Frostberry for Northern Short-Season Growers

If you live in an area with a short growing season (anywhere in Canada for instance) then you'll appreciate how difficult it can be to find that perfect outdoor Cannabis cultivar that will ripen before that nearly overnight transition from summer to fall, and the ensuing miserably cold and damp weather that nearly always spell disaster for thick buds and heavy colas.

Autoflowers have been the obvious solution for many, but the problem with autos is that since they have a genetically pre-programmed life span that can be extremely short, they provide very little room for error. If you happen to get a stretch of damp and cold weather, or scorching heat, this will cause the plant to slow or even pause its growth rate, which will ultimately lead to small, stunted plants with very poor yields that lack potency.

This is where Frostberry comes in. A combination of genetics from a special early flowering Granddaddy Purple male combined with Blackberry Kush provide the raw materials for this unique hybrid. Where Frostberry shines is in it's ability to flower earlier than most standard photoperiod strains, resulting in a harvest window that will land right at the end of August through early September in the northern hemisphere. This puts the peak flowering window of Frostberry right dead centre in the middle of summer when this plant's metabolism is running in overdrive to bulk up those big frosty colas of berry smelling goodness. Conversely, most other photoperiod strains won't hit their flowering stride until mid-late September, and by that time (here in Canada at least) the weather is starting to turn nasty which significantly hinders the potential of these plants which are warm climate annuals.

To breed Frostberry to be resilient to the challenging climate of the north, we start by sprouting very large populations and then systematically eliminating all weak and poor performing phenotypes through heavy culling. This results in every successive generation becoming stronger and more adapted to a difficult climate.

Below you can see some photos taken earlier this season from the F4 generation of our Frostberry line.

144 Frostberry seeds planted in our custom organic seedling soil mix and left in the unheated greenhouse to germinate

One week later nearly 100% of the Frostberry seeds have germinated

Frostberry starting week 2 of the vegetative period, now moved outdoors into the elements without protection of the greenhouse

Closeup Frostberry Week 2 Vegetative Growth

A portion of the Frostberry seedlings beginning the third week of vegetative growth, no obvious culls yet

Closeup week 3 of Frostberry. The weather has been miserable with one of the coldest and wettest seasons we've seen, yet these seedlings are cruising along very happily thanks to multiple generations of strict selection.

-Professor Sprout