I bought my landrace seeds from seedsman - Kumaoni-regular-seeds on the understanding they would be a cold-hardy, mould/mildew & bug resistant pure Sativa.
To my mind (at that time), these seeds would be ideal for growing in the North of Ireland 54.5977° N with maximum daylight hours of 17.15hrs and minimum 7.15hrs.
However, the seeds turned out to be original and had come from Uttarakhand, Northern India 30.0668° N with maximum daylight hours of 14.05hrs and minimum 10.11hrs.
My first seed breeding grow was carried out in a small tent and used a combination of natural light and a 300 watt LED. I used 18/6 lights for veg and a staggered light schedule of 1 week at 14/10, 1 week at 13/11, 6 weeks at 12/12 and 6 weeks at 10/12.
With the luck-of-the-Irish, the light schedule worked and I got a few hundred Kumaoni seeds along with hundreds of Kumaoni - Jamaican Pearl cross seeds.
Subsequent indoor grows under lights have produced satisfactory yields and smokes.
In June/July, I tested both sets of seeds by germinating and planting 15 of each strain in my polytunnel under natural daylight only.
Explosive veg growth started almost immediately and continued until about the second week of September when the first signs of flowering started to show.
I knew that my experiment was going to fail.
The original seeds were not acclimatised to the daylight hours and extreme climate conditions of winter in the North of Ireland.
By late November the plants had only managed to produce some scraggly buds and mildew/bud rot had set in, the whole lot had to be chucked.
I started 2019 in very poor shape. No smokes and very little chance of growing anything worthwhile.
I start 2020 in much better shape. 3 months of smokes and a 4-week continuous harvest schedule along with hundreds of seeds.
I’m developing a cunning plan to beat the mildew and rot by crossing early hardy landrace Indica with my current plants.
Plan it, practice it, pucking do it…
Good luck
