the Mexican Landraces Thread

[yesum]

You can get high just looking at those ^^ colorful buds Menhaden! Hope it smokes as good as it looks.

 

[mexicani-ar]

Bodhi Acapulco Gold

Bodhi Acapulco Gold

, saludos Mexicani-ar

 

[Coughie]

Admittedly, i haven't read this whole thread, but has anyone grown the Bodhi Zipolite Oaxacan?

 

[Rusty Mohican]

A couple of Subcool testers for CBD:



Very excited to try the Oaxaca x Querkle!

 

[HemperorsKnight]

Anything Mexican would NOT be landrace it would be Heirloom because some traveler had to of brought it from it's homeland maybe Africa India or somewhere where cannabis is indigenous with no human domestication... so much confusion to what's landrace and what's heirloom think of it like this Landraces are not touched by man and do as they have for centuries or even thousands of years untouched by man as where heirlooms are domesticated varieties possibly even crossed etc hope this helps you guys distinguish landraces from heirlooms anywho have a good day blessed be
Hemperorsknight

 

[yesum]

^^ I am no authority on heirlooms vs landrace but I will say, if the strain has been in a new land for a a few seasons, it is now a landrace of that new country. The strain will adapt and change pretty quick on it's own and with some selection it will go real quick to another form.

The Mexicans selected among the phenos and maybe crossed them, so for me, yeah they are landraces of Mexico. None of these old strains are just wild afik, they were selected and bred for drug effects in all countries.

I am quite sure all the good strains are cultivars not wild. They may get loose and are still good in the wild but they were cultivated and bred at some point.

Really the distinctions are kinda fuzzy at best so I just go with old elite strains for my own definition. 'Old elite strain' is the same as heirloom? I guess you won that one. hehe

 

[Jhhnn]

^^ I am no authority on heirlooms vs landrace but I will say, if the strain has been in a new land for a a few seasons, it is now a landrace of that new country. The strain will adapt and change pretty quick on it's own and with some selection it will go real quick to another form.

The Mexicans selected among the phenos and maybe crossed them, so for me, yeah they are landraces of Mexico. None of these old strains are just wild afik, they were selected and bred for drug effects in all countries.

I am quite sure all the good strains are cultivars not wild. They may get loose and are still good in the wild but they were cultivated and bred at some point.

Really the distinctions are kinda fuzzy at best so I just go with old elite strains for my own definition. 'Old elite strain' is the same as heirloom? I guess you won that one. hehe

I think Landrace is a bit of a misnomer with Heirloom being more accurate. Sativa vs indica is similar where all drug strains are now classified as indica, wld or nld, and hemp strains as sativa.

OTOH, the use of landrace & sativa is common & people in the community know what others are saying when those terms are used.

Nobody really knows where cannabis originated but it's clear that humans carried the seeds all over the world & bred it in different directions for different purposes. It's also clear that genetic diversity in cannabis strains makes them able to adapt to different environments as does variable gene expression as well.

 

[HemperorsKnight]

Untouched by man is landrace and domesticated varieties would be heirlooms so like oaxacan and Acapulco would be Heirloom yiu can research the findings of those who did go to different areas and find interesting strains like those in India that grow wildly without the intervention of man would legitimately be landraces as those that have had human intervention for generations of selected breeding what not would be your heirlooms the big confusion still runs in the minds of those interested in the exotic lines I thought the same way until Matt Riot made sense of what is what from landrace to heirloom it did confuse me at first but the more I looked into the more it made sense as to people messing with the beans like travelers trader's etc shit even animals could be the reason of why a Indian indigenous would end up in let's say Africa or even lands much further same with afghan varieties and African varieties and Chinese I do know for sure that cannabis originally heirs from the Asia area may be around Russia maybe around India shit maybe I am wrong and it's from Africa kinda like how we humans are supposed to be from Ethiopia

 

[Coughie]

The difference between landrace and heirloom is a distinction between human selection pressures.

I was interested in setting up an experiment to make a landrace for my local region, so I did some reading on the subject from various educational institutions. A landrace is a group of interrelated plants whose only selection process is the environment, no pressures made by man. To make a new landrace would require the same group of plants, growing in the same region, without any help, for 20-25 years.. This means no watering, no selecting the best females and disregarding others, no removal of early/late/undesired males.. at most, the removal of hermaphroditic individuals.

An heirloom is a landrace + human selection pressures.. essentially..

One can grow/create a group of landrace individuals, as I intend to, to acclimatize them to my region in a natural manner, which takes time. And one can remove cuttings of these individuals if they're desirable for other projects, but once removed and used otherwise, those cuttings/projects are now heirlooms and not landrace.


What my experiment will do is take unrelated groups of plants - Mazar, Pakistani, Lebanese, Kerala, Red Thai, Acapulco Gold - and make a large open pollination of females and males from each of the 6 groups, and then further combine them in a larger open pollination fashion for a second and possibly third generation.. then take that large, intermixed heirloom population and introduce it to a growing region for 20-25 years essentially untouched.

The first couple generations are to ensure that the genetics are thoroughly mixed so I don't lose any one whole group of original starting genetics, but then from there on, let the genetics and environmental compatibility decide which groups of traits will survive the duration.

In the end I should have an acclimatized, local landrace capable of surviving with or without the intervention of man. They will be winnowed down to a unique set od genetic combinations, interrelated and capable of surviving everything my locale will put it through. After 20-25 years of "wild" growing.


In actuality, most of what we call landraces are already heirlooms, but the term 'landrace' is used in cannabis culture because the term 'heirloom' is used for hybrid plants/genetics that have been around since the 80s or so.. so it's used as a distinction between heirlooms from a growing region (landrace) and heirlooms from a commercial entity (heirloom)..

So it just depends on if you're speaking within cannabis culture of within the scientific/botany/horticultural community.

Hope that helps some..

 

[HemperorsKnight]

The difference between landrace and heirloom is a distinction between human selection pressures.

I was interested in setting up an experiment to make a landrace for my local region, so I did some reading on the subject from various educational institutions. A landrace is a group of interrelated plants whose only selection process is the environment, no pressures made by man. To make a new landrace would require the same group of plants, growing in the same region, without any help, for 20-25 years.. This means no watering, no selecting the best females and disregarding others, no removal of early/late/undesired males.. at most, the removal of hermaphroditic individuals.

An heirloom is a landrace + human selection pressures.. essentially..

One can grow/create a group of landrace individuals, as I intend to, to acclimatize them to my region in a natural manner, which takes time. And one can remove cuttings of these individuals if they're desirable for other projects, but once removed and used otherwise, those cuttings/projects are now heirlooms and not landrace.


What my experiment will do is take unrelated groups of plants - Mazar, Pakistani, Lebanese, Kerala, Red Thai, Acapulco Gold - and make a large open pollination of females and males from each of the 6 groups, and then further combine them in a larger open pollination fashion for a second and possibly third generation.. then take that large, intermixed heirloom population and introduce it to a growing region for 20-25 years essentially untouched.

The first couple generations are to ensure that the genetics are thoroughly mixed so I don't lose any one whole group of original starting genetics, but then from there on, let the genetics and environmental compatibility decide which groups of traits will survive the duration.

In the end I should have an acclimatized, local landrace capable of surviving with or without the intervention of man. They will be winnowed down to a unique set od genetic combinations, interrelated and capable of surviving everything my locale will put it through. After 20-25 years of "wild" growing.


In actuality, most of what we call landraces are already heirlooms, but the term 'landrace' is used in cannabis culture because the term 'heirloom' is used for hybrid plants/genetics that have been around since the 80s or so.. so it's used as a distinction between heirlooms from a growing region (landrace) and heirlooms from a commercial entity (heirloom)..

So it just depends on if you're speaking within cannabis culture of within the scientific/botany/horticultural community.

Hope that helps some..

sorry to sound trollish but you cannot create a landrace that's impossible it would be an inbred line an heirloom not a landrace a landrace is not something a person can make its a term for a wild cannabis species with 0 human intervention

 

[Coughie]

It's not impossible.
It just takes 20-25 years.

I would encourage you to research it yourself if you're interested in it. It's what my personal information digging uncovered.

It's been done before.

Edit:
As a sidenote, there's been a few other threads that went over this exact topic, here in ICMag.. No big need to keep derailing this one..

But, you might find this interesting:

http://garden.lofthouse.com/adaptivar-landrace.phtml

To western peoples access to traditional landrace crops is extremely limited, so it is often necessary to create our own. The method most commonly used is to plant approximately equal amounts of seed from several different sources and varieties. We recomend using heirlooms, open pollinated varieties, and appropriately screened hybrids. It is common to plant together the seeds from 5-50 varieties to make the original mass cross. The seeds produced by this mass cross are the beginnings of a new landrace. With the first harvest of seed, and in the following years the landrace is tailored to each garden and to each region by survival-of-the-fittest and farmer-directed selection.

Plenty more out there to read on this topic, but you usually have to look into vegetable breeders/farmers.. cannabis boards only get you 'so far'.

 

[ThaiBliss]

you cannot create a landrace that's impossible it would be an inbred line an heirloom not a landrace a landrace is not something a person can make its a term for a wild cannabis species with 0 human intervention

I agree. I think the term for an heirloom variety "escaping" into the wild is "feral".

In my opinion, "landrace" is misused left and right. We need to remember that our ancestors have been breeding cannabis for as long as or almost as long as any other plant species. They have been working their asses off at it for 10,000 years.

The recent hybridization of strains during the last few generations of growers has done a disservice to the plethora varieties that have been passed down to us. In my opinion, we have gone backwards in quality of the high, potency of cerebral strains, and most certainly with the diversity of varieties.

 

[Mustafunk]

sorry to sound trollish but you cannot create a landrace that's impossible it would be an inbred line an heirloom not a landrace a landrace is not something a person can make its a term for a wild cannabis species with 0 human intervention

Actually it seems you are wrong... first you need to understand Cannabis landraces don't appear wild in the nature. A landrace is an ecotype/biotype, which is a semi-domesticated population of plants that evolve within a geographical locations developing distinctive features. This is why you have drug, fiber and seed landraces, all of them are the result of man selection. This evolution is always the result of: man + natural selection + enviromental conditions. And that's in fact what makes the difference between a landrace and a feral plant too. Feral plants evolve without men's help, in this case, loosing gradually all the traits they have been selected for (either psychoactivity, fiber/seed qualities and so on, depending on the initial use).

All Cannabis is cultivated was eventually domesticated by men and farmers... maybe there was wild Cannabis back then, the Central Asian ancestors that where first domesticated by the Scinthians and other pioneer Cannabis cultures, but that was thousands of years before the men spread Cannabis all over the world as a domesticated plant with very specific uses and qualities.

Then you have feral or naturalized Cannabis too, but that's another whole different thing.

And yeah, you can create landraces for any plant, you just need to provide the needed conditions for it and wait enough for that.



This may interest you:

Landraces are basically shaped through the place and conditions they are being grown. In the case of Cannabis, they are plant populations which are linked to a certain enviroment characteristics (ecotypes/biotypes that have been semi-domesticated if you prefer). Basically they were wild plants that became highly adapted to a very specific enviroment (and its availability of nutrients, water, weather conditions, latitude, soil, farming techniques and even final use...) with minimum selection by man, but definitely the result of: a certain enviroment + natural evolution + domestication by man.

This is also the reason why they still offer huge genetic variability which makes them very rustic, adaptable and sturdy overall. Yet they have enough common characteristics to be considered part of a certain recognisable plant population happening in a very certain location. This is the reason why landraces are attached and always named with their place/village of origin.

On the other hand, heirlooms are the result of man's work to preserve a traditional cultivar and they are fairly stable, homogeneus and always feature a handful of desirable characteristics happening, just like their ancestors. As opposed to landraces, they aren't defined by it's strict relation to a certain enviroment or ecosystem where they evolved. Nor they offer high genetic diversity, which sometimes can make them prone to desease and so on.

Besides what's commonly known, they aren't true open-pollinated plants because quite often only the seeds from best plants are kept. That's how the heirlooms reached their homogeneous and stable status within the years. They are also traditionally passed from one generation to another and preserved like that. Some people only consider pre-1945 seeds as true heirlooms, the time when modern agriculture and hybrid crops become widespread in the market.

Obviously Cannabis heirlooms should be the oldschool, pre-80s and pre-skunk cultivars, or any cultivars predating the crazy hybridization that happened since the introduction of Kush hashplants.

Developing your own landraces is easy on the other hand, heirloom vegetable gardeners have been doing it for years. You just need to grow together in your local spot a similar number of seeds from a few dozens of different cultivars (heirlooms, open-pollinated or stable hibrids are preferred, the more different cultivars the best genetic diversity at the end) and let nature do her thing for a period of time. The resulting seed crop of this big cross-pollination will be the begginning of a new possible landrace population that may keep evolving through the years with minimum farmer intervention and lots of survival-of-the-fittest selection. This promotes hybrid vigour and avoids inbreeding depression. This is basically how true landraces started everywhere.

In 10 years you may start finding intersting results and maybe in 25 years, you will have your very own local landrace, adapted to your own enviroment and still featuring a huge genetic potential against different growing conditions, pests, enviroments, diseases and cultural practices. Definitely much more adapted to your conditions than any hybrid you may grow. Maybe you can start with 50-100 seeds of 10-25 different strains. I know heirloom farmers who started growing up to 100 different cultivars together and ended with amazing results within 6-10 years.

 

[earthwyrms]

martian simulant soil

 

[ThaiBliss]

As usual, some truth to both points of view. This is the best definition I have found, away from ICMAG definitions:

"A landrace is a local variety of a domesticated plant species...

which has developed largely adaptation to the natural and cultural environment in which it lives. It differs from a cultivar which has been selectively bred to conform to a particular standard of characteristics.

Landrace populations are often variable in appearance, but they can be identified by their appearance and have a certain genetic similarity.Landraces have a continuity with improved varieties. The relatively high level of genetic variation of landraces is one of the advantages that these can have over improved varieties. Although yields may not be as high, the stability of landraces in face of adverse conditions is typically high. As a result new pests or diseases may affect some, but not all, the individuals in the population."

From: http://b4fa.org/bioscience-in-brief/plantbreeding/cultivars-clones-landraces/

I've separated and bolded a section for my emphasis.

My own take: If there is culling/selection going on, then it is more of a cultivar. Landraces react to the environment they are in, and to locations they are planted, timing of planting, soil conditions, exposure, watering, etc. (culture). Most ganja growers cull from the population. Landraces are rare.

Best,

ThaiBliss

 

[Dawn Patrol]

Awesome post TB, I think you nailed it.

 

[Mustafunk]

If there is culling/selection going on, then it is more of a cultivar. Landraces react to the environment they are in, and to locations they are planted, timing of planting, soil conditions, exposure, watering, etc. (culture). Most ganja growers cull from the population. Landraces are rare.

Not exactly, landraces are culled too, but they are still landraces. I've been spending some time researching on this and trying to come out with an appropriate definition for the Cannabis case for my articles. I've found out that landraces are always domesticated plants (or animals), undomesticated plants or animals should be known as ecotypes. That means that landraces are always domesticated ecotypes, as well all know, farmed by men for either drug, medical, industrial or food use.

Thus landraces are often associated with artificial selection (+ natural selection + environmental and other influences), while ecotypes only rely on natural selection and enviromental factors. ie: "survival of the fittest" based selection.

I think pretty often most people think about Cannabis landraces as wild or natural ecotypes of untamed plants that arised naturally on certain ecosystems. But this is a common misconception, as all Cannabis landraces are actually domesticated plants, in fact this is what originated the speciation within the Cannabis genus itself.

I think nowadays you can't really find any wild Cannabis anywhere or any of the wild ancestors that Clarke and Merlin refered to... maybe in the depths of the Altai, Pamir Knot or the Himalayas. But most "semi-wild" Cannabis you can find either on the Himalayas foothills, the ditchweed fields and so on, are in fact feral or naturalized populations that escaped from domestic fields back then. Cannabis became domesticated many thousands of years before.

On the other hand, scientists or botanists don't have a broad knowledge of Cannabis history or particularities, so I think it's really us the ones who should come up with an adequate definition after revising and researching the topic.

Hope it helps.

More info:

Re: Landrace.

A landrace is a dynamic population(s) of a cultivated plant that has historical origin, distinct identity and lacks formal crop improvement, as well as often being genetically diverse, locally adapted and associated with traditional farming systems'. Camacho Villa, 2006.

Landrace: refers to a plant variety developed by farmers/growers by adopting various traditional agronomic practices.

Landrace: is a regional ecotype, locally adapted. Usually correspond to a domesticated species of animal or plant that has developed over time, through adaptation to its cultural environment of agriculture and pastoralism.

Landrace refers to farmer developed varieties of crop plants that are heterogeneous, adapted to local environmental conditions and have their own local names and distinguishing traits

Landrace: a variety developed over many years by one or more farmers using simple selection processes for local adaptation, and a wide spectrum of quality traits. Usually low yielding but highly stable in the ago-ecology of selection.

Re: Ecotype.

"Ecotype" refers to a locally adapted population or populations that is, in its local adaptation, genetically distinct from the rest of the species; the local adaptation is assumed to be a result of the action of natural selection. Ecotype is used more generally for non-domesticated organisms. A landrace might be considered a special case of an ecotype (within a domesticated organism) IF what makes it distinct from other varieties is also distinctly adaptive to local conditions (which may or may not be the case).

An ecotype is a wild plant that has historically occured in one area, and over time has become adapted to that specific area (soil type, climate, altitude etc). A landrace is the same, except it has also been cultivated by farmers and become domesticated.

A landrace is essentially a domesticated ecotype. Landraces will typically be more distinct from wild populations than ecotypes for this reason, they have two selection pressures (one natural and one artificial) where as ecotypes only have natural selection.

Ecotypic differentiation is hereditary differentiation in respect of morphological and/or physiological attributes occasioned by the selective action of the habitat environment. Ecotypic differentiation in response to one set of environmental conditions is liable to proceed independently of that in response to another set of conditions.

Regularities in ecotypic differentiation are therefore best studied in relation to particular environmental trends. Ecotypic differentiation may be regional or strictly local. Regional ecotypic differentiation occurs most frequently in species with wide latitudinal and/or altitudinal distributions, i.e. it appears as a response to variations in climate.

A feature of ecotypic differentiation in response to climate is that the range of variation is not usually continuous in the direction of a gradual change in climate, but instead a limited number of populations is formed each with its own climatic ‘latitude of tolerance’.

Ecotypically differentiated populations may coincide with geographically differentiated subspecies. When they do coincide with subspecies, or when they do not coincide but still exhibit the fundamental features of truly objective populations, i.e. have definable borders and some degree of ecotypic individuality, they ought to be taxonomically recorded at the subspecies level. The use of the term ‘ecoclinal subspecies’ has been suggested as a convenient way of making the necessary distinction between experimentally delimited ecological subspecies and orthodox subspecies.

Re: Cultivar.

Cultivars are not necessarily true to type. In fact cultivar means "cultivated variety." Therefore, a cultivar was selected and cultivated by humans. Some cultivars originate as sports or mutations on plants. Other cultivars could be hybrids of two plants. To propagate true-to-type clones, many cultivars must be propagated vegetatively through cuttings, grafting, and even tissue culture. Propagation by seed usually produces something different than the parent plant.

The term "cultivar" comes from cultivated variety. It is widely used in crop sciences and is more precise than just talking of a variety that is often also confused with a botanical variety, meaning a described sub-taxon of a species.

So, in forestry it may be that "typically a cultivar is clonally regenerated" - BUT this is not necessarily the case in agriculture. Typically (sic!) a cultivar is just a cultivated variety, mainly commercially available and also registered in those countries that have variety protection legislation. A cultivar still could be a mixture of genotypes, depending whether the crop is outcrossing (for example rye) or inbreeding (for example wheat). How genotypically variable a cultivar is also depends on the breeding scheme. Therefore, cultivars from outcrossing crops may even show a certain phenotypic variability. While a cultivar of a clonally propagated crop (potato, cassava, sugarcane) will be phenotypically identical.

Consequently, there can be many genotypes contained in one cultivar, but not really several cultivars should be released from one single genotype. Even, there is a rule in the UPOV guidelines (International Union for the Protection of New Varieties of Plants - http://www.upov.int/portal/index.html.en) that - if the same genetic material already released as a cultivar in one country is released again in another country, it should not change its name.

Cultivars are varieties of plants bred by plant breeders; there can be many cultivars of the same plant that are artificially selected for based on particular (desirable) phenotypic differences. A genotype refers to genetic makeup. A genotypic lineage of a group of plants are all genetically the same.

Cultivar is any genotype under cultivation, it may be variety, advanced breeding line, land race (recommended or non-recommended).

Variety is group of plant having specific uniform chracteristics recommended for cultivation for general and specific area by a committee.

Re: Heirloom.

Hierloom: refers to very old traditional variety.

These are varieties that were commercially available in the past, but fell out of use when hybrid types were developed and promoted. They are open pollinated- meaning that seed can be saved from one generation to the next without losing characteristics and performance of that variety. The term heirloom is evocative- an heirloom is an old treasure.

Hierloom: old type of plant that is still available because individual people have continued to grow it for many years, not used in modern large-scale agriculture. Heirloom plants have been returning in popularity thanks to organic farming old varieties are being cultivated again.

Heirloom variety refers to seeds preserved by home gardeners who saved seed from their family gardens from year to year. What is an "heirloom"? The definition is open to dispute. But the term is usually applied to fruit, flower or vegetables varieties that were being grown before World War II. Heirloom varieties are open-pollinated--meaning that unlike hybrids, seeds you collect from one year will produce plants with most of the characteristics of the parent plant. And that's key to their survival.

Heirloom: an old cultivar, usually not cultivated any more by commercial farmers, but kept going by enthusiasts and gardeners. They often has some good quality traits (a tomato with a wonderful flavour) but also some serious flaws, such as extreme disease susceptibility (the same tasty tomato may be extremely susceptible to Fusarium wilt)

 

[ThaiBliss]

"A landrace is a local variety of a domesticated plant species...

Hi Mustafunk my friend,

I think we are saying almost exactly the same thing. Notice my quoted definition of landrace uses the term "domesticated" in the first sentence. We are drawing our lines slightly differently, which possibly affects the occurrences of our definitions dramatically. The truth is, no one can know how widespread landraces or ecotypes actually are due to the fuzzy nature of the definitions, and no one can be everywhere at every time to know the history of every population. Though these concepts are important, it is a bit of an academic exercise.

I don't know why the term landrace rubs me the wrong way. It seems like people think so much of their own work, yet underestimate the value of the work of others. As if "modern" breeding has done so much, and the generations before us were primitive. If this is true, why did I enjoy the type of weed so much more when I was younger? It is rare that I find something as good as what was commonly available decades ago. This irritation I have also could have something to do with the politics at my place of employment, and in fact, the direction of the politics in the U.S.A. and Europe. This attitude that we are great and it is others who are screwing things up is hard for me to stomach. It will not end well. LOL.

Thanks for all the effort you put into your good quotes. It was instructive, and helped me to clarify my own concepts.

ThaiBliss

 

[thejact55]

One could say this discussion could be had on every level for almost every agricultural crop. That last few decades may be the doom of agriculture as we know it in the future.
I really can't add much to what thai bliss and mustafunk have added, except amen.
I came here to keep up on the Mexican strain posts, but the recent conversation is the exact fear and struggle I feel given the current status of this plant. In my own insignificant personal way, I try to make seed copy of all "landrace", "heirloom", "old school"...whatever the term, plants I can find. Cannabis on the forefront, but also stashes of heirloom vegetables and other plants as well. My wife thinks I'm crazy!

 

[ahortator]

Developing your own landraces is easy on the other hand, heirloom vegetable gardeners have been doing it for years. You just need to grow together in your local spot a similar number of seeds from a few dozens of different cultivars (heirlooms, open-pollinated or stable hibrids are preferred, the more different cultivars the best genetic diversity at the end) and let nature do her thing for a period of time. The resulting seed crop of this big cross-pollination will be the begginning of a new possible landrace population that may keep evolving through the years with minimum farmer intervention and lots of survival-of-the-fittest selection. This promotes hybrid vigour and avoids inbreeding depression. This is basically how true landraces started everywhere.

In 10 years you may start finding intersting results and maybe in 25 years, you will have your very own local landrace, adapted to your own enviroment and still featuring a huge genetic potential against different growing conditions, pests, enviroments, diseases and cultural practices. Definitely much more adapted to your conditions than any hybrid you may grow. Maybe you can start with 50-100 seeds of 10-25 different strains. I know heirloom farmers who started growing up to 100 different cultivars together and ended with amazing results within 6-10 years.

Hi. This is somewhat very similar to a composite variety.

http://agriinfo.in/default.aspx?page=topic&superid=3&topicid=1790