php

An afghani leaf with double jags. On the right side a rough jagged leaf.


So far.. I´m happy that already a few interested ppl joined this thread. I´m looking forward to all who will come here. For me a
constructive exchange is very important and besides I´m excited about your feedback. If you have any questions please write and ask
me!!

The 2nd Chapter will be about the project and it´s initial conditions. After that I show you, how the prehistoric seeds jumped into life!
I´ll try to work fast, so that you get regular updates in this thread. But remember that I´m currently learning English. That´s why it
sometimes could take more time to write a chapter. Thanx for your understanding.

With sincere thanks for your interest:
hatman

🤠



----------------------------------------------------
>> Go to 2nd Chapter:
The Germination Process
<< Back to OVERVIEW







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CannaZen

Well-known member
brilliant presenta


really worth sprouting a line that old for afghan kush; crossing with other original hindu kush line so incredible seed storage. what how is aroma of? really for something crossed so without bred grown only from handfuls of handfuls of seed that serves and consists of substantive flavor resistant plants, I mean i would consider.
 
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gorilla ganja

Well-known member
Very nice report.

I thought you did very well with the English. And the pictures tell a thousand words.
Love the fact you have saved an old strain from extinction and kept it pure. My hat is off to you my friend :tiphat:

Looking forward to the full story on how you have bred with this line.
:woohoo:


Peace
GG
 

TheHatman

Active member
brilliant presenta
Thanx a lot!

brilliant presenta
really worth sprouting a line that old for afghan kush; crossing with other original hindu kush line so incredible seed storage

I admit, for me it´s not easy to understand. I repeat it in my own words, ok? :)
You said sprouting old afghani seeds like mine is a worth job. And I should cross them with another original variety from the Hindu Kush area for combining their genes, right? If you meant it: Yes, I preserve my original lines and I`ll do other crossing experiments with other original affies (If I find other pure lines; a Deep Chunk e.g.).

what how is aroma of? really for something crossed so without bred grown only from handfuls of handfuls of seed that serves and consists of substantive flavor resistant plants, I mean i would consider.

Do you only want to know sth about the aroma? Of course I´ll say anything about the aroma/terps in a later chapter of this report. After the strain rescue I started an open pollination run during that I worte down all traits (incl. aroma). But in advance: It smells like the oldschool hashy afghani from the 70s. It has this lemony-earthy with honey-maracuja. The parts of plants have a very deep smell. If you are nearby a guy whose smoking this weed, it smells strong like black afghani hash.

Did I unterstand correctly?


Greets,
hatman
:tiphat:
 

TheHatman

Active member
Too few are doing inline work.
High, oh yeah that´s true... welcome to my thread!! :)

Very nice report.

I thought you did very well with the English. And the pictures tell a thousand words.
Love the fact you have saved an old strain from extinction and kept it pure. My hat is off to you my friend
tiphat.gif


Looking forward to the full story on how you have bred with this line.
woohoo.gif



Peace
GG
Thank you very much for feedback @Gorilla!! Nice to read that my english is better as I thought.. :dance013:
 

JustSumTomatoes

Indicas make dreams happen
Awesome report and back story my friend. I could honestly see that whole write up with photos being published in a book discussing a future classic strain. Thank you so much for preserving such a special plant. I love my Afghans. Hats off to you Hatman! :tiphat:
 

TheHatman

Active member
Awesome report and back story my friend. I could honestly see that whole write up with photos being published in a book discussing a future classic strain. Thank you so much for preserving such a special plant. I love my Afghans. Hats off to you Hatman!
tiphat.gif

Ohh thanks for praising this thread my friend!! Who knows, maybe I´ll write a book one day hehehe.. :biggrin:
It was my duty to save this great strain. Most "pure" Afghanis that are available in these days unfortunately are hybridized.

Thrilled to see this. Thankful for the work you have done.
Thanx a lot! :)
 

TheHatman

Active member
I´ll write the 2nd Chapter for you in the next days

Pooh it takes more time as I thought .. but the 2nd chapter is quite more longer as I thought, too.
Give me 2 or 3 days then I´ll give you an update. Maybe I should give you in the future
photos for entertainment in between? I´ll think about it :chin:

Little question:
Is there a possibility to use more pics than only 5 in a post?
 

CodyPomeray

Member
Unreal work you have done brotha. Much appreciation for your efforts. Havent smoked real afghan for probably 15 years now. Like you said, everything is hybrid. Amazing stuff.
 
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