For this threads sake : flip that on its head.
Genetics is a numbers game - finding those outliers anyway.
So increase the amount of pollen chuckers - increases numbers significantly - crosses being made and grown.
Now that’s improved the chance of finding outliers - with just a few lucky lotto winners at completely random. But now that their are more participating - the chances of it happening are greater. No?
How do they know what they’re looking for? More seeds are planted, more chucks are made. The way I see it, it’s like a pyramid…yes the top slice will grow, the ceiling will get higher and experienced growers will have more access to resources and increased ability to share. I also believe the bottom slice will grow the most, as that’s where almost everyone starts. The number of inexperienced growers has skyrocketed, bringing the average down in stores/on the market. The overall ceiling of quality has probably gone up, but average gone down. That’s my perspective, at least. In time, I think the whole pyramid will grow and quality will slowly go up, but when you lower the threshold of who can grow, you get more mediocre product. It’s like dry sifting a plant that isn’t pruned vs one that is. Same product, but one requires more sifting.
More seriously though, not trying to be a dick or anything.
If you have been a heavy user for decades, have you considered the possibility you may have burnt out some of your CB1 receptors?
This 100% @Grayeyes
This isn’t 100% factual. The effect of genetics and environment with both plants and humans tends to be about 50/50. If someone more educated in the field of genetics wants to chime in or correct me please feel free. Genetics are a critical component, but they aren’t everything that goes into a good result. Genetics provide the blueprint, environmental factors determine how that blueprint is expressed. Epigenetics is most definitely a thing.
I believe you are now kind of referring to nature versus nurture.
Would the same seed popped by one grower have the same results if it were popped by a different grower?
I also take this into consideration.
Man this threads attracted a good amount of bad juju, so like back to the discussion at hand what’s the constructive part that’s come from this thread?
I think the TLDR is commercial selection pressures like bag appeal, short flower time, and general ability to fit into a very specific grow model, usually using questionable techniques, does not end up making the weed us weed nerds live for. I wanna smoke the dopest dope I ever smoked. Not harsh boof that gives me a headache
I’ll give it a shot…
I often wonder if the shorter duration high so many claim has to do with higher potency. Perhaps your brain exhausting dopamine or some other brain chemical faster.
I hold and have held a lot of old school cuts as well as the latest hype. The latest hype strains are generally quite nice, some of them are great, especially if you grow them yourself. But, some of them are just high THC, easy to grow, and have lot of bag appeal. They are widely varied in aroma, flavor, and high. People like to spout off on these, but when you grow them and harvest them at the right time they’re hardly dull highs and they don’t all taste the same. Perhaps too many middle of the road muted highs from being harvested too soon. Lastly, if you know anythingv about cannabis genetics you’ll realize that tooth there are a lot of kinds with cookies genetics in them along the way, modern cookies strains are anything but inbred and homogenous.
The older elites, a lot of them are good headstash but they’re often not very fun to grow, need extensive staking, have terrible yields, or special requirements. TK and most OG yield like crap and I often wonder if the shorter duration high so many claim has to do with higher potency. Perhaps your brain exhausting dopamine or some other brain chemical.
I hold and have held a lot of old school cuts as well as the latest hype. The latest hype strains are generally quite nice, some of them are great, especially if you grow them yourself. But, some of them are just high THC, easy to grow, and have lot of bag appeal. They are widely varied in aroma, flavor, and high. People like to spout off on these, but when you grow them and harvest them at the right time they’re hardly dull highs and they don’t all taste the same. Perhaps too many middle of the road muted highs from being harvested too soon. Lastly, if you know anythingv about cannabis genetics you’ll realize that tooth there are a lot of kinds with cookies genetics in them along the way, modern cookies strains are anything but inbred and homogenous.
The older elites, a lot of them are good headstash but they’re often not very fun to grow, need extensive staking, have terrible yields, or special requirements.
Hold multiple OG, sour, and chem types while also growing a bunch of the latest stuff and it will make sense why the market is what it is commercially. You’ll also realize that there are a hole bunch of people that are full of nostalgia and BS, plus you’ve got a bunch of potheads acting like they remember something from 30 years ago when they can’t even remember what they had for dinner last night. Now with the RIU vibes mixed in it’s getting tiresome.
For you newer and unhaded geowers, It’s a great time to be growing, there are loads of strains to choose from and clones are cheaper and more readily available than ever. Don’t let some of the miserable and insufferable old foggy types that are stuck in to past make you think otherwise. lanky and floppy.
Hold multiple OG, sour, and chem types while also growing a bunch of the latest stuff and it will make sense why the market is what it is commercially. You’ll also realize that there are a whole bunch of people that are full of nostalgia and BS, plus you’ve got a bunch of potheads acting like they remember something from 30 years ago when they can’t even remember what they had for dinner last night. Now with the RIU vibes mixed in it’s getting tiresome.
For you newer and not jaded growers, it’s a great time to be growing, there are loads of strains to choose from and clones are cheaper and more readily available than ever. Don’t let some of the miserable and insufferable old foggy and bro types that are stuck in to past make you think otherwise.
I think the most bizarre part of some of these strains is the very first time you smoke them its a wild experience that lessens without a break from the strain.
I suspect part of it is body chemistry because me and my buddy were talking about a specific strain we both smoked recently and i mentioned its a very short lived high for me, while he has a very opposite experience.
I am going to throw my inexperienced $0.02 into this, because why not at this point? 
I am someone who has only ever had dispensary weed until my recent harvest. I’ve definitely noticed a difference in the past 9 years even from what was available in dispensaries to what is available now. What I grew was dispensary bag seed from a friend because I expected to kill it at some point.
How will I know what is “worthy” of keeping and maybe sharing cuts or breeding at some point? For me the line is “are the effects beneficial to me personally?” that’s it. I feel like that is just as worthy a criteria as “frosty” or “this smell” or whatever.
Everyone who complains that people water things down has their own breeding criteria. Someone breeding specifically for scent or flavor might pass up some fantastic medical effects. Someone culling based on growth speed might miss a perfect mold resistant strain, whatever else. There are always sacrifices made when choosing which genetics are “worthy” of being passed on.
Commercial breeders have their criteria, hype breeders have theirs, OG breeders all have different ones. There’s no One True Way in pretty much anything. Be the change you want to see and all that. If you think more landraces should be out there, then do a seed extension run or whatever. If you think old school strains, get some cuts and get to making seeds! There are options other than complaining in one of the best places to find non-commercial strains.
Encouraging people to try some of the outliers seems like a way more productive use of time. I’m specifically going to praise @US3RNAM3 for this, because that’s how I got the landrace seeds I have queued up for my third run (after my upcoming one). Sending to people with the request that they grow and talk up the landraces. That was the only requirement/expectation! And it’s so appreciated! I’m really excited to grow them.
Not to bring academia into it but a friend of mine is attending the U of Maine and one of their Psych related cannabis courses they’re also exploring like “threshold” theory and how the amount of stimulation and outside factors while consuming and after consuming can lessen the high because any stimulation on the system can create certain chemical situations biologically. So there’s also a lot to be said about the higher THC bomb strains and how some of the Millenial and Gen z consumers need them becaus the same systems at play that make it so we need to be on our phone, watching TV, playing games all at once create a different threshold system for how we uptake all sorts of shit not even just cannabis in the Cannabinoid system and it’s receptors. Studies are super limited though but I think it’s a really interesting aspect of how cannabis has been shaped and “evolved” through the tech boom and all these major changes in how people live.
Not to be off topic, we can get back to talking about Old School vs New school
I’d also love to get into like “small craft and boutique” breeders and what they push out, a lot of them talk about making the best selections of the new modern hype and creating unique and resilient outliers from them. Sometimes it looks like they just take whatever won the cup the year before, and slam them into an (A x B) x (B x A) type situations and then saying they’ll be killer.
Here’s the reality of this… There is no consistency in cannabis and there never will be. Too many variables. I’ve run clones in hydro in the same system and had taste and potency vary from one plant to the next. Take a bunch of clones and put them in one pot and see how some will stay small and others will take off quickly, and there’s no rhyme or reason to it.
On top of that, humans are highly flawed and we ourselves are our own unique chemovar/cultivars. I’m the person that can smell things others can’t, and can describe things well because I have a strange ability to recall something where I once had almost verbatim. Smells, tastes, and places leaves accurate imprints in my memory in a way it doesn’t for most people. I also am that person that gets the “less than 1% of people will experience the following side effects” guy. I also couldn’t handle my weed until my late 30’s, and it took me a long time to not get blasted by one hit of any weed.
I’m short, ymwv!
Acro that’s two great comments, good on you.
Jackpot. It’s the reason I don’t care for hash or dabs.
Agreed.
I can’t argue with that, and I’m an older head. Everyone has their preference and/or reason for smoking what they do. One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. Potency is not my top metric. I look for cultivars with character. Something that appeals to me. I can throw a dart and hit a potent strain.
I can’t think of one plant I’ve grown since legalization that I didn’t like. They weren’t all my favorites, but they all brought something I was looking for to the table. I hope my tolerance is never so high that most cultivars are a disappointment to me.
Just my opinion but i think Anyone who smoked old thai or hawaiian knows we lost something along the way. Even early 90’s island thai or hawaiian makes modern polyhybrids seem very lacking in comparison of effect and duration.
I smoked a hallucinogenic thai as a kid that to me still blows away all post 90s cannabis. Even puna indicas of 80-90s were as good as any nevil NL skunk indica lines, and they would surely send all cookies derived lines to question the worth of they’re glitter. Those puna buds went for 6-8k a lb all throughout 90s.
Well that’s basically what it is. Environmental factors flip certain genetic switches, having a direct outcome on the results.
