WINTER strains??

Looking for a strain that actually does well DURING winter COLD, not just flowering early before winter sets in? Friesland has been suggested, does it do well with a few morning frosts? Any other strains? Looking to pop seeds now (Mid-november), veg indoor til ~1 ft, then put outdoors (covered with plastic overhead, but sides open, so will get cold, but in ground, so root zone stays ~60-65F) with an extra 1-2hours of light in the middle of the night. Will stop supplemental light around Jan 1, so looking to finish flowering around March 1. I'm NorCal, ~1300ft in sierra foothills, ~39N latitude.

growerNshower said:

Looking for a strain that actually does well DURING winter COLD, not just flowering early before winter sets in? Friesland has been suggested, does it do well with a few morning frosts? Any other strains? Looking to pop seeds now (Mid-november), veg indoor til ~1 ft, then put outdoors (covered with plastic overhead, but sides open, so will get cold, but in ground, so root zone stays ~60-65F) with an extra 1-2hours of light in the middle of the night. Will stop supplemental light around Jan 1, so looking to finish flowering around March 1. I'm NorCal, ~1300ft in sierra foothills, ~39N latitude.

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How cold does it get in your area? Mid-high 20s, and freisland, balochistan, a lot of afghan, pakistan, north east iran, or on the opposite side, North-western india, hindu kush type shit, should all be able to survive, for a while at least, but they'd probably still be slow to develop... Low light and cold temps will almost always slow development... And with spring light coming in, it might confuse the plants, but maybe not... I don't think there's a plant out there that will grow in temps in the teens or lower... even low 20s is really a gamble. On the plus side, if you are able to get a line used to growing in the winter, you might be able to teach the genetics to accept that as its normal growing conditions. Hmm... maybe I'll try over wintering some stuff too...

SFnone said:

How cold does it get in your area? Mid-high 20s, and freisland, balochistan, a lot of afghan, pakistan, north east iran, or on the opposite side, North-western india, hindu kush type shit, should all be able to survive, for a while at least, but they'd probably still be slow to develop... Low light and cold temps will almost always slow development... And with spring light coming in, it might confuse the plants, but maybe not... I don't think there's a plant out there that will grow in temps in the teens or lower... even low 20s is really a gamble. On the plus side, if you are able to get a line used to growing in the winter, you might be able to teach the genetics to accept that as its normal growing conditions. Hmm... maybe I'll try over wintering some stuff too...

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Thanks for the 411! I get just a couple frosts per year that generally only last the morning. Temps below 30F are rare, but occasional. The afternoons can get pretty warm, even in winter. I thought about the light issue, and that could be problematic...perhaps something with semi-auto tendencies would stay flowering as long as its not too late in winter/spring. The slow-development seems potentially less of an issue with me being SW exposed, and we get a good amount of light during the day, even in winter. I did have my eye on friesland or some crosses. I thought RealGorillaSeeds may have some potential...PurpleFreeze Bx1 caught my attention. I wonder if the purple in the mix could increase cold tolerance with the anthocyanin production. I suppose it may also be important to keep Brix high.

SFnone said:

How cold does it get in your area?

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I will say that the wild grasses/weeds start germinating in late sep/oct during the first rains, and continue to grow until they go to seed in late spring when drought starts. A lot of those wild grasses do very well in the climate.

Sounds like a cool project, most if not all strains can handle an occasional frost, maybe look more specifically for strains with mold resistance.

I live in NorCal in the Sierras at about 3500', we might live near to each other. I have grown many strains that handle the temp ranges that you are describing just fine, most plants can handle temps down to the mid-twenties without damage. Pot plants can handle frosts pretty well, but they handle it better when they can warm up between frosts, if there are frosts followed by continual cool temps they tend to have very slow development and lack of vigor. Lack of vigor lowers a plant's natural resistance to mold

My main concern if I were you would be centered around mold resistance. I've never tried to grow a plant through winter, but I've grown plants till the end of December with a heater in my hoop house, and the condensation becomes a bigger issue for me than temps.

Funkentelechy said:

Sounds like a cool project, most if not all strains can handle an occasional frost, maybe look more specifically for strains with mold resistance.

I live in NorCal in the Sierras at about 3500', we might live near to each other. I have grown many strains that handle the temp ranges that you are describing just fine, most plants can handle temps down to the mid-twenties without damage. Pot plants can handle frosts pretty well, but they handle it better when they can warm up between frosts, if there are frosts followed by continual cool temps they tend to have very slow development and lack of vigor. Lack of vigor lowers a plant's natural resistance to mold

My main concern if I were you would be centered around mold resistance. I've never tried to grow a plant through winter, but I've grown plants till the end of December with a heater in my hoop house, and the condensation becomes a bigger issue for me than temps.

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Yeah man your right frost aint the problem its very high /constant humidity plus frost thats the killer ime weed can take cold frost and snow long as it gets a break if its non stop even the most resistant stuff will still get hit a bit with mould nothings 100% in conditions like that

growerNshower said:

Looking for a strain that actually does well DURING winter COLD, not just flowering early before winter sets in? Friesland has been suggested, does it do well with a few morning frosts? Any other strains? Looking to pop seeds now (Mid-november), veg indoor til ~1 ft, then put outdoors (covered with plastic overhead, but sides open, so will get cold, but in ground, so root zone stays ~60-65F) with an extra 1-2hours of light in the middle of the night. Will stop supplemental light around Jan 1, so looking to finish flowering around March 1. I'm NorCal, ~1300ft in sierra foothills, ~39N latitude.

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If you got time and patience you could cross some ruderal genetics to semi auto stuff like friesland etc ruderal stuff like Siberian naturally need a freeze to even germinate its just how they evolved you could work that for your area pretty good im sure

I'm no expert on outdoors but I've always heard that Blueberry and White Widow can grow well into the winter, even survive snowfalls.

Not sure if that's true, but I had to switch grow locations on 1 of my grows and temps swung big time between the 2 locations- caused most of my plants to hermie - but the crosses I had with Blueberry in them did absolutely fine, not even effected by the temp change....temps at night were hitting the 20s lol

mother of berries... i used to feed mine cold water the last 2 weeks and it thrived!

Have a look into Early Queen from Mr Nice. I've just got a pack from Shanti for this exactly scenario. Looking for an early finisher that can handle colder climates.

GWilliamsCannabis said:

I'm no expert on outdoors but I've always heard that Blueberry and White Widow can grow well into the winter, even survive snowfalls.

Not sure if that's true, but I had to switch grow locations on 1 of my grows and temps swung big time between the 2 locations- caused most of my plants to hermie - but the crosses I had with Blueberry in them did absolutely fine, not even effected by the temp change....temps at night were hitting the 20s lol

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Interesting with the blueberry...you may be on to something! This article (among others) talks about the cold tolerance provided by anthocyanin accumulation: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6726734/.

oldtymemusic said:

mother of berries... i used to feed mine cold water the last 2 weeks and it thrived!

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It has some blueberry in it...does it purple/blue?

eastcoastmo said:

Have a look into Early Queen from Mr Nice. I've just got a pack from Shanti for this exactly scenario. Looking for an early finisher that can handle colder climates.

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Also interesting, from a different perspective...if she is an early finisher AND cold tolerant, might that imply she can grow rapidly in the cold even in veg? I wonder how much of the tolerance to cold in late flower translates to being able to veg and early flower at those low temps...

the maines own blueberry 'mob' is blueberry x jerry berry? but the mother of berries 'mob' is a strawberry cough cross i think. the flower turns magenta color ans tastes like berry tootsie pop. berry, chocolate and earthy flavor. way different than any blueberry or bb cross i ever had.

growerNshower said:

Interesting, from a different perspective...if she is an early finisher AND cold tolerant, might that imply she can grow rapidly in the cold even in veg? I wonder how much of the tolerance to cold in late flower translates to being able to veg and early flower at those low temps...

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I'm about to test this out. We still have overnight temps of 5-10 Celcius so I'll let you know how they go!

Funkentelechy said:

Sounds like a cool project, most if not all strains can handle an occasional frost, maybe look more specifically for strains with mold resistance.

I live in NorCal in the Sierras at about 3500', we might live near to each other. I have grown many strains that handle the temp ranges that you are describing just fine, most plants can handle temps down to the mid-twenties without damage. Pot plants can handle frosts pretty well, but they handle it better when they can warm up between frosts, if there are frosts followed by continual cool temps they tend to have very slow development and lack of vigor. Lack of vigor lowers a plant's natural resistance to mold

My main concern if I were you would be centered around mold resistance. I've never tried to grow a plant through winter, but I've grown plants till the end of December with a heater in my hoop house, and the condensation becomes a bigger issue for me than temps.

EDIT: micronized sulfur until early flower will hopefully help.

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I think you are 100% right, the biggest issue will be mold...but I'm guessing secondary to cold damage, since the freezing can rupture the tissue and allow mold to infect the plant. When I think of cold resistance, I guess I lumped mold resistance in there, due to this relationship - though I understand there are other contributors to mold growth, such as humidity and temps (the plants will be covered overhead with 9 mil poly, but open air on the sides...with heaters inside a greenhouse/hoophouse, I would imagine that would result in a lot of condensation, since the air inside will be warmer than outside, and thus condense on the inside of the poly...were you using poly with anti-condensate coating?).

I was looking through Ace seeds, since he is very diligent at describing cold/mold/etc. resistance. He has Romulan BX1 listed as High/High for Cold/Mold resistance...Without thinking too much about it, I popped some Romulan BX1, but in hind sight, I wonder if he listed Romulan as being cold tolerant bc it is somewhat early to flower (Mid-October). Either way, we will see whats up when I put these babies outside!

conor c said:

If you got time and patience you could cross some ruderal genetics to semi auto stuff like friesland etc ruderal stuff like Siberian naturally need a freeze to even germinate its just how they evolved you could work that for your area pretty good im sure

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I wonder if there are some autos out already that fit the bill? Maybe Auto Frisian Dew? Playing on the anthocyanin cold resistance, maybe Auto Blueberry, or Friesland x Erdpurt?

I wouldn't mind starting from scratch if I could pop a lot more seeds, but...Hmm...maybe it would be easy to select from a population vegging in the cold...the phenos that can still grow in the cold should show themselves pretty quick! That would be pretty fun/exciting to find something.

growerNshower said:

I wonder if there are some autos out already that fit the bill? Maybe Auto Frisian Dew? Playing on the anthocyanin cold resistance, maybe Auto Blueberry, or Friesland x Erdpurt?

I wouldn't mind starting from scratch if I could pop a lot more seeds, but...Hmm...maybe it would be easy to select from a population vegging in the cold...the phenos that can still grow in the cold should show themselves pretty quick! That would be pretty fun/exciting to find something.

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Avoid frisian its weak shit also ul hate if u get the pheno that tastes and smells like crayons i shit u not nah id say something like rgs whitey freeze auto would be better or seedheaven in demmark sells soviet findland seeds they got some interesting stuff and they higher than me im at 56ish there gears ran up to lat 61 and there fairly cheap and offer reg seeds something few auto guys do as for semis and outdoor photos yeah id go with friesland mighty mite or guerilla gold 3 or viking or something like that mind you some of paniks lines would suit you too but also id say especially viking cos its hardy mould resistant decent smoke and lots of purple buds/anthocyanins there are green ones but purple phenos are more common ime anyway as for dutch passion gear id take passion#1 over frisian dew anyday its more hardy and better smoke

growerNshower said:

were you using poly with anti-condensate coating?

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Yes, I am using poly with an anti-condensation coating. I'm sure it helps over no coating but still condensation is an issue both on the poly and on the plants themselves. Air movement can be very helpful in keeping moisture from settling on the plants at night.