There are so many variations in the hundreds of strains of cannabis, from the strength of the high, the medical benefits, the sweet smells, and even the colorful presentations of the plants themselves. One of the more popular strains is purple cannabis. Purple is historically the color of royalty, so purple cannabis could be called the cannabis of kings!
It’s been said that many growers simply try to suffocate their weed to make it stop processing chlorophyll (what makes the leaves green). While you can simply buy purple cannabis, you could find out which strains to use when you learn how to make purple weed.
What Makes it Purple?
We all know that we have pigmentation in our skin. Our color is determined by our pigments. For example, those with red hair tend to be very pale because they lack pigmentation. However, those who are darker are so because they have an abundance of pigmentation.
In plants, chlorophyll is the dominant pigmentation, and it appears as green. Anthocyanin is a pigmentation that appears as purple. Plants with this pigmentation can occur naturally, but in cannabis, it means the weed is weaker because it’s not absorbing the proper amounts of oxygen it needs to be healthy.
While there are some strains that have been genetically altered to grow purple (Purple Kush or Grandaddy Purple), and have very high THC levels, most purple cannabis strains are weaker than green strains.
How to Make Purple Weed
Step 1. Start by planting your seeds as normal (the conversion to purple cannabis will not occur until the flowering stage). Take your plants through the germination (5-10 days), seedling (2-3 weeks), and vegetative stages (3-16 weeks) as normal. Make sure they are receiving enough light, water, and nutrients to create a strong root system and healthy stems and leaves.
Step 2. Once your plants have reached the flowering stage, you will start the color conversion through temperature differentiations. Your day temperature needs to be 30 degrees warmer than your night temperatures. So, if your day temps are 80 to 85 degrees Fahrenheit, your nighttime temps should be 50 to 55 degrees Fahrenheit. But, do not drop below 50 degrees F. Anything below 50 will lead to dying, brown plants.
These violent swings in temperature make it difficult for the plant to go through the process of creating chlorophyll – the green factor. When chlorophyll is lacking, anthocyanin takes over.
Step 3. Continue the temperature variations up until about 2 weeks before harvest. At that point, you should start seeing purple cannabis instead of green. Continue to make the temperature changes until the buds are ready for harvest.
Quality Check
So, now you’ve successfully grown some purple cannabis. While it may be pretty and pleasant to look at, purple cannabis is no different in quality from green cannabis. In fact, some growers might say that purple cannabis is of lesser quality because the techniques to grow it alter the basic structure and function of the plant.
The truth is that you won’t know it until you smoke it. Just don’t blindly And it all comes down to how the weed was grown.
If you want to make purple weed, remember that purple cannabis is not a marker of potency or quality; rather, it is simply an aesthetic choice for the user’s pleasure. Happy growing!