This particular property is situated at the literal top of this Colorado town, making for a particularly majestic scene. The garden in its entirety is really an endeavor in polyculture and permaculture, featuring mushroom-yielding woodchip beds, vegetables and other food plants in abundance, and other infrastructure in place to facilitate the harmony of various life forms. Deer frequent the garden, bears are present in the area, and greenhouse-cameras have caught footage of mountain lions—truly a wild place!
A family makes this property their home, and as always, I cannot help but look at the property as a reflection of the minds and spirits of the people who are living on the land. This land is composed of a healthy mix of food-producing gardens, income (and good-times)-producing greenhouses, and beautiful wilderness—all seemingly aiming toward a better future for all parties involved.
Adjacent to national forest, this land is about as wild-mountain-town feeling as they come, with the exception of visible neighbors (and other greenhouses full of cannabis across the valley). Just like the Carolinas, I fear properties like this are quickly becoming a thing of the past—so I feel unbelievably lucky to be invited and able to experience this Colorado mountain property in the meantime.
HIGH DESERT GREENHOUSE
An auspicious omen of a double-rainbow is visible above these freshly-transplanted seedlings. Rocks from the mountain are placed around the greenhouse to secure the film in high winds.
While not grown completely organically, the featured flowers and plants were grown in soil with mostly organic inputs. They are supplemented with simple salt-based feeds, and these plants will get up to 15’ tall and look like they are in northern California by harvest time. This garden is primarily for commercial purposes, which is why salt-based feeds are used on the cannabis plants. Plants are irrigated using Blumat Watering Systems, and this cultivator enjoys a very high Yield:Labor ratio.
This Limevine F2 has a pretty cool story behind it. I bought original Limevine F1s from Freeborn Selections, gifted them to @planthoarder who then grew them out and made F2s and very generously gifted me many back. I then gave some to this greenhouse cultivator, who grew them out. These smell like lemon-lime skittles, lysol, skunk, and just generally very dank weed. Generally a narcotic, couch-locking type effect.
Laugher is a plant I don’t really know anything about, aside from it being a clone-only this cultivator acquired. It smells similar to Sour Diesel (sour funky fuel) and has a similar appearance too. Everyone who looks at my jar collection always asks about this one—the name must be grabby!
Testa Rossa x Black Lime Reserve aka Formula One has a really compelling smell, certainly a contender for my favorite. Lime rind and other citrus tones come through in a character very close to Limevine, as does a lysol-chemical-cleaner smell—this is like Limevine’s darker sister. Limevine is bright, funky and citrusy, while this one is of the same character, just much “darker” lime aroma compared to the bright citrus of Limevine.
Dream Lotus, a cross of Blue Dream and Snow Lotus from Bodhi Seeds, might have my favorite bouquet of the bunch, exhibiting an inviting, brightly-sweet, fruity, floral aroma. It loses the hazy notes of Blue Dream, but keeps the tart-berry while adding the fruit and floral tones of Snowlotus—a really nice blend. The flowers are highly resinous, with great color accents of purple, green, and some blueish hues. These are also probably the most vigorous plants I have personally grown (I received clones) or seen growing. They were so big and vigorous in fact, it caused a problem for this mountain grower, as they were pushing through the tops of his greenhouses as early as July. The grower was able to propagate seeds outside, veg the plants to the point of taking clones, then vegged the clones up, all in the same season, thus filling an entire other greenhouse with these clones. These plants are so fast and monstrous growing, you can basically start growing them halfway through the season and they’ll yield as well as other plants—maybe better. Seriously impressive and just unbelievably fast.
Afghani x OG is a cross that has been done many times, with as many OG and Afghani cuts. I have no idea which ones were used here, making this weed even more generic-seeming. The buds are obviously all of very small size, so it is a bit hard to judge this one—but the aroma is musty, soapy, with some mild lemony OG tones coming through.
This appealing MAC1 (originally bred by Capulator) is covered in resin with the signature MAC aroma, a quality I place somewhere between chalk and sour milk . This is so visually-appealing, it is almost difficult to believe it was grown in such conditions—7000’ altitude where temperature swings of 60 degrees/24 hours, hail, rain, snow, and 100+mph winds are to be expected. This is a testament to the genetics and cultivator. Not necessarily my favorite smoke, but if I were a commercial cultivator I’d pump this one out.
This greenhouse is mostly full of Dream Lotus, but some other strains are visible. The giant plant featured is the most vigorous outdoor plant I have seen growing.