There are two forms of cannabis seeds: the cannabis sativa seeds and indica seeds. Sativa seeds are exactly the opposite of indica seeds. You will quickly notice their difference in just one glance. Cannabis indica and sativa seeds vary not only in their physical appearance. The truth is, they differ in many ways.
Cannabis sativa strains are very useful. They often have higher THC and lower CBD amounts, making them suitable for some health conditions. The main qualities of cannabis sativa strains include the following:
- Anti-depressant
- Anti-anxiety
- Treating chronic pain
- Increases creativity and focus
- Increases serotonin. Serotonin is the neurotransmitter responsible for the regulation of mood, learning, sleep, appetite, and anxiety.
Sativa strains are ideal for daytime use. That’s because they mainly boost your ability to focus and be creative. If you have a special task in which creativity is a must, sativa strains will be very helpful to you.
History of Cannabis Sativa Seeds
According to Wikipedia.org, Carl Linnaeus classified sativa strains in 1753. Cannabis sativa was the earliest species to have a name. Carl Linnaeus is a botanist from Sweden. He got the name “Sativa” from a Latin word that means “cultivated”. Cannabis sativa originated in Mexico, Thailand, and Columbia. These plants grow in areas with warmer climates and longer hours of daylight.
The height of cannabis sativa strains is often between 8 and 12 feet. However, they can grow taller if you let them. In this case, their height can be more than 20 feet. These tree-like plants have long and thin finger-like leaves that can absorb more light, especially the ones grown outdoors.
Cannabis sativa strains take more time to grow. However, they produce decent yields, rewarding your patience. Linnaeus didn’t find anything to compare cannabis sativa to, so he thought it was a single whole species of weed.
30 years later, a French naturalist named Jean-Baptiste Lamarck proposed two cannabis species: cannabis sativa and cannabis indica.
How Do Cannabis Sativa Strains Look?
As said before, cannabis sativa strains have thin and long leaves. These plants pass these characteristics to their flowers. Therefore, the buds of sativa strains look bigger than the buds of indica strains. However, they are looser and less dense. They look like a horde or fine hairs.
Sativa buds are also lighter and airy than indica buds because when sativa plants bloom, their flowers form laterally the branch as if they stretched out. Sativa plants are orange or deep red in color because they thrive in warmer climates.
In short, sativa buds are:
- Less dense
- Long
- Fluffy and wispy
- Orange to deep red in color
Therapeutic Effects of Sativa Strains
While the names and appearances of cannabis buds may help you recognize if they are sativa or indica, still the most accurate way is to remember their effects on your mind and body once you consume them.
Many cannabis users say cannabis sativa strains are good to use in the morning because they often give uplifting and energizing effects. Their effects are making sativa strains the opposite of indica strains.
People often associate sativa strains with increased energy, increased focus, and improved creativity. With sativa strains, a person will become more intellectually functional which matters a lot in daily scenarios where he needs to be more creative and attentive for better productivity. Thus, cannabis sativa strains are ideal to use after waking up and even in the mid-afternoon.
Other common effects of cannabis sativa include laughter and increased ability to initiate a conversation. It means these strains may help a lot to shy people who need to speak in public. Cannabis sativa strains will increase their level of confidence, helping them to succeed in this obligation.
Since they boost creativity, cannabis sativa is extremely famous among artists, philosophers, and musicians. This improved creativity always lets them have world-class performance.
Such effects are not due to the sativa strains. Instead, the cannabinoids or compounds in marijuana plants produce these therapeutic effects.
Common Uses of Cannabis Sativa Strains
Cannabis sativa seeds are the main ingredients used in making hempseed oil that you can use for lamps, cooking, paints, and lacquers. You can also use sativa seeds as a caged-bird feed because they give an exceptional source of essential nutrients for various animals.
The flowers of cannabis sativa plants have psychoactive chemical compounds called cannabinoids. Thus, you can use cannabis sativa buds for medicinal, recreational, or even spiritual purposes.
Marijuana users consume the buds and leaves by smoking and vaporizing. They also infuse cannabis strains to homemade cookies, pies, teas, or ice creams. In the past, people were using cannabis sativa strains as teas, ointments, and tinctures. In India’s traditional medicine, people used cannabis sativa plants for their sedative, hypnotic, hallucinogenic, anti-inflammatory, and analgesic effects.
Cannabis sativa strains are useful in therapeutic practices. They are a great medicinal alternative for patients who have mental disorders. Cannabis sativa is effective in lifting off the stress that makes recreational consumers believe sativa can help them kick stress out of their daily lives.
However, the latest ethnopharmacology research showed cannabis sativa can trigger sleep disorders and intensify psychiatric and neurological illnesses.
Differences Between Sativa and Indica
Cannabis sativa and indica differ from each other in many ways. If there’s one thing they are similar to one another, it might be their abilities to contain both THC and CBD and even other cannabinoids.
Their Seeds
Although this method is always not valid and requires experience, the cannabis seeds can tell something about their origin. Indica seeds often have huge oval-shaped seeds with dark brown or black stripes. However, sativa seeds have a rounder shape and minimal to zero stripes.
Their Growth Phase
Marijuana plants in growth can tell people several things regarding their genetic origin. Indica cannabis strains do not grow quickly compared to sativa strains. In fact, in other varieties, it can become an issue when you want to have a mother cannabis plant for making clones. The same issue can take place when you strew late outdoors.
Young indica strains will have strong branches and stems. Also, they will have a structure that looks like a Christmas tree with a protruding main stalk covered by short secondary twigs. Indica plants are often short.
The gap between the inter-nodes is typically short or even very short at only 1 cm. The leaves are short and wide with wide leaflets and a greenish color. Indica strains are ideal for hashish elaboration, with a significant resin production.
However, cannabis sativa strains grow vigorously. They are tall plants that can be taller if you plant them directly to the ground. Their stems are flexible and longer compared to the ones found in indica strains. Therefore, these plants deliver a candelabrum-like structure in which the secondary twigs are almost of the same size as the main stalk.
The intermodal distance will lengthen while the sheets will be long and big with a light green color and slim and long leaflets. Usually, you need plant stakes to support sativa strains while they flower. The branches may bend and even break because of the oversized buds.
Their Flowering Stage
During this flowering phase, cannabis plants will develop flowers that will eventually turn into buds. Therefore, it will give you more proof of their origin. Indica plants can be more sensitive to photoperiod. Thus, they start their flowering stage in no time compared to sativa strains.
Likewise, indica strains barely grow throughout this stage. They typically double their height while sativa plants grow taller. Their size can be 4 times during flowering.
Indica strains typically take fewer weeks to bloom compared to sativa strains. The earliest indica strains take seven weeks to flower while a few sativa strains can take as long as 20 weeks. Likewise, indica strains typically create more compact buds compared to sativa strains that form more airy and elongated flowers. Due to this, indica buds are more prone to rottenness and fungi.
The Buds’ Flavor
Every marijuana strain comes with a specific smell and taste. Typically, moss, earthy, fruity, and sweet tastes and smells mostly exist in indica genetics while most sativa strains often show incense, woody, and metal undertones. However, it does not mean it is possible to see a fruity and sweet sativa strain, but such features do appear in several specimens of each species. Tropimango is a good example. This strain is indica-dominant. Despite that, Tropimango has a fruity and sweet taste and smell.
Hybrid and poly-hybrid strains let the breeders create awesome organoleptic crosses in which they combine most of these traits with one another to create a new strain with remarkable effects, aromas, and tastes.
Conclusion
Cannabis sativa strains are suitable for indoor and outdoor gardens. They have a therapeutic high recognized for its uplifting potentials. Marijuana sativa varieties have been there for a long time, and people found them useful in many ways. Known for their cerebral high and euphoric effect, sativa strains are suitable for people who look for a soothing relief that will let them stay active and focused for the whole day.
