Like a vast majority of commercial gardeners, the two work with clones that they don’t buy from another source but produce for themselves
For many years, the standard strains Power Plant and Amnesia had solely been cultivated and the respective sorts of marijuana been offered to their customers by the Dutch commercial growers Dick and Freerk. Like a vast majority of commercial gardeners, the two work with clones that they don’t buy from another source but produce for themselves, cutting them from their own mother plants. Every now and then, they try new strains by getting themselves respective seeds, growing them and checking how their customers liked the new kind of buds – sometimes better, sometimes worse, but never was the overall feedback as enthused as it would have had to be to for an acceptance into their standard assortment.
Some time ago, from a grower friend called Cloudz, they received a clone of Dinachem, a strain by Dinafem of Spain. This Spanish seed company has earned itself a big name in the worldwide seed business over the past ten years. “You should really try that one”, Cloudz recommended, and since Dick and Freerk knew that he was very well-versed in the world of cannabis strains, having an unmistakable nose for stunning top-notch varieties, they happily accepted his recommendation. Although being an ardent grower of plants started from seed, for once Cloudz hadn’t selected that Dinachem cutting himself – this had previously been accomplished by another very experienced grower named Growolf, based on a package of feminized Dinachem seeds.
While that Dinachem cutting grew into a mother plant in Dick’s and Freerk’s veggie room, they started to look into this strain that had been unknown to them up to that point. And they came to know highly interesting details: Dinachem consists of nothing less than original ChemDog 91 genetics! Probably everybody who is a little bit familiar with cannabis strains has heard of ChemDog, because these exquisite genetics (created in 1991 by the breeder of the same name at the East Coast of the USA) are simply legendary. Like only a few other strains, it has put its stamp on the seed breeding business. Back then it was the first kind of marijuana on the American market – the strong basic note of which amazingly smelled like fuel, complemented by citrus and conifer notes – a real aroma revolution. And as a parental plant, ChemDog later on gave birth to other strain legends such as NYC Diesel, Sour Diesel and OG Kush, just to mention a few. The ChemDog descendant OG Kush is a phenomenon on its own: arguably it’s the most influential and important variety in recent years on the international seed market, as it was (and is) used for countless crosses and breeding projects, some of which have been showered with awards. And there’s no end in sight yet to that huge OG Kush hype.
However, the problem with the original ChemDog 91 is that it’s a clone-only plant and not an actual seed strain, only being available in the form of female cuttings. So a seed company striving to offer Chemdog 91 genetics in the form of seeds has to be in possession of that female elite clone as well as male plants of a strain preferably closely related to it so that, through multiple backcrossing, the breeder can approximate the ChemDog 91 genetics as closely as possible. This applies to Dinafem in Spain: They received the original ChemDog 91 clone genetics directly from breeder ChemDog, and in addition, plenty of GuavaChem seeds, a stabilized great-great-grandchild of ChemDog 91 bred as a seed strain by ChemDog over many years. Genetically, it resembles ChemDog 91 very much, thus being a perfect backcross partner for it, and furthermore a perfect rejuvenating cure – due to the very old age of the genetics, it can be propagated again and again over decades into the vegetative state, original ChemDog 91 clones grow slowly nowadays and don’t yield well any longer. But if transferred into seed form by means of related genetics such as the GuavaChem, it gets refreshed, regaining power and productivity, the lost vigor comes back – it’s a bit like an invigorating autohemotherapy. Dinafem chose the most stable GuavaChem plants of the highest quality to cross them with the original ChemDog 91 cutting, thus, over several generations, creating their vigorous high-yielding Dinachem strain (65% sativa, 35% indica).
The smoke delivers an extremely powerful turn which is cerebral, euphoric and uplifting at first, then finishing with a relaxing body high. So both sides of the spectrum, sativa and indica, are very well expressed in Dinachem’s kind of high.
Special emphasis was also put on the breeding goal to preserve that special penetrant fuel/diesel or petroleum trademark aroma of ChemDog, but also those other olfactory attributes typical of that strain, hints of citrus and pinewood – it’s all in there! Dinachem needs about 60 days of flowering to ripen, yielding up to 500 grams of chubby buds that despite its sativa-dominant genetics remind more of indica than sativa. Medically, this strain can do wonders for people suffering from stress, anxiety or inner restlessness, and it can also act as a great analgetic, relieving even chronic pains.
Back to Dick and Freerk – after they had learnt all this about Dinachem, they were fired up for this strain and full of sizzling anticipation for the forthcoming Dinachem bud premiere. The first cuttings produced rooted without any problems and after ten days in the veggie stage were put to flowering.
Eight and a half weeks later, the plants had fully matured, and there it really was – that incredibly intense and complex odor mix of fuel, citrus and pine. “If one reads such an usual aroma description, it already comes over very remarkable, but having this green olfactory artwork in front of you then and actually smelling it, really is astounding and fascinating”, Freerk reported, and continued “also, the buds were extremely resinous, thick, roundish and tight, making for big yields – grower’s heart, what more could you ask for?”
When having their first Dinachem test smoke, Freerk and Dick were so quickly drugged up to the eyeballs that the two of them could hardly finish that single test joint (which wasn’t the biggest). Dick said: “Dinachem’s indica stone turned out to be more than tremendous, the effect was instantly there and totally steamrolled us after just a few hits so that we were stoned to the bone and could hardly move. But mentally totally happy and sunshiny, it gave us a broad permanent grin.
Obviously, Growolf has selected a phenotype with that sort of enormous heavyweight indica punch and less sativa influence than usual. But with that mood-lifting effect, a part of Dinachem’s sativa side at least did come through in a very pleasant way.”
Dick and Freerk were deeply impressed by Dinachem’s potency, but what would their customers say? After a couple of days, the first feedbacks came in, for example: “Smoked it and couldn’t remember my own name after a while”, or “it’s like careless day-dreaming… feeling extremely stoned and relaxed, I was just sitting and dwelling on happy thoughts.” Other customers’ statements were all of the same or similar tenor, there was sheer enthusiasm without exception about Dinachem’s aroma and potency.
So that there was no doubt about the fact that this strain had accomplished its mission to make it into the weed assortment of Dick and Freerk, who rejoiced “it’s a great feeling to have found a new clone king after all those years, all good things go by threes!”
Some time later, Cloudz reported that he had taken part in the indica competition of the IC420 Growers Cup in Amsterdam with Dinachem buds grown from that very same cutting and gained second place! A lovely confirmation of this cutting’s superb nature, and as a matter of course, Dick and Freerk counted themselves lucky to have decided for a cup winner. And Cloudz didn’t forget to give thanks to the initial selector: “Credit goes to Growolf who selected this Dinachem clone, he and his work were the starting point of this success story.”
Green Born Identity – G.B.I.
Originally published in Weed World Magazine issue 140
