Colombian Gold

The first few most “helpful” reviews bemoan the fact that Santa Marta Colombian Gold, an infamously phenomenal equatorial Colombian landrace cultivar that, alongside two other equatorial Colombian sativas - Colombia Punta Roja & the rare Chocolate Colombian phenotype of Wacky Weed, an heirloom Colombian sativa that was popular as early as 1953 in NYC (apparently it was one of the only options for cannabis smokers in the US before the 1960s, at least on the East Coast, & the Beat Generation’s pre-60s experiences smoking ‘tea,’ were almost all of this once ubiquitous cultivar that today is believed to be extinct in the US, & quite possibly everywhere else as well - the Colombian landrace plant that eventually became Wacky Weed is unknown, although many believe it’s simply a variety of Colombian Lowland or just Colombian - the most common landrace cultivar in Colombia), were bred together by The Haze Brothers in Santa Cruz in 1969, creating the mostly unworked F1 seeds of O Haze or Original Haze. A lot of people incorrectly believe (including apparently Leafly itself, which is unsurprising considering that there is a great deal of misinformation on Leafly which is a shame) that Haze has Mexican, Colombian, Thai, & Indian genetics. But it doesn’t, and it never did. O Haze is a cross of three equatorial Colombian sativas & like other equatorial sativas usually takes 20-24 weeks to flower. Except that O Haze, while containing the sought after, legendary genetics of Purple Haze, Green Haze, & Golden Haze, more often than not would produce mediocre offspring or totally garbage offspring due to all the undesirable genes that weren’t ever bred out of Original Haze. Nevil Shoenmakers, the Amsterdam based Australian expatriate & founder / owner of The Seedbank of Holland, the world’s first cannabis Seedbank, which advertised in High Times throughout the 1980s, after scoring a bundle of O Haze seeds from Sam The Skunkman, spent most of 1985-1989 concentrating the desirable genetics in the O Haze, while breeding out the garbage genes at the same time. In 1989 he successfully wrapped up his Haze breeding project with the Haze A & Haze C males. His 1989 first ever cross of (Northern Lights #5 x Haze A) became a holy grail cross virtually overnight, & S1s of the original cross would eventually be popped & hunted, with two outlier phenotypes becoming two of the most infamous plants in cannabis history. An unknown cultivator in the US popped an unknown number of S1s of Nevil’s brilliant 1989 cross, & from that population selected a truly unique & legendary plant that would become extremely popular up and down the I-95 corridor, from Miami to Maine. That legendary plant was the original cut of what growers in NYC called Bronx Golden Haze, NYC Haze, Uptown Brown, Harlem Haze, The Church or Frankie due to its overwhelming terpene profile that reeks of frankincense. Most people know her simply as The Piff. A cut of the exact same plant made its way to Southern Florida, & while the locals are totally incorrect about the plant’s origins / genetics / & alleged exclusivity to Miami. To this day many South Florida natives claim the plant is a pure haze & that it doesn’t exist outside of Miami. Except that it was even more deeply embraced in NYC & for a long time, in the late 1990s-mid 2000s, .8 gram dimes of Piff could be found fairly easily north of 110th street, & occasionally in other parts of the city. The name that is most often associated with Piff is Cuban Black Haze, since it was embraced by the Cuban expatriate community in Miami, bolstered by the misinformation that plagued the Florida cut. Years later Karma was gifted a handful of S1s of the ‘89 NL5/Haze A, & of the plants he hunted through, he selected another unique outlier phenotype as his favorite & that plant would go on to become the A5 Haze, which has been the parent of so many incredible cultivars. But stepping back to the Santa Marta Colombia Gold, it hasn’t gone anywhere or been crossed out of existence like so many other classic cultivars. Genuine SMCG beans or a clone of the plant aren’t exactly easy to come by, but the Colombian Gold hasn’t gone anywhere. I’ve grown it many times, & despite flowering for 18-20 weeks & able to reach 5-6 meters or taller in size if planted directly in high quality organic soil, it’s a truly incredible plant. The best chance to find Santa Marta Colombian Gold seeds lies in European Seedbanks, although it was released by several small US breeders, including Snowhigh, & can occasionally still be found in the US from experienced collectors & breeders. After all, Capulator used it just seven years ago to breed his most infamous creation, Miracle Alien Cookies. Otherwise known simply as The MAC. Sure, it’s not easy to find Colombia Gold. But it’s even harder to find Panama Red, Kona Gold, Kerala Gold, Puna Budder, Black African Magic, Congo Pointe Noire, Malawi Gold, Angola Red, Highland Oaxacan Gold, & many other cultivars of heirloom and landrace cannabis that still exist but aren’t going to be easy to source by any means.

Belushi Farms in Oregon sells a form of Santa Marta if you’d watched Jim’s show it shows his dumb antics in Columbia but his hybrid products are clean and tasty. I enjoyed my variety box and have reordered. That’s Jim, John, SNL cast.

Dried in the sun, chlorophyll is degraded as -10%THCBud becomes a Gold Color. Same method of drying for Acapulco Gold