The strains that drove you crazy

The best weed I’ve ever smoked in California was from Insane. Ruby red. Shit tastes like turning on the Shirley Temple flower and then dipping the joint in a cup of ocean spray. It’s the kind of weed you come across and you think, “Okay, yeah, whoever did this has definitely perfected their growing craft over a long period of time.” That person is Kenji Fujishima who has been growing for 30 years.

Insane by Dr. Greenthumb is a California brand co-founded by B-Real of Cypress Hill, one of the pioneers of modern cannabis culture, Fujishima and Roni Desantis. Fujishima, the experienced breeder of the brand, told me about the future of Insane: “There’s a bunch of different genetics behind it. We are preparing for some deals with multiple states. We do a lot of pheno[type] Hunting and breeding programs, so I think that we will continue to develop our activities as breeders, but also as a brand. “

These are the tribes that brought them there.

1990: Colombian gold

The very first seed Fujishima ever planted in California soil was around 1990. He couldn’t afford to buy weed so he thought he would just grow it. The load? Some bag seeds that he believes was Colombian gold. “Just plain stress weed. If we bought a bag, after we’d picked all the sticks and seeds, we were lucky when we got a joint. The weeds were rubbish, but if you grew those seeds, it was actually fireweed. ”

In 1993, Fujishima met B-Real through a mutual friend named Gator. Gator taught him to do a show [California State University, Dominguez Hills] that the Beastie Boys, Rage Against The Machine, and Cypress Hill (what a goddamn cast, wow) all performed. Soon a shared love of martial arts led B’s training by Fujishima’s father, and in 1995 Fujishima and B were close friends and cultivation partners.

1996: Cali O, White Russian, White Rhino

The meeting with Cypress Hill was also when Fujishima first saw indoor grass. Some were fluorescent green, others looked like cotton candy – all of which sparked a deeper passion for different types of flowers. In 1996 he started touring with Cypress Hill and got the opportunity to go to Amsterdam. This was the first time he had real access to all of these different types of weed.

“I went to Sensi Seed Bank and a couple of other places that were there. Cali O, White Russian, White Rhino. Those were the first ones I remember like, ‘Wow, I can’t believe we’re going through a seed card.’ “

Fujishima chose Cali O (aka California Orange), White Russian, White Rhino, and a few others based on the best looking and faster flowering times. “Some of the hazes were cool, but it was 13 weeks of flowering, 11 weeks of flowering. I thought let’s go with these that are going to go [harvest] More quickly. The faster it [harvests]the faster we will smoke over it.

1997: Kush Bubba (Bubba Kush)

In 1997, Fujishima, B-Real and the crew started getting into the game of Kush. “The first thing we were known for was ‘Kush Bubba’, everyone else knows that [as] Bubba Kush. These seeds were planted and phenohunted in B-Real’s bathroom or a guest room he had in his home. ”

The Bubba Kush was so loud you could smell it all the way down the block. “If you want to start talking about history shit, Dr. Greenthumb was born from this house. The name, the song, the idea, 20 plants that stink the neighborhood, that was this nativity scene. ”

1997-1998: OG Kush

At the same time that Bubba Kush debuted, the mystique of OG Kush burned the streets. However, the crew didn’t get their hands on it for a while. In late 1997, Fujishima and the DGT team finally got a cut of OG Kush from the folks at Wonderbrett. That’s when the shit really started. Life changing shit. Mind people’s family shit.

OG Kush was so popular that people would ask for megabucks for even the smallest amount. Before they had access to growing OG Kush, the crew paid a whopping $ 100 for an eighth. When they started growing and selling it, it went up to $ 500 an ounce, $ 8,000 a pound. It was such a special burden that people broke the bank just to get their hands on it.

“People wanted to give you money before it was harvested just so they could have it. Back then that was a hell of a lot of money. “

2000: Kenji Kush

From the moment it hit, OG Kush dominated the streets of California. It’s everything people wanted in the 2000s. “Everything we had was in [turkey-size oven bags] or mason jars. We didn’t necessarily have to have a brand because there weren’t that many people. People just knew he had this Kenji Kush. We didn’t have to market it because maybe one or two people would take it all. “

All this time, Fujishima was still touring with Cypress Hill. In 2000 he toured with Limp Bizkit and in 2009 began touring again with Cypress. That was until 2013 when he focused on building the Dr. Greenthumb and the media platform.

2014: Crazy upper floor

Prop 215 legalized medical cannabis in California in 1996, but Dr. Greenthumb did not enter the legal market until 2014. In 2015 they got their first cultivation system. In August 2018, Dr. Greenthumb with the opening of its flagship pharmacy Dr. Greenthumb in Sylmar, California, from medical to adult market.

All along, they were still bringing out the OG Kush that gave birth to their name. This time around, however, it had evolved from Kenji Kush to Insane OG (aka 3X Crazy), Dr. Greenthumb’s very first legal product.

2021: Christmas lights, honeymoon

To this day, Insane still keeps the OGs on deck, but they’re not growing nearly as much as they used to be. Instead, they have shifted the focus to new flavors to meet consumer demand. Christmas Lights and Honeymoon are two of their newest popular flavors. Christmas Lights is a phenotype of Flo that Fujishima and his team received from Aaron Yarkoni of DNA Genetics; Honeymoon is a wedding cake phenotype. In addition, they have released Hindu Funk, Gotti, and Mac 11. In August they are bringing out ten more new flavors.

However, if it were up to him, Fujishima would only grow one of the seven different OGs that Dr. Greenthumb has in her library. “For me, there is still nothing quite like this OG high. The other stuff is still baked, the flavors are cool, but for me it’s an OG thing if you want that bang on the head. “

Selected image courtesy of Insane. Graphics by Britt Rivas / Weedmaps