Can You Paint With All The Colours Of The Weed? (Part III: Purple Drift)
Returning To The Rainbow
So it’s been a while since the previous installment, but I think it’s worth returning to my little strain renaming project. Last time was a lot of fun, and it was cool to build a profile for pink strains and what makes them similar. Today, I thought I’d try for the same concept with a different colour of cannabis.
I had a difficult decision to make as far as what colour to cover, but eventually it all came to down to blue and purple. Honestly, I think that blue strains are a little bit less popular than purple strains right now, so that’s what tipped the balance: serving purple while it’s hot! Well- relatively, anyway.
We’ll wait another week or two for blue, to the dismay of Ludacris.
We’re Primed With Purple Power
Purple strains were once a serious treat, if you could find them- vibrant purple tones in cannabis were often the result of exposure to cold temperatures during the grow process, rather than a result of their genetics. These days, the purple can be bred right in, so you can yield a purple flower without having to worry about temperature at all.
Deep purples were often associated with a powerful, indica-heavy profile of effects, so you would often hear if someone had a decent purple strain available. If you were looking for potency back in the day, most knew to look for something purple. This was long before a lot of other colours appeared on the scene, so purple may have been the first colour that actually denoted something about the cannabis that bore its name.
These days, however, you can find purple strains in just about every variety. There are purple hybrids, and even full-on purple sativa strains if that’s your jam. There’s less consistency than ever when it comes to purple strains, since growers have mastered selectively breeding for colour.
I think, for many people, the idea of a ‘purple’ strain goes well beyond the colour of the leaves. Just like with pink in the previous post, I’m hoping to lay out a basic profile for purple strains that we can use to measure just what makes a given strain of flower purple.
Just like with pink, I believe that the best way to do that is by starting as far back as possible.
Purple Haze In My Mind
Where better to start than with Hendrix?
It’s a little unclear which came first, the strain or the song, but both rose to prominence in the late 60’s. Purple Haze is probably the first popular example of a purple strain, but doesn’t quite fit the profile of traits that I laid out above. Purple Haze is a sativa strain, and isn’t quite as purple as you might expect. It’s more of a lavender, really. It isn’t the original purple, but it’s a popular strain that I think has a seat at this table. The taste, at least, has hints of grape and other berries, which is common to most purple strains regardless of genetics.
The original purple strain is (probably) the strain we know today as Afghan Purple. A descendent of the original afghani landrace strains, it would be almost impossible to estimate when or by who it was originally grown. Afghan Purple is by far the most probable source of purple strains’ most famous traits: the indica dominance, sleepy/hypnotic effects, and even their appearance. Afghan Purple is infamous thanks to its dense, heavy buds, as well as a hint of sweet grape in its otherwise citrus-dominated flavour.
Another famous purple strain to help round out the profile might be the most common on the market: Purple Kush, the ever-present cross of purple genes with classic OG Kush. Purple Kush offers the same hints of grape in its flavour profile, as well as the sleepy, relaxing effects it shares with strains like Afghan Purple. That makes sense, considering Purple Kush is just a cross of Afghan Purple with some classic Hindu Kush.
Perhaps it's no surprise that by combining two of the most ancient, potent strains around, that something good was born as a result.
Between the three purple strains mentioned above, I think we can nail down exactly what ‘purple’ should mean when it comes to creating new strains and their names.
Let’s put it all together:
What Makes Purple 'Purple'?
Well, I think we can boil it down to a few major factors:
(1) The Appearance
- Dark Purple Leaves
- Thick Buds
(2) The Effects
- Sleepy / Relaxing
(3) The Flavour Profile
- Grape
- Berries
- Citrus
Those are the traits that I think make a purple strain ‘purple’.
For the final section of this post, let’s take a look and see how well a few more modern purple strains stack up against the baseline we’ve created for them.
First off, let’s look at Mendocino Purps:
(1) The Appearance
- Mixed / Purple Leaves (+)
- Medium-thick Buds (-)
(2) The Effects
- Sleepy / Relaxing (+)
- Hunger-inducing (-)
(3) The Flavour Profile
- Grape (+)
- Berries (+)
- Wood (-)
Looks like The Purps is a go! It carries all of the important purple traits that we identified, and adds a few effects and flavours of its own. The leaves are purple, which is big, but so are both the flavour and the overall effects. The buds might not be super thick, but that’s the only sticking point with this one, and I don’t think that’s enough to keep from calling it a classic purple strain.
I would even venture to say that Mendocino Purps belongs squarely among the most time-honored purple strains of cannabis.
Let’s go with Purple Urkel next:
(1) The Appearance
- Dark Green Leaves (-)
- Medium-thick Buds (-)
(2) The Effects
- Sleepy / Relaxing (+)
- Pain Relief (-)
(3) The Flavour Profile
- Grape (+)
- Berries (+)
- Skunk (-)
This one is right on the edge for me.
On the one hand, Purple Urkel does have both the effect and flavour profiles of a purple strain. It’s just so hard to call it purple when the leaves are green! If the buds were just a little thicker, too, it would be so much easier. It might be worth a grower taking just a few more passes at it, breed that purple colour right on in. As is, it feels a little short of being called a purple strain.
Maybe we could call this strain ‘Steve Urkel’ for a while, wait for version 2.0 with purple leaves before we add the ‘purple’ moniker?
This particular strain is so close that I almost feel bad for saying that it isn’t purple. To be honest, though, it feels to me like purple only made the name because it almost rhymes with Urkle if you squint. That’s stoner humour for ya, no concern for the effects their dumbass half-rhymes might exert for years on the naming conventions of strains.
Let’s finish up with ol’ Granddaddy Purps:
(1) The Appearance
- Purple Leaves (+)
- Compact Buds (-)
(2) The Effects
- Sleepy / Relaxing (+)
(3) The Flavour Profile
- Grape (+)
- Berries (+)
- Citrus (+)
Granddaddy Purps is just about as purple as it gets! It’s genetically quite similar Afghan Purple, so that makes a lot of sense. Being so closely related to the original purple strain should ensure that the apple doesn’t fall too far from the hydroponically grown tree.
So that’s what I’d say makes a purple strain ‘purple’. All in all, I’d say that most purple strains on the market today are more in line with the profile laid out here than was the case with the pink strains we looked at before.
Whether that’s because the market has had more time to settle on the purple side of things, or because pink strains are currently undergoing a massive amount of exposure, cross-breeding, and general change, I can’t say. Either way, it’s nice to more clearly define what the important traits of any purple strain might be, and even see how accurate our list lines up to purple strains that you can find and buy today.
Next time we do this, I’ll be looking at what makes a blue strain ‘blue’.
Until then!