"Pre-Soviet" Afghani Question

Heh, i forgot i already got it on my website (with some pages from Edge Forums). Here it is:
www.geocities.com/loroan/AK47.htm
It is a 13th post from the top (Koston's). And it's a transcript from the High Times article from '87. Nevil went there in '85.

What amazes me is that I haven´t seen a post in which the Howard Marks trip to a "hash factory"(of the Afridis) in Pakistan was mentioned...

Speaking of Afghani in general. What is the original Californian Afghani from the late sixties? Guys who brought those seeds to California surely traveled a lot at that time all across the central Asia (probably except the Soviet Union part). And they smoked a lot. Is there a chance that "Afghani" seeds are not of Afghani origin at all?

Possibly but at that time hash was almost free flowing from afghanistan. Smugglers were spending a lot of time there and getting to know the brokers and growers quite well. That along with the very distinct taste of presoviet afghan plants and hash I find it very unlikely. Also indicas weren't dispersed outside of afganistan parts of pakistan and india until the late 20th century.

DC is my "text-book" afghan

I´ve heard of "Pre-Dronkers 76 Hash Plant"...

zamalito said:

Also indicas weren't dispersed outside of afganistan parts of pakistan and india until the late 20th century.

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Hm, Turkey is not central Asia, but indicas were cultivated there since middle ages certainly. There's still those genes in hash plants that people grows in former Yugoslavia (parts of Kosovo and Macedonia) and it's some turkish indica landrace. However, turkish hash was known here (during the '70's and '80's) as "Turk the madman", 'cos it had a lot of crazy cerebral buzz. Maybe it's because of usual early harvest, but maybe those indicas are not pure indicas, maybe they have some sativa genes in it. They're like 1,5-1,8m tall, but a bit more branchy than usual indica.
Some old man told me (he lives in an rural region of Serbia), that in the years pre World War 2, people use to grow feral Cannabis for fiber. It wasn't industrial hemp, it was some hemp people use to grow for centuries, from the times of turkish Otoman empire. It was low in fiber (they didn't knew for any better) but when it's harvest time it's a hollyday - everybody get "drunk" just from the working in the field. Those plants weren't tall at all (not taller than an average man) and the leaves were very dark green. Sounds to me like indica was grown in Serbia also. Those genes are somwhere around here, but it sholud be found.

Indicas spread really rapidly in the late 20th century because many culture that traditionally made hashish from wild sativas embraced the indicas for somewhat obvious reasons. You are right they do have an ancient hashish culture. But turkish landrace actually makes up a decent amount of the genes in american hemp sativa varieties. Lebanon and iran are known to have great indicas varieties but the majority of their history of manufacturing hash was done with sativas until the 20th century when indicas were brought in to modernize the hash trade.

Many of the hash sativa varieties are on 3-6 ft tall. In the 60s and 70s many of the mediteranean and balkan areas that traditionally made hashish actually employed hashish farmers from afghanistan to increase their yields for commercial purposes the afghans brought with them genetics that hybridized with the older varieties. Although what I believe is somewhat different most botanists believe that indicas weren't even used for hashish in afghanistan until sometime between 1924 and 1960. It definitely didn't escape out of afghanistan until then. Vavilov's report after extensive travels in 1924 said indica was only found growing wild and used for hash only by nomads and every cultivated plant was sativa.

great info here guys, keep up the discussion..

For reasons zamalito knows, I'm very interested in Afghan cannabis heritage.. It's all very fascinating stuff for sure..

Discussions like these are an asset to the canna community :tup:

Hi,

Maple Leaf Indica is supposed to be a pre-soviet afghan variety.

Yeah I read that about the maple leaf somewhere, too. One thing about the presoviets is they varied much more. The first western hash seekers to travel to afghanistan in the 60s noticed that some plants leaned more toward the indica spectrum and some leaned more towards the sativa spectrum. During the two immigrations to afghanistan after the russian capture of russian turkestan (now uzbekistan and tajikistan) in 1868 and the chinese capture of chinese turkestanin the late 1930s (now xinjiang province of china) turkestani hashish farmers not only brought there ancient traditional and potent sativa hashish varieties but in the walk through the himalayas may have seen the highly resinous wild himalayan indica landraces and likely saved seeds from these wild plants. So between 1930 and 1980 due to the harshness of the climate the plants gradually turned from pure sativa to pure indica. Several visitors in the 60s and seventies noted much variation in height and leaf width in the hash plants in afghanistan until by 1980 they were predominantly the same as the wild plants that had been growing uncultivated in 1930.

interesting zam, nice info, you always pull through with it...i shoulda expected it

Reign of Terror said:

What happened to the afgani mj when the soviets invaded? Because there must be a reason why people must claim that their afghani is a "pre-soviet"

Reign

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It's good to see the best ppl on the case (Zam n Raco)

My two stalks:

During the soviet occupation of Afghanistan, the mujahiddin (those who struggle) adopted a system of growing smaller highland (indica type) plants in a gorrila setting,,, perhaps imported from Iran, Tajikistan, or Nepal (?)

These indica type plants are good to "double-crop" (see 'Mr Nice' by Howard Marks). Whereas the wild sativa are exactly that wild (or "Jungly" in pashtun). In Afghanistan it is mighty cold,,, you wanna get ya hashish to market (Peshwar) before winter takes a hold ,( you know buy some grain, rice, a new pattu, some ammo,,,). T'is WAR and has been for many a year!

Traditionally, in more peaceful times, the cultivation/harvest of taller lowland (sativa type) plants was once the habit of Pashtun (Pathan groups) in N. Afghanistan. Wild sativa type plants are commonplace on the Afghanistan/Pakistan boarder. Places like Chitral hold both types: wild and cultivated, tall and small:
http://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=20942

hope this helps
dL

*What's all the talk about "Commies" ??? Remember kids,,, "there's red stripes in the American flag..!" (Dylan)

Hey leaf; Your explanation does fit with the guerilla farming tactics that took place during the war though I think they used predominantly wild afghan indicas that had remained uncultivated until that point. I was wondering what you know about the length of the lowland growing season in afghanistan and during what months it took place and anything that you know about thes sativas would be great. I always assumed they were similar to the typical short season (for a drug sativa) wild nepalese/original chitral type, but when he was still working in canada breeder steve used a "kush" (he didn't know if it was more specifically afghani pakistani or north indian) landrace that came from a company called hbc to make plum bud and big skush that he said was very similar to south indian. I also recently heard of another long season sativa-like afghan that from the best I can tell from pictures resembles a south indian and has a very long flowering period and uneven maturation. Of the strains that are culturally and geographically anywhere near the hindu kush and were around long enough to get the attention of westerners the south indian strains did have the longest history of selective breeding for drug content. This make me wonder if the afghan hash sativas may have actually been quite different from the nepalese and pakistani landrace hash sativas though it does seem most likely that they were very similar. Do you think its possible that the turkestani/early afghani hash farmers had been using a south indian-like variety that would start flowering early but continue flowering for the rest of the season thus making use of a variable season length? That's one thing about the south asian sativas is that they never fully mature and just flower continuously (with definite exceptions). I'm starting to think that the large uzbek indicas very well may be hybrids of wild indicas with potent domesticated south indians. Of course this sounds a lot more romantic than likely. I just have very little understanding of why these long season south indian types would be up there. I don't think without extensive breeding to make the flowering start early or gradual acclimation there's any way these south indians could finish anywhere in afghanistan highland OR lowland but I am aware of two separate instances where people claim to have brought them back around 1970. They could've been more recent additions but even then it still seems odd. The old afghans believed their variety was bred and selected according to the criteria set by Baba Ku implying that it wasn't a domesticated strain and not the wild landrace sativa from nepal/pakistan.

I'm also very curious to see the differences I height calyx to leaf ratio seed size and leaf width between the petrolia compared to the deep chunk. The seeds of the deep chunk definitely show the plants have a very recent wild ancestry which is suprising considering the quality of this strain. However the branching pattern and leaf size shape show definite presoviet traits. Interestingly the seeds are almost identical to wild rusian ruderalis type cannabis although the ruderalis are less grey and more reddish tan with a woody appearance and have slightly more of a dominant ridge going all the way around the seed but still they are very similar in size shape and a lack of mottling The presoviet plants were cultivated with more room given to the individuals so they branched out wider. During and after the war they placed the plants more closely, which fits with the vavilov pre-turkestani hybridized wild afghan indica description of vertical branches. Raco please correct me if I'm wrong because I'm just going on pictures since my deep chunks are still pretty small but the deep chunk starts out with vertical branches but when it gets into normal outdoor size and full flowering the branches get pretty wide. We also must remember that wild traits are almost always dominant to domesticated traits. Small yet wide leaves and verticle branches that stay close to the center of the plant are definitely more suited to growing wild in the arid afghan environment than very large long leaves and wide branching. If any of you have a copy of marijuana botany the picture on the cover fits more with the wild or post soviet afghans and the drawing in the description for hindu kush is more similar to a presoviet afghan. Though presoviets did have much more variation and while they were less common all of same genes were present in the post soviets at least until recently. Pre soviets can also have wide leaves in early and mid vegetative growth but as the plants flower the leaves get more narrow. Most of the old afghan lines I've grown had wide leaves in the flowers but i've seen some pictures of presoviets that had really narrow leaves in the flowers.

Good info. zamalito

-The 'Hindu Kush' is so broad in geographical terms that the term "Kush" can/could/is prescribed to a vast number of varieties of plant type, from across the region; including both landrace cultivar and wild species of cannabis. It's a case of ethnocentrism... like saying, for example, that 'BlueMeany', 'Exeter Cream' and 'Cheese' (all localised UK strains) are all "English" ? ??? this means very little, cause each plant is so different in genotype and result. (...they call it racialization)!

-The contemporary accounts of several anthropologists, note that tall cannabis plants grow wild alongside rivers (irrigated down valley land not higher arid zones) across N/E Afghanistan, N/W Pakistan.

It's also important to remember that the mujahiddin (those who struggle) during the soviet occupation, were supported by outside ppl including; Tajik, Uzbeck, Paki, CIA and you got it Soviet freedom fighters from tyhe North... all of which could have introduced new stock as a means of economic support (?)

*I n I is just playing with words n verbs... :wink:

keep it flowing folks
knowledge dispels shadow, and draws light unto myth...
peace n bloom dL

Its sad that Nixon through paraquat destroyed many of the fine mexican landrace and through money convinced king zahir shah to outlaw cannabis production in afghanistan after many years of giving his blessing to the hashish farmers. Their first afghan contact with westerners was a flood of them coming with money to participate in the hash trade. Then Nixon sent a flood of american money used to buy the morality of their king causing him to use their own military to burn and destroy farms and the lives of the farmers who lived there all to destroy the crops that westerners were coming to buy to begin with. This started the destruction of the afghan gene pool. Within a year the king was overthrown (coincidence I think not) and replaced with a soviet government that provided schooling for women and college educations for many. Reagan through support of the columbian cartels to stop the spred of communism destroyed many fine columbian genetics and support of the mujahidin and their poster boy oasama started to finsish the job on the afghan gene pool.

The last year afghani hashish manufacture was condoned by their govt was the last year they weren't devided by war and had a stable govt

yes you read between the lines... lol
many scumbags made upon the misfortune of many...

Very few travellers during the 1980's and 90's actual got into the tribal zones of the north. Those back-packer whom thought it cool to reach Kabul where only half-way there,,, lol

...wild populations remained wild, even when placed under shell.

Hi again,

Has anyone tried Taskenti from CannaBioGen. It is a 100% indica from Uzbekistan. I picked up a package when it first became available, but haven't sprouted them yet.