My MNS SSH grow

The Grey Man

New member
I have just finished a SSH grow from a packet of Mr Nice Seeds.
I planted all 18 of the seeds and they all sprouted (shot glass method with a 2 hour soak. Pure RO water.)
From those I got 7 females.
I used Plant Magic 'Old Timer's' organic range of nutrients but without extras. I used RO water and pH adjusted with hard water from my fish tank.
I have much experience with haze and her hybrids and love the Mango Haze, in particular. I have grown many many of Shanti's seeds (and Nev's too..) I have also grown much SSH over the years but not for a good while now.

The grow was in a tent with equal pressure in and out. Fans blow the hot air up from the bottom to the top (away from the plants) where it is extracted.

I used 2 600w Gavita Pros. Unbelievable lights. Anybody wondering why they don't get 1 gram/watt should switch to these lights.

The grow went OK. I went away for a week, during which time neglect and abuse occurred. The temps got too high for another week due to a window getting jammed and the plants grew into the lights and I had to chop their heads off.

Despite these problems, the plants carried on growing and producing.

2 plants were very single cola dominant, like sativa versions of a Northern Lights plant. One of these smelt and tasted very bland and was a decent but dull smoke. It went 8 weeks. The other smelt much more like a haze plant. Sweet/sour and very pleasant but not too strong in smell at all. Untidy looking. It went 11 weeks. Neither were keepers but the 11 weeker was worthwhile.

3 plants were like tall stretchy skunk plants. They all tasted very bland and had not much smell at all. Strength was OK. 9, 11 and 12 weeks. The 9 and 12 weekers were strong enough but dull. The 11 weeker had a slight haze flavour and slightly stronger smell (so far - it is still curing but not improving in terms of flava...) None were keepers but the 11 weeker was worthwhile. When dried they looked dark and over hairy.

At this point it is worth noting a few things:
# Even though I have not thought much of some of these phenos myself, all of the final product from these plants so far mentioned have been received perfectly well with the general public who have tried it.
# The 8, 9 and 11 weekers yielded about 5 ozs each, on average (almost exactly - 1 gram over!) The 11 and 12 weekers look slightly bigger. At a guess an ounce more each, maybe 6 ozs.
# The weather has been wretched for weeks but there has been no mould whatsoever on these plants. The same cannot be said for some other plants I have been growing (MasterKush/Skunk and UK Pineapple.)
# I have not been totally attentive to these plants and once dialled in could do much better with them.
# None of the plants so far mentioned have been hay.

So that is 5 of the 7 plants out of the way.

That leaves the 2 much more sativa phenos. One looked more hazy but both were very much sativas.
Both had much more resin on them than the other plants. It was a carpeting of tiny silver resin glands which you would recognise immediately if you had grown much Super Silver Haze or Mango Haze.
Both smelt much better during the grow than the others. The Hazy one was sweet the other spicy. The smells of both plants intensified considerably during drying.
Hazy - to any haze lover this plant smells divine. Grapefruit juice, soap, strawberries and flowers. Classic Super Silver Haze smell. The smell is very intense and getting stronger and better. Addictive smell. The plant went 12 weeks.The yield is huge. 9 ounces. The branches were floppy and this was the biggest plant. It is still curing. This is a classic Super Silver Haze plant. Stunning.

Altenative - this plant didn't smell as much during the grow as the other one and smelt more spicy/leathery. This changed as soon as the plant started drying when the smell just grew and grew. To be honest, I preferred the other one at first but kept this one because it was a true sativa and had that classic resin profile which I recognised. That was a good call because it is possibly my Holy Grail. At first its smell was very unusual. It was very smokey but specifically Cedar, like Cedar smoked Bavarian cheese! I've not smelt a plant like that before EVER. As the plant dried and cured the smell got stronger but also changed. Cedar wood, leather, dried apricots and skunk. The resin glistens on the perfect flowers and each flower cluster has stretched in such a way as to make it look like the plant has dreadlocks made out of weed. Each calyx is an individual silver ball and the buds are large, fox-tailed but solid. It is a thing of real beauty. 11 weeks but could be 10 with clones. As each day passes the aromas change and intensify. Incredible. Yield 6-9 ozs.

I haven't smoked either of these plants yet as SSH sativas are much much better when cured for at least 6 weeks. I know what the first will be like as it is a classic SSH plant and I can't wait but the other one...'Dreadlock Haze' has more Skunk in there but is very much a sativa. It has massive resin. I know it will be superb but the exact high..... if it is as complex as the aroma it will be AMAZING. Time will tell...

Final Thoughts:

When growing any haze hybrid from seed you are looking for 1 keeper. You may have to go through many plants before you find it and some of the non-keepers can be crap. The quality of those plants is immaterial. The only thing you care about is the quality of the one you keep. With SSH many of the plants can be bland, with the indica phenos being weaker, generally. You are looking for a 10, 11 or 12 weeker with a very impressive resin profile and more distinct smell. Having said that, all the plants work, non are hay.

There is no point in judging this variety by the non-keepers and not even much point in describing them. Anybody who cannot afford the time or space to grow plants which may not be wanted should either choose another variety or beg cuttings of a keeper from a good friend!

I consider myself lucky to find 2 beauties but haven't smoked either yet...either has the potential to be my Holy Grail, so far so good.

Pictured is a bud from the haze pheno keeper.
 

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great post brother

especially liked your description of the resin that you find on mango haze and SSH... spot on.... also loved you descriptions of the smells before and after the cure...

congrats on such a superb plant... that is a KEEPER

love an respect

and if you are who i think you are please say hello to cola bro
 
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cheers bro. (I'll pass on the message.)

This strain is so worth the money. It's a real reward after some hard work to find such lovely plants.

Smoke reports will follow, of course. I'll get them properly cured first of all.
 
yes, great post man.

ive got 4 mns 5C in flowering, just small clones, testing to find something to grow out full size.

thanks for sharing your plants with us.
 
Very nice report!

Thanks for posting that & all your research. Looks like great sample pic, wish we could see more. Sounds like you put those Gavitas to work!

Anyways, great job! Hope those end up exceding your expectations & that you end up w/a new member in the fam!
Fingers crossed.

-SD
 
Very nice report!

Thanks for posting that & all your research. Looks like great sample pic, wish we could see more. Sounds like you put those Gavitas to work!

Anyways, great job! Hope those end up exceding your expectations & that you end up w/a new member in the fam!
Fingers crossed.

-SD

just bought a new camera, so let's see...

trouble is - I'm still a shite photographer! sigh

anyway, I've smoked a little from the chosen girls and will be in a position to report soon.
 
OK, so I am in a position to give smoke reports for my 7 SSH females.

A quick reminder - 1 pack of SSH seeds (MNS) gave 7 females. They were grown together under 1200W of HPS, organically (although perhaps not orgasmically.)

They were dried and cured enough for a proper test so here goes.

#1, #2, #3 - flavourless. Hay.
#4 - Dreadlock Haze. Looked lovely. Resinous. Great smoke but the flavour (dried apricots/smoke/cheese) just got less and less with the cure and it turned out very lightly flavoured. Still nice to smoke but no keeper. I had high hopes for it and even gave it a name!!!
#5 - This one went longest. It looked OK, not amazing. It was strong and skunky-like in it's high. The flavour was slightly fruity and very hashy. Not bad flavour. Worthwhile but no keeper. A very nice, strong sativa.
#6 - 11/12 weeker. Hazy growing but single cola dom (strange thing...) Smelt like haze but the SSH version. Grapefruity/soapy/sweet/sour - you know what I mean... slightly scruffy looking buds. Wonderful SSH flavour and strong sativa smoke but with a NL influence which packed a punch. Very nice - potential keeper (if I didn't have #7) although, for me, perhaps TOO STRONG on the indica side of things.. Great yield.
#7 - 11/12 weeker. Hazy growing, large yielding, donkey-dick having plant. Stank of SSH (see above.) Lovely, lovely smoke - and getting better. Hazy taste and high. Buds look great - resinous and large. Very motivational high, very laid-back, very cerebral. Not quite an electric high (a 'la Mango Haze / Kali Mist) but a very very nice smoke.I reckon it'll be even better second time around. Definite keeper. The classic SSH plant. Worth every penny. YES.




Overall a very interesting grow with lots of different phenos to explore. There is only 1 real 'keeper' pheno and the rest range between total hay (indica side) to very interesting sativa/indica one-offs. Nevil claiming all and sundry as SSH phenos (OG, ChemD, UK Pineapple and fuck knows what else...) is absolutely laughable. The indicas are totally awful. I always wonder about growers who claim to have amazing 8/9 weekers from this variety. Really?? I've never come across ANY and this isn't my first SSH grow at all. (Not by any means...I am a veteran.)


The keeper pheno is a classic sativa hit and great, great taste. It needs patient drying and curing. It will be around the 11 / 12 week mark and stretch more than the others. You will identify it by it's smell and resin.

Despite what you might be led to believe, this isn't a good commercial plant. The worthwhile plants take longer than you'd want to flower and need a proper cure, whilst the short flowering plants are total hay (I got abuse for some of them, I can tell you..) Who would grow Haze commercially?

I remember the SSH of old blasting me into space which this one doesn't <quite> do but as I said, perhaps it was in the grow. (I'll update after grow, dry and cure number 2!!!), perhaps (and I suspect..) I am just immune to THC these days...saturated, as it were.

As far as the modern Haze hybrids go this is lovely. Perhaps, for me, the Mango shades it. Although perhaps not... They are very similar and both totally lovely.

Highly recommended but don't expect to find 3 or 4 keepers per pack. This is about search, identify, keep and cherish. You need to plant a whole packet to find the one...don't pike it with just a few seeds.

GS
 
Great report, thanks for sharing the grow - sounds overall pretty consistent with the nice results I had with my SSH pack a couple of years ago.

I'm still running one keeper out of the batch, but I'm pretty sure I'd like to go back and run another pack at some point in the future.

Can we sweet talk you into a pic or two of the keepers? eh? eh?
 
I am already going with grow #2 of the keeper so I will post some photos as it progresses. 4 plants in a SOG style, to keep height down.

I know exactly what you mean about wanting to go again and see what else you can find...I am well happy with my keeper but have already cracked a pack of Mango Haze, just to see what I can find....
 
wonderful, look forward to it ... and yes, it's a wonderful temptation to keep exploring and finding about genetics hiding in the next batch of seeds, especially when you know they come from really well-bred stock.
 
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