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Hawaii \u2014\u00a0the name alone evokes glistening visions of paradise; emerald hills and valleys, topaz waterfalls and lagoons, diamond white beaches and shimmering obsidian stretches of volcanic coastline, all sprawled across a sapphire sea and drenched in the floral perfume of perpetual spring.<\/p>\n
For lovers of cannabis, that gem-encrusted island cluster possesses an extra layer of allure thanks to the long-standing (and well-earned) reputation it has cultivated where cultivation is concerned. The unfettered fertility of\u00a0Hawaii\u2019s<\/a>\u00a0volcanic soil and the ceaseless beaming of its nearly seasonless sun produce some of the most highly prized agricultural products on Earth, including sugar cane, coffee, pineapple \u2014\u00a0and yes \u2014\u00a0cannabis.<\/p>\n Hawaiian bud earned a place in the pantheon of pot during the 1970s, the first golden age of modern ganja. This was long before formal branding was a part of cannabis, but\u00a0\u201cMaui Wowie\u201d still made a big enough impact to become a global household name. To this day, not only do people still recognize and respond to that name, it\u2019s on the short list of old-school cultivars that are still grown and enjoyed in (roughly) their original form. Bottom line: Hawaiian cannabis is the stuff of legends.<\/p>\n Hawaiian Seed Company<\/a>\u00a0co-founder and CEO, River Young, is counting on the tangible expression of that legend in the feeling and flavor of the company\u2019s proprietary genetics to propel the fledgling company to soaring heights.<\/p>\n Powerline 41 is a cross of a Kauai Electric mother plant with a Thunderf*ck father.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Young is no stranger to Hawaiian cultivation. He was raised on Kauai\u2019s North Shore and worked as the manager of a lettuce, tomato and cucumber farm there, giving him an intimate understanding of the unique advantages and challenges of island agriculture.<\/p>\n As far as he\u2019s concerned, finding \u201cthe best genetics possible\u201d is the first step in establishing a successful brand.<\/p>\n \u201cWe foresee that genetics will ultimately control the growth of cannabis and\u00a0hemp<\/a> companies,\u201d Young said. \u201cThe genetics here in Hawaii can withstand trade winds and high humidity, so they tend to be tougher strains, meaning people in\u00a0Florida<\/a> and other climates with high humidity find them especially appealing.\u201d<\/p>\n But those hardy genetics didn\u2019t just appear from thin air: they\u2019re the result of the fastidious seed hoarding of his business partner, co-founder and head breeder Sol Kahn.<\/p>\n About 25 years ago, in 1994, Kahn planted the literal seeds that would eventually blossom into Hawaiian Seed Company. As is often the case in these stories, they were generally unremarkable bag seeds he just happened to find, but when they bloomed, so did his lifelong passion for cultivation.<\/p>\n \u201cI started breeding in 1994\u00a0 and I haven\u2019t stopped since,\u201d he said. \u201cI remember exactly what that plant looked and smelled like. It was this light green and orange with popcorn nugs and a very tropical sweetness, like mango. I grew them out, I had some males and grew them all, then realized they crossed and created seeds.\u201d<\/p>\n That simple discovery inspired Kahn to pursue increasingly complex breeding projects in his backyard and at hidden spots up in the mountains, using seeds which he obsessively collected \u2014\u00a0a habit that Young, a childhood friend, used to laugh at, until it formed the foundation of their company.<\/p>\n Sol Kahn, the head breeder at Hawaiian Seed Company.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u201cI thought he was completely nuts for collecting seeds all these years and it looks like he was correct \u2014\u00a0there\u2019s definitely value in those genetics,\u201d Young said.<\/p>\n What started as an eccentric hobby has grown into a massive private stock of cannabis genetics, encompassing over 60,000 seeds, including the heirloom island genetics (and accompanying tropical flavors) that serve as the brand\u2019s signature.<\/p>\n It\u2019s worth noting that, despite the brand\u2019s island roots (and still island-bound leadership team), the official corporate headquarters of Hawaiian Seed Company is in\u00a0Oregon<\/a>, where the laws are already in place for this level of cannabis commerce. The company is working towards bringing their company \u201cfull circle\u201d with operations in Hawaii, but for now, Oregon provides them not only the legal freedom to operate but a unique space to do so \u2014\u00a0a former elementary school.<\/p>\n \u201cWe didn\u2019t kick any kids out. It was vacant and had moved to a new location,\u201d Kahn said. \u201cIt turned out to be a perfect location for us and we\u2019re ultimately hoping to turn it into a cannabis learning center.\u201d<\/p>\n There\u2019s a lot of different factors involved in growing a trusted cannabis brand, but chief among them is establishing the legitimacy and value of your signature strains. Like many contemporary cannabis cultivators, Hawaiian Seed Company utilizes the massive \u2014\u00a0and ever-growing \u2014\u00a0Phylos Galaxy<\/a>\u00a0to identify and validate their flagship strains.<\/p>\n Khan said\u00a0Phylos<\/a>\u00a0\u2014\u00a0a company he describes as \u201cfrickin\u2019 awesome\u201d \u2014 offers him and other cultivators the perfect tool for elevating their brand above the noise of a crowded field and protecting their genetics from unscrupulous dudes looking for a quick come-up at the expense of someone else\u2019s hard work.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s so many bullsh*tters out there who will take your strain and change the name, and [the Phylos Galaxy] just keeps the growers honest and keeps track of strains so they don\u2019t get lost in the wind,\u201d he said, adding that the ability to quickly discover other strains with both similar and distant genetics helps him \u201cmap out a more visual interpretation of the genetics\u2019 travels.\u201d<\/p>\n That ability to map the ancestry of cannabis cultivars has proven invaluable when working with the ephemeral genetics endemic to Hawaiian herb. Some cultivators, at least publicly, place a high premium on genetic stability, but Kahn is not among them. He typically just lets Mother Nature do her thing when it comes to phenotype variation, a philosophy rooted in the aggressively diverse lineage of old-school Hawaiian\u00a0pakalolo.<\/i><\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t really worry too much about stabilization. Back in the day, there was none, everything just got cross bred with each other,\u201d he said. \u201cIn Hawaii especially, everything was breeding and getting crossed with all kinds of pollen \u2014 Thai, Afghani,\u00a0everything got so mixed up \u2014\u00a0so I\u2019m not trying to make one pheno that\u2019s \u2018perfect\u2019 and then clone it.\u201d<\/p>\n Midnight Splendor, a Kali Mist hybrid crossed with GDP and Kauai Purple, creates a beautiful fuschia flower. The flavor of this cultivar include bubble gum, butter pie crust and sharp lemon.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n But when he does find a need to stabilize something\u00a0or just feels like jazzing around with genetics,\u00a0the year-round sunlight of the North Shore allows him to do so in less than half the time it would take a breeder on the mainland<\/p>\n Another thing Kahn doesn\u2019t worry about much is potency. Most of his creations test in the high teens to the mid-20s for\u00a0cannabinoid<\/a>\u00a0content. This is partially because he personally prefers lighter, more mellow effects, but mostly it\u2019s the result of an intense focus on other characteristics like\u00a0terpene<\/a>\u00a0profile and \u2014\u00a0here\u2019s a novel idea where flower cultivation is concerned \u2014\u00a0color.<\/p>\n That success of that last mission, discovering vibrantly colored cultivars, is immediately apparent in the mature flowers of Akala Kush, a deep lime-green flower punctuated by dazzling bursts of pink and fuchsia pistils sprawling out like glowing antennae.<\/p>\n And while color is an important (and deeply undervalued) aspect of cannabis, it\u2019s practically impossible to overstate the importance of a strain\u2019s terpene profile when it comes to how it\u2019s received by the public. At a time when potency is more or less a given \u2014\u00a0particularly for cannabis destined for extraction \u2014\u00a0the smell and flavor of a strain is the main source of its unique identity.<\/p>\n Young is confident that those searching for terps will find much to love in the distinctly Hawaiian flavor profiles of the company\u2019s flowers.<\/p>\n \u201cFrom the lab tests and feedback we\u2019re getting it seems like these strains do hold some tropical flavors in terms of terpenes,\u201d Young said. \u201cIf you\u2019re a processor and you get a hold of some of our flowers the terps are going to have a very unique flavor, so it\u2019s very attractive to them and it stands out for growers as well.\u201d<\/p>\n Those living in Northern California will soon be able to see (and smell) for themselves: Hawaiian Seed Company has coordinated with\u00a0Dark Heart Nursery<\/a>\u00a0to make some of their top strains available to consumers as clones, including Kahn\u2019s undisputed favorite strain,\u00a0Midnight Splendor<\/a>, an \u201cabsolutely fantastic mix\u201d he\u2019s been working on for nearly a decade.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s Kali Mist, an old school strain that\u2019s been grown on Kauai forever, crossed with Kauai Purple \u2014\u00a0a deep purple indica I got from an uncle a couple years ago \u2014 crossed into Girl Scout Cookies for potency and flavor and then crossed with Grandaddy Purple for a little more color,\u201d he said. \u201cWhat we got was giant, long fuchsia spears of amazingness. It\u2019s\u00a0covered<\/i>\u00a0in resin and when you grind it up, it\u2019s purple, pink, green and beautiful.\u201d<\/p>\n Kahn is proud of the terpene profiles he\u2019s harnessed and excited for people to taste them, whether that means smoking a bowl or dabbing concentrate extracted from his flowers, but he\u2019s most enthusiastic about the whole plant \u2014\u00a0and much less so about the direction and character of the industry surrounding it.<\/p>\n Hawaiian Seed Company searches for terpenes that evoke tropical flavors.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n He hopes his love of the whole plant will translate to the final product and help those who enjoy it embrace a more holistic view of cannabis.<\/p>\n \u201cPart of why we founded Hawaiian Seed Company was to bring that retro \u201970s vibe back to cannabis,\u201d Kahn said. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of disrespect in the new cannabis industry\u2026 we do this because we love it, we love this amazing plant and we want to share it, but we want to respect it.\u201d<\/p>\n No matter how you feel about the direction of the cannabis industry, it\u2019s hard to find anything bad to say about beautiful cannabis cultivars with unique terpene profiles, and that\u2019s exactly what Hawaiian Seed Company is all about \u2014\u00a0providing a mouthwatering slice of the islands.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s the originality of the flavors, just having something that\u2019s tropical and different,\u201d Young said. \u201cMaybe there\u2019s a certain connection to vacation or something, but people just seem a little more relaxed when they smoke our strains.\u201d<\/p>\n There\u2019s no substitute for experiencing the North Shore in person, but breathing in a fragrant, intoxicating cloud of its tropical essence and sinking gently into a mellow, productive buzz is almost like a smokeable Hawaiian vacation \u2014\u00a0and it\u2019s certainly cheaper than buying a plane ticket.<\/p>\n TELL US<\/b>, have you ever smoked a Hawaiian strain?<\/p>\n Originally published in Issue 35 of Cannabis Now.\u00a0LEARN MORE<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n The post Breeding Tropical Genetics With the Hawaiian Seed Company<\/a> appeared first on Cannabis Now<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Hawaii \u2014\u00a0the name alone evokes glistening visions of paradise; emerald hills and valleys, topaz waterfalls and lagoons, diamond white beaches and shimmering obsidian stretches of volcanic coastline, all sprawled across a sapphire sea and drenched in the floral perfume of perpetual spring. For lovers of cannabis, that gem-encrusted island clusterContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":32979,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1924,50,3944,7677,954,7678,7679,85,7260,7680,7681,7682,7683,7684,7685,107,1598],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32978"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32978"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32978\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32980,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32978\/revisions\/32980"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32979"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/Powerline-Cannabis-Strain.jpg\")
<\/p>\nFrom Bags to Riches<\/h4>\n
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<\/p>\nHawaii\u2019s Colorful, Unstable, Terp-Filled Edge<\/h4>\n
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<\/p>\nComing to the Mainland<\/h4>\n
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\nRead More: Breeding Tropical Genetics With the Hawaiian Seed Company<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"