Next Big Crop: Cannabis Genetics Sourcing

We’ll connect you to the most celebrated breeders and their treasured strains.

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From the moment you receive a cannabis cultivation license, the race is on to create a buzz in the market and get a quality product into consumers' hands.

But raising flower that yields memorable aroma, taste, and a reliably awe-inspiring potency is no easy task.

After you've poured millions into a cultivation facility and all the crucial pieces of equipment you need to make cannabis magic happen, the last thing you want to do is destroy your reputation with low-quality buds.

New operators often overlook their strain budget during the early planning and budgeting stages; once those millions are spent on the cultivation facility, you must still invest in excellent strains. Because without this crucial investment, your reputation is at risk.

Cannabis Genetics Sourcing from Next Big Crop is your answer.

What are Cannabis Clones?

A cannabis clone is a genetic copy of a mother plant. It’s a marvel of nature made by cutting a portion of one plant and replanting it to grow an entirely new plant. Cloning is a trusted practice the non-cannabis gardening community has understood for a long time.

Clones are imparted with the exact traits found in the mother plant. And when you start with a high-quality mother, it all gets passed on to the clone.

You grow the best plants and keep on developing them. You harvest the best buds and keep on harvesting them.

Is Cloning Cannabis a Risky Venture?

There's no doubt that weak genetics lead to poor-quality clones, which leads to a mediocre final product, a couple of years of misery, and potentially a failed business.

And unfortunately, in the cannabis cloning sphere, some folks are peddling catastrophically lousy genetics.

Risk Factors of Working with an Unreliable Cannabis Cloning Shop:

• Virus Contamination: Hop Latent Virus is running rampant through second-rate cultivation facilities. A single microscopic trace of this virus can spread like wildfire, decimating an entire crop and ruining your strain library before you even know what happened.
• Pests: Cannabis plants can be highly susceptible to pests such as russet mites, which cannot be seen with the naked eye. These insects can go undetected until your plants have suffered severe damage.
• Powdery Mildew: This fungus attacks various sections of the cannabis plant. Powdery mildew spreads rapidly and will heavily damage your crops beyond repair if not treated early.
• Chemicals: When you work with a fly-by-night grower, there's no telling what restricted chemicals they've used on your clones. Many of these nasty and potentially harmful chemicals can be detected at harvest and can render a crop “green waste.”
• Unknown Origin: You don't know what you're getting when you acquire cannabis plants from a random genetics lab you found on the Internet. And by the time you veg out the mother, cut clones, and get it tested, that's easily three-to-six months of time and money wasted.

The Next Big Crop Difference

We mitigate risk factors by following strict standards and our genetics partners do, too. Our strain packages include:

• Strain potency results
• Hop Latent Viroid testing certification
• Strain-specific grower’s notes and tips
• Access to our expert cultivators for real-world advice and support to help your team harness the full potential of each strain in your library

Next Big Crop is not a nursery.

We are part of a nationwide cannabis collective comprised of some of the most well-known and well-regarded breeders.

We source plants directly from them, spending good money on genetics to ensure that these plants are genuine and safe. And our catalog of strains keeps growing as more and more continue to meet our high standards and make the cut.

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Breeder Cuts

It's simple: high-quality cannabis genetics produce the best strains.

By working with Next Big Crop, you have access to award-winning cannabis strains sourced from some of the best-known breeders in the industry.

These cannabis pros are absolute icons, and our library of strains is sourced directly from these cultivars, whose products continue to "wow" us daily.

Our exclusive, well-nurtured partnerships give us access to strains that have been hunted and meticulously bred by some of the most notable breeders across the globe.

And just because we don't have something on our current list, that doesn't mean we can't find what you're looking for. Our standing in the cannabis genetics network guarantees our ability to score whatever strain is on your wishlist.

Speed to Market

At Next Big Crop, we calibrate our services to offer unparalleled speed to the market.

By skipping the seed and mothering process and placing a bulk clone order, startup operations can see a harvest in three months, versus the six to nine months it takes to mother one (or two) clones or the nine to twelve months it can take to turn a seed into a complete harvest.

You can save yourself a ton of time, money, and energy by sourcing cut clones through reputable folks—instead of going through a nursery and buying one clone at a time.

Genetics is a More Cost-Effective and Timeline-Friendly Alternative to Buying Seeds

Don't get us wrong—we LOVE seeds.

Popping seeds is how you find genuinely unique strains that no one else has.

However, growing plants from seed is an entirely different approach, more closely resembling a research and development project with numbers and spreadsheets.

But not many small or medium-sized businesses have the necessary crew and physical R&D space they can dedicate to seed popping and phenohunting.

It's not nearly as simple as dropping a seed in the dirt and watching a plant sprout from the ground–if you plant 100 seeds, you might get one plant you like enough to bring to market.

Or worse, you might plant hundreds of seeds and get zero usable plants.

Here's a quick timeline of the actual process involved in growing cannabis from seed:

Getting Started

Before you drop a seed into the soil, you have to ask yourself many technical questions.

• What kind of grower are you - indoor or outdoor?
• Do you have the supplies needed for your specific growing environment?
• Will your seeds thrive in your chosen environment?
• Do you know the difference between photoperiod and autoflowering cannabis plants?

The Five Stages of Cannabis Cultivation from Seed to Plant

Stage 1

Germination: 1-7 Days

The first root cracks out of the seed's shell, which takes between 1–7 days.

Stage 2

Seedling: 2 Weeks

Plants require 18 or more hours of daylight for at least two weeks.

Stage 3

Vegetative: 2-8-plus weeks

The plant outgrows its starter medium and will require a transplant to a more suitable space. Flowering should occur after around three weeks, but that's only the beginning of this stage.

Stage 4

Flowering: 6-12 weeks

The focus shifts to bud production.

In the early phase of bloom, you'll learn the sex of your plant, with flowering females developing telltale pistils. Flowering generally lasts 7-10 weeks for indica and hybrid cannabis strains, with sativa-dominant strains taking 10-14 weeks.

Stage 5

Harvest, Trimming, Drying, Curing: 1-2 Months

After 7-11 weeks of flowering, it might be time to strip the plants of their buds.

All of that work, and you might end up with a batch of buds that, in the end, inspires absolutely no excitement among clients and consumers and no winning strains to show for it. Can you imagine spending all of that time (and money) only to find out you don’t have anything worth cloning?

In addition:

• You must hold mothers of all seed plants to ensure that you have a replica ready to harvest when you select a winner.
• You must initiate a three-month revegetation process to “trick” the seed plant from its flowering cycle back into a vegetative cycle to produce clones once again.

Both processes mentioned above are labor-intensive and take up space and, more importantly, time.

The Advantage of Professional Clone and Cannabis Genetics Sourcing

In partnering with Next Big Crop, a team of reputable genetic sourcing professionals, you mitigate the risks and unknown factors associated with growing cannabis from seed.

• Starting with a clone ensures your plant is female, a vital factor in the cannabis experience.
• Thanks to complete documentation, you know what you are getting well before harvest time.
• The cultivation process is accelerated. Clones are six to nine months ahead of schedule compared to seeds.
• Growers can focus on their job: yielding high-quality flowers, not chasing strains, and managing seed run experiments. These are two different jobs with different goals.
• It's flat-out easier. Clones are essentially "plug and play" and much more conducive to success for new and experienced growers.

Why are Exceptional Cannabis Genetics Important?

It's competitive out there. With new markets opening as states continue to legalize medicinal and recreational consumption, the cannabis industry is expanding faster than at any other time in the plant's history.

Thousands of people cycle through dispensaries every month, some stopping by multiple times a week. And these cannabis connoisseurs always ask the same two questions when they walk into the shop:

• What's new?
• What's most potent?

If your strain library never changes, these customers will go elsewhere in search of something new and powerful. Fresh strains keep people interested; variety is an approach that brings dynamic buds to customers.

Next Big Crop's access to Breeder Cuts and paradigm-shifting strains makes it possible, no matter the size of your cannabis enterprise.

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