Why was pot quality so bad in the past?

Wordz said:

well when i first started smoking i would be comatose from dirty brown schwag and I've never been high like that since my first year of smoking.

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yeah true that but there are hardcore hippies I know in cali that are growing modern strains and have testified to it not being that much stronger than it was in the past if you either grew it yourself, or had the most amazing hookup ever.

rowlman said:

...think about what your saying...how much do you really think weed has evolved in 40 years...considering the plant has been around for well over 5000 years, I don't think science has done that much to it...think about how shitty the weed would have been 500 years ago if you think it was that bad only 40 years ago...people would not have been consuming a plant for religous and medical purposes if it was so weak and low in the thc...think about that for a minute....just smoke a bowl of your super duper 2010 strain that God himself couldn't of made better 40 years ago and think about it

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take 100 seeds and plant them all in a CONTROLLED environment. now pick the single best female and the single best male and breed them.

you just did something in less then 6 months that may take nature 1000's of years to do. those two plants may have never even come together at all. by you SELECTIVELY BREEDING them you have made a MAJOR change in the evolution of quality weed.

it's like second grade stuff. there really is no argument. today's vegetables are better as well. less disease ridden, more resistant to mildews and pests. juicier and more flavorful.

i don't understand how anyone can argue against this.

bunch of old people with egos trying to hold onto there youthful bragging rights. it's kinda sad to watch.

fdd2blk said:

take 100 seeds and plant them all in a CONTROLLED environment. now pick the single best female and the single best male and breed them.

you just did something in less then 6 months that may take nature 1000's of years to do. those two plants may have never even come together at all. by you SELECTIVELY BREEDING them you have made a MAJOR change in the evolution of quality weed.

it's like second grade stuff. there really is no argument. today's vegetables are better as well. less disease ridden, more resistant to mildews and pests. juicier and more flavorful.

i don't understand how anyone can argue against this.

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I agree that its better.. I Just don't think i'ts so much better today that pepole can' say that there wasn't weed as dank as this back then. maybe not quite as dank but definitely close...

which brings me back to my point that I believe the overall quality has gone up DRAMATICALLY....

rowlman said:

....not you fdd...I meant the guy before you...lol...I respond slow...all that shitty weed i smoked back then i guess

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now i see this. lol

Wordz said:

my dad was telling me about weed the late 60s in mexico. He went down there and they got a coupke kilos of stuff that off one joint he couldn't keep his eyes open or move and then he fell asleep on the beach and woke up to the worst sunburn off his life. lol. he said it was golden from all the trichs so maybe it was alcapulco gold? He said most weed was 75% stems leaves and seeds though but it was 5-10 bucks a lid, yes that's right they measured weed by a lid to a jar back then. lol fuckin cavemen.

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"tolerance levels".

fdd2blk said:

"tolerance levels".

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but how much of it can we truly attribute to tolerance vs unique cannabinoid content...?

tafbang said:

All the old people I know say that bud back then were barely stronger than cigarettes....

It just has to do with our increased knowledge of science and botany and experiments. I'm sure in the future we'll have whole entire marijuana plants that are just all drenched with trichomes and look like diamonds with no visible green. People are working on it

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Like this stuff!? I almost dropped a deuce in my pants when I saw these! HERE

fdd2blk said:

take 100 seeds and plant them all in a CONTROLLED environment. now pick the single best female and the single best male and breed them.

you just did something in less then 6 months that may take nature 1000's of years to do. those two plants may have never even come together at all. by you SELECTIVELY BREEDING them you have made a MAJOR change in the evolution of quality weed.

it's like second grade stuff. there really is no argument. today's vegetables are better as well. less disease ridden, more resistant to mildews and pests. juicier and more flavorful.

i don't understand how anyone can argue against this.

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yeah but farmers have been doing this forever, i'll agree not on our standards today but obviously you had to save seeds back in the day so I'm sure farmers would keep the best specimens for the next year. it's been grown for human consuption in other places than america for thousands of years. it's just that growing sensi is becoming the standard so obviously you'll get a higher quality with better grow conditions, but i don't think in 40 years the western world has taken low potency strains and turned them into top shelf of today. I think the grandparent strains must've had high potency. I don't think afgani(for example) has changed much from hundreds of years ago til now. imo

There is no way weed as a whole was anything near where it is today back then. Sure if you are the grower...you are always going to have killer dope. 1970 or 2010...your dope will rawk.
(But a grower today would be able to produce weed that would DESTROY whatever the 1970 d00d had) I mean what was the BEST strain then? Acapulco Gold? Some kind of Afghan 1 deal?
I'd put a $25 pack of Nirvana's AK48 against anything in the 70's and we'll see how strong the Acapulco Gold seems then. Or a pure sativa like Cinderella 99. You can get those for 57 bucks. They flower in 50 days.
They have a 50 day sativa of Cindy's strength in 1970?
Also how much easier is it today? I can order 8,000 strains online. They come with semi-accurate descriptions and are relatively cheap. Maybe if you were a TRUE weed baron in 1970...you'd
have access to a few dozen strains. That combined with breeding/local trading would get you many options. You'd never have enough years in your life to match the offerings of a modern seed bank though.
Not even close. There are strains on the net that took years and thousands of plants breed to capture. And there are thousands of them. So your odds of being a regular joe pot smoker and getting weed
of today's quality on a consistant basis would be impossible. Never mind the variety.

Then let's give people credit. They get better at "stuff". "Stuff" improves over time. Gardening techniques, lighting tech/efficiency. Farmers for ALL types of crops in this world are producing bigger, better faster
than they were in 1970.

Bottomline for me is there is nothing WRONG with weed with a 5% active level, sure you can get more fucked up faster on higher level THC, but for me it involves a harder adjustment when I run out, and also I just don't like getting THAT stoned.

Weed is better now than when i was in high school 20 years ago. I went to HS very near a major city...I knew people that had great hookups in that city.
The best herb going then was Northern Lights and I got it 4 or 5 times a year I'd guess. Sometimes I even got it sans seeds! (Most times it had a few...but certainly
less seeds than the "regs" had) Now I can get anything I want and sans seeds is a given. Best weed I've had for potency now is probably Sour Diesel. Best flavor? Juicy Fruit.
I swear to Gawd I was smoking that more addictively than any other type of weed...and it was that flavor! I craved the taste something wicked. Best high was probably
DNA's lemon skunk. I really dig 50/50 indica to sativa blends and the flavor of the lemon was pretty nice too.

my friend's dad is an old hippie guy and he says he can't honestly say if it was better then or not because he was always so fucked up on other shit. what he does say is that hands down even the shittiest weed back then would dystroy any of today's weed in the flavor department. any time i bring him some new shit he says the taste is nice but it's not like the "real stuff". he compares it to coffee. he asked me if a coffee enthusiast would rather drink a fine colombian or some starbucks with a shot of hazelnut. i get his point.

fdd2blk said:

bunch of old people with egos trying to hold onto there youthful bragging rights. it's kinda sad to watch.

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...wow...i'm really out numbered here...but I'm standing my ground...fdd , I'm surprised at your response because I thought you were near Humbolt ( spelling ) County??...in 1984 I lived in Newbury Park and Thousand Oaks...I can't begin to explain the quality of smoke ( humboldt county indica bud to be exact...was the name )...I remember paying like $120 for 3 golfball size nugs...probable some of the best weed I've seen to date...but I'm out numbered here so...what else can I say except I feel very fortunate to have had the access to this non existent smoke...and anyone who grew up with me would just laugh at this...my father in law is like 69...we smoke together every day...he's been a biker his whole life and he's laughing right now( as he tokes on a bowl of my Violator Kush)...if you guys only new...lol...Peace

Rowlman-I agree with you there was killer stuff back then. Not as abunant though.

FDD-I agree with you that the science and strains have gotten better as well. But i disagree with you on your fruit and veg anology. Have you bought fruit and vegs from the store lately? THEY SUCK ASS. No flavor. Yes they resist molds and bugs and stuff but they taste like shit.

Yes with the advance in indoor horticulture we have gone far in a short amount of time and yes i believe that as time goes on we will find and or make better strains. But that doesnt mean we didnt have really good shit back in the 70 and 80. It may have not been readily availible like it is today, but it was there.

Just my two cents on the subject.

fdd2blk said:

take 100 seeds and plant them all in a CONTROLLED environment. now pick the single best female and the single best male and breed them.

you just did something in less then 6 months that may take nature 1000's of years to do. those two plants may have never even come together at all. by you SELECTIVELY BREEDING them you have made a MAJOR change in the evolution of quality weed.

it's like second grade stuff. there really is no argument. today's vegetables are better as well. less disease ridden, more resistant to mildews and pests. juicier and more flavorful.

i don't understand how anyone can argue against this.

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I have to half agree, half disagree.


I agree with the weed part, but comparing it to vegetables just doesn't work. A LOT of veggies, and I mean a LOT are genetically modified. Corporations (like monsanto) are changing the genetic makeup of the farm crops...It's a controversial topic, but still it's not so much selective breeding as it is with cannabis.

im gonna plug kentucky here if thats ok..lol...alot of pot was grown naturally back in the day, they didnt treat weed in the same way we do now because it was so abundant. Johnny Boone, in my opinion, was one of the fore fathers of selective breeding. From Kentucky. you can read part of his story here. http://www.northernwinorml.org/wordpress/2010/11/28/run-johnny-run-kentucky-wisconsin-king-pot-caught/ actually he's been considered a federal fugitive for quite sometime because he refuses to stop growing pot.

thanks...I wish I could shout out my name and see if anyone who grew up with me is on here...don't really want to open-up that can though...lol...but we who smoked in the late 70's and early 80's and lived near Pine Knob...MI....we had the shit in our little town...strains didn't have fancy names back then...but the Gold (" no stems or seeds you don't need...just badass weed"...cheech and chong..lol)and the Thai...when you could get it...was not be talked about like this...it deserves much respect...and is probable the same blood that is running through the veins of the pot you smoke today

Luckily it doesn't seem to matter how much they tinker with DNA, it seem to revert to its original state within about 25 generations....

i always heard 14 generations would give u the same characteristics you started with. but i havent tried that personally. lol.