Apollo-13 A Genetic Lift Off

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Someone asked me last week about Apollo-13 and I wanted to post up this article I wrote for Skunk magazine in 2008.

Apollo-13 is one of those strains a grower could spend his life learning and one I have been working with for a long time now. The cutting we have is old and hard to work with. She is a bit picky on nutrients and has an almost vine like growth creating a very wide sagging bush that needs a lot of support to keep her from having bud flop. She has a very distinct peppery, yet also a funky rotting fruit smell. She has many different expressions according to environment. She can go from being very fox tailed with dread like airy buds in a warm room to hard tight colas in perfect conditions. She prefers a daytime temperature of around 75 degrees but does not like chilly nighttime temperatures like some strains. As she approaches harvest her fan leaves will sag and curl under making trimming a time consuming process but every bit of her smaller leaves are covered in resin that yields a red bubble hash that has to be tried to believe. Her downside is trimming. I spend a good 4 hours on just the upper portion when harvesting. The buds are covered in swirling curled sticky leaves that take loads of concentration and small scissors to clean up. I focus hard to remove all the sugar leaf as my main goal here is Bubble! I have noticed that actual sugar leaf makes the best hash. When I use pure bud I never get the same yields as with trim leaf. I think its almost a waste. So my buds get cleaned well to make more Apollo-Bubble.
The original information on this Brothers Grimm strain states that only 500 seeds were ever made so to have an original cutting is a big deal. Brothers Grimm are responsible for the famous Cindy99 and a few other killer hybrids and they were big on back crossing to there mother plants to improve stability by “Cubing” a clone only strain. Apollo-13 is Genius x p-75 the 75 indicates that 75% of the desired traits will be determined by the male that has been back crossed twice already.

 

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This is how it works it simple terms. You have a clone only female cannabis plant youd like to have seeds of. These seeds will produce plants that display 50% of the females traits and 50% of the males. You pollinate her with a male plant keeping a copy or clone of the original mother alive. This is an outcross and these seeds are grown out and the best male is selected based on desired traits. This male is then used to again pollinate the original mother plant. The seeds of this breeding will produce seeds that display 75% attributes of the mother plant. This process is continued twice more until the strain is cubed and in theory 99% of what the mother was. Now the science is much more complicated than this but this is a good lamens explanation of cubing. In fact I find these hybrids add new life to old strains and in some cases the sibling crosses can be as good or better than the mother strain in terms of ease of growth. The Apollo-13 mother plant still is the tops as far as resin is concerned it has a flavor and consistency like no other. Its resin shards up on scissors like clay or plumbers putty and has a deep red color. A small hit of the Apollo-13 red bubble out of a bong on a clean screen is like a heart punch and leaves you making the worst grimace ever seen.
That doesn’t mean I don’t treasure my stash jar of Apollo each harvest I truly do she has a buzz all her own even though she can give you a work out figuring out what exactly she wants each run. I have been growing her in super soil now for 3 years straight in the same conditions and have her just about figured out now as to what she wants and when. She likes a lot of high Nitrogen nutrients all the way up to day 30 of budding or she will start to fade to early making harvest an even bigger nightmare with yellow leaves curled over each bud. Apollo-13 has a harvest window from day 54 all the way to day 65 for a completely different high and flavor. I always top her to make sure she has at least 3 heads and I keep her in the vegetive state ( 18 Light 6 Dark) for a full 2 months to make sure she has a solid root base and enough branch support to yield 5-8 ounces per plant in soil. I use bamboo stakes and plastic coated garden wire to keep her held up once the buds start to form.

 

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I first saw a cutting in the mid 90’s and most of my internet friends grew her for head stash but she was considered a smaller strain because back then we really didn’t understand temperature control and most of the people growing her were doing so in a bud room with temps above 80 degrees and in many cases close to 100 which almost no strain does well in except pure sativas. Since then we have learned to keep our rooms cooler and we have seen some of the older clone only strains shine in these conditions reaching some decent yields while producing simply primo buds.
We have used this clone to produce some amazing hybrids like Sputnik that’s featured on the cover of Big Book of Buds 3 and Vortex our current favorite medical strain it is in high demand for the happy up buzz it provides while still having a serious punch in potency a favorite of bubble hash makers to. I recently created a new hybrid we call “ The Void” using Apollo-13 and our new Querkle male that has a grape smell and purple coloring and this strain is currently a week into budding and already has a grape scent. One day I will find the male I want to work back to the Apollo mother plant until then we will have a lot of fun testing her offspring. ( This actually took place in 2009 and we now offer an Apollo-13 BX.

 

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Breeder Quotes

"Apollo 11 & 13 are from the same mother plant (Genius). The father of Apollo 13 was P.75 whereas Apollo 11's dad is Cinderella 99. Apollo 13's mother was bred from a mysterious hybrid of Jack Herer crossed with an unidentified male which seems to have given it an unusually SHORT flowering period. Its scent is a pungent “Lemon Pledge” citrus with an undertone of acrid skunk. You really taste lemons when you smoke a joint. The high is STRONG, and starts hitting you while you're smoking it, rather than being a “creeper” high. It's easy to grow, matures rapidly, and manicures easily." MrSoul

"The potency of A13 and Cinderella are "on par" in strength, but the character of each high is unique. A13 is a more "happy, social high" although seriously potent. Cinderella has a bit more "paranoia-inducing" high. Neither one has the "couch-lock" effect -they give the smoker an "up", energetic feeling... good for doing something physical, as opposed to lying around comatose." MrSoul


From Brothers Grimm Original Discription

"Apollo 13: This skunky girl will make your eyes water with her pungent perfume. The delicate balance of Indica/Sativa makes Apollo 13 perfect for growers limited to a single strain. The long, fat colas and sparkling, sticky side branches really weigh in at harvest time. This is the type of smoke you can't hold down; it expands and “blasts off” from the lungs. The high is clear and cerebral, without a hint of paranoia. Her citrus flavor and happy high make Apollo 13 very popular at parties! Two hits and you can leave your own footprints on the moon. Flowering: 45-55 days Height: 120 - 150 cm.Yield: 400 gm/m2."

 

[kaotik]

jeeze sub.. everytime you do a write up, my choice on what i want to order changes

looks just lovely (and sounds great)

 

[burnin123]

Ready for lift-off subcool...just got some A13 :yay: Bring on the Dank!!!!


:48:

 

[loolagigi]

sub you do have some great threads man. pleasure to have you on our team.

 

[legalize_freedom]

Thanks for clearing that up for me Sub! I know I could have looked through my books to come up with the answer, but I thought others here may want to know the difference to...and I figured you were just the guy to clear it up! Thanks again man, for all the details, and the beautiful pics!

 

[kaotik]

alright.. this write up, and the sale today did it.
ordered my first TGA beans
thought for sure space queen or JTR would be first, been flip-flopping on them for months. but this sounds like the stuff i've been after for years

first time i've ever bought seeds (usually just trade cuts with friends.. boy are they gonna be stoked when they get some apollo for free )

 

[legalize_freedom]

alright.. this write up, and the sale today did it.
ordered my first TGA beans
thought for sure space queen or JTR would be first, been flip-flopping on them for months. but this sounds like the stuff i've been after for years

first time i've ever bought seeds (usually just trade cuts with friends.. boy are they gonna be stoked when they get some apollo for free )

Congrats! I must say I'm a little jealous...I've been wanting to get some beans from sub for awhile now...but thanks to the michigan economy, and the lack of work...I guess I have to live through you all for now. God I need to get back to work!

I hope you share with pics kaotic!...I'm partial to these genetics and will always have cindy or her descendents in my grow. I'd sure like to see what you get though!

 

[Funkfarmer]

I would like to know the genetic make-up of the mother plant(genius).

 

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Genius is Apollo-11