Thanks for your thougts and words.
I think you are all right. i guess they arent any right or wrong answers.
Ill keep reading your words.
So good to chat about the good stuff 
bless
6 Likes
I’d have to say my stuff puts elite cuts to shame and its never circulated. I have a seed run coming up with some killer crosses for the pheno hunters OG only.
I run the hype seeds sometimes yes to hunt out desired cuts for head stash. But usually after a few runs they phased out try to seed them with good males so those traits and more come back in the latter.
8 Likes
Ooooh that sounds delicious! Next fall I might need a cut of her
2 Likes
Without lab testing you cant call any cut hype or elite…the commercial market is driven by numbers, specifically THC%, cannabinoid ratios and %. Check out the DjShort potcast about how he chooses future males and females to keep breeding. And check out others that are doing lab testing to choose, then look up how the customers feel about the final products. Lots of smoke reports out there on these breeders and their strains.
More then one way to skin a cat…
6 Likes
Too bad numbers don’t mean everything though.
The market is driven by numbers solely because people are uneducated.
11 Likes
Exactly
Try different things like reducing light to 11/13
Changing light spectrum
You can see what I do to increase thc, flavors, colors in this smash together. If I run these same things under normal conditions they lack.
5 Likes
Bagseed Bagseed Bagseed!
6 Likes
My double serrated crunchberry is a bag seed and grows faster, and bigger buds than almost anything I’ve ever grown. Double the yield of other plants grown in the same size container and at the same time. But it lacks density, smell and strength and takes 14 weeks to finish. I’m saving it to breed with.
4 Likes
Everyone has their own interpretation of what an elite cut is. For me personally, this refers to the end product - the flowers/resin. I think “elite” gets thrown about too loosely, lots of hype strains are pushed as being elite when they lack in some areas.
For me personally, an “elite cut” doesn’t refer to the growth habit of the plant itself…ie. rooting time, plant structure, flower time etc. are irrelevant. It’s all about the quality of the final product…I don’t care how great a plant grows if the flowers are “meh”. To qualify as “elite” in my books, the flowers need to be special, and a tier above normal top shelf smoke:
-
jar appeal: colour, trichome coverage, bud structure
-
smell and taste: need to both be prominent, as well as desirable and/or interesting/unique.
-
potency/effects: has to pack a punch and get the job done. Lab %s aren’t the be all end all.
-
overall smoke quality/enjoyablitity (the grower plays a role in this as well obviously).
Lots of pretty/hype Instagram strains are labelled “elite” and look insane, but are majorly lacking in terps/flavour and sometimes effects. I need to be blown away/wowed in every category to consider a cut to be elite. And a cut usually has to be grown at least twice to get a full and proper assessment.
In my opinion, truly elite cuts/plants are quite rare. So from a breeding and/or pheno-hunting standpoint, it’s very much a numbers game. The bigger the population to select from, the greater chance of finding truly special parent plants to breed with.
8 Likes
Elite cuts. Hahahah all it takes is a salesman. For me growing is about the journey. And if you got skills and a dialed in room you should be able to make any plant shine.
6 Likes
You know good 'n well I’m getting in that Line right behind you. @Seamonkey84 is a “Cut Master”!!! I’ve got some of his Ladies in a Cloner, getting ready to "pot em up, some in the Crisper. Gonna be a heck of a Winter here. All, enjoy the Holiday, SS/BW…mister 
4 Likes
I have grown plants that would never achieve elite status because of whatever reason, mostly lacking bag appeal. I had one that foxtailed forever and smelled like unwashed feet that only a collector of weird things would enjoy. It was one of my favourites.
I have some elite seeds I’ll sell for the low low price of $100 each. It’s a good deal. You should do it.
6 Likes
The thing this post misses is that the early “landrace” strains needed to be grown by the 1000s to find those exceptional plants to breed with. Once those were found and bred and crossed, only then was it as simple as it is now to find what is now called an elite cut.
The problem with this though is that all these modern elites are from highly bottlenecked genetics.
Once the seed banks popped up in the 80s, most real breeding stopped and it just became a game of crossing strain A with strain B and calling it something new.
3 Likes
Hype most of the time.
A lot of hype with “elite” cuts I think tbh, back in the day I had quite the stable , many of them considered to be “elite” after a few years of SERIOUS pheno hunting, and some backcrossing I found the cuts I hunted outperformed even my most sought after clones, this is when I began thinning the herd. I do seriously regret letting 2 cuts go that I was never able to Reobtain or recreate (not even close) but I’m looking forward to the future with all this new tech and a reinvigorated passion for cannabis cultivation. I think elites are just easier for many people as pheno hunting is a timely, space demanding venture. But it truly teaches the nuances of terps, flavonoids. And the subtle differences from pheno to pheno, and when you find an absolute gem 
there is nothing like it.
11 Likes
I am going to find out what all the hype is about for a couple of what are considered Elite clones. I have G.G. #4 in flower now and a couple of Apple Fritter rooting and going to be grown out soon. I know I am going to like the G.G. #4, if it is the real deal. Harvest time should show me if it is real or not. The Apple Fritter I have never tried. Strong or not it still has to have a great high if I am going to keep it.
To me that is the one thing that never gets mentioned much about the Elites. Just because they are strong doesn’t mean everyone is going to like them. I don’t know if these plants are worth all the hype, I do know I will know more soon.
2 Likes
A lot of them are hype for other reasons than strength too. Fruity terps (edit: and bag appeal , that purpurp) is all the rage now I think.
There are some well proven clone only varieties that perform exceptionally well, in most environments. The ones that check all the boxes, breed well, and have been time tested. But not all clones or cuts are considered “elite”. I think there are more categories than just Elite. I think it would be more reasonable to break them down into categories like “Legendary”, “Elite”, “Hype”, “Quality”.
“Legendary” being those older, time tested, top quality, clone only cuts, that almost everyone who knows anything has had or at least heard of. Like OG, NL5, Chemdog, Skunk…
“Elite” being an award winning, well tested, proven quality, rare phenotype/clone only variety. Like Gelato, MAC1, Wedding Cake, Zkittlez…
“Hype”, I consider to be anything that is relatively new, heavily marketed, not well tested, but still good quality. Like Runtz, PBB, Gary Payton, Apple Fritter…
“Quality” (or “affordable” if the price is right) would be anything that is still somewhat available in seed form, but someone found a better than average pheno that will save someone else some time from hunting a pack of seeds that may be out of their price range or space/plant limit capacity. Everything else could go under this category, really.
Just my opinion
7 Likes
Yes. I don’t have a ton of space but I enjoy hunting through seeds.
Been gifted some cuts and they were very nice.
I tend to avoid hype in every aspect of my life, not just cannabis stuff.
4 Likes
Honestly I couldn’t agree more @Berserker7205 . Even down to your choices of examples, had an associate pay 1000$ US for Apple Fritter (Lumpys) 100% authentic, was very disappointing IMHO, and then there are cuts that are closely guarded by my circle and crew. That I know for a fact would be ELITE LEGENDARY if they were just circulated beyond us 6-7 people. A lot of these new cuts/strains I tend to find to be hype , all in all I think half the fun is pheno hunting and eventually coming across that absolute GEM! And then seeing what you can do with it beyond that. Gets me fired up just thinking/talking about it.
5 Likes