Why we say cultivar, not strain

If you’ve spent any time on our menu, you’ll have noticed the site says cultivar where most of the internet says strain. That isn’t us being precious. It’s us using the word that’s actually correct — and it’s worth two minutes to explain why.

What a cultivar is

Cultivar is a botanist’s word, short for cultivated variety: a plant that people deliberately bred and selected for particular characteristics, and then kept going by propagating it. Apples work this way — a Honeycrisp is a cultivar of apple, bred on purpose and maintained on purpose. Cannabis works exactly the same way. Every named variety on our board exists because growers selected for something — a flavour, a structure, a look — and kept the plants that had it.

Where “strain” came from

Strain belongs to a different corner of biology. Microbiologists use it for variants of bacteria and viruses — a flu strain, a yeast strain. Somewhere along the way cannabis picked the word up and it stuck, the way slang does. It isn’t wrong enough to start an argument over, but it isn’t the right word for a plant, and the people who actually breed cannabis — the ones selecting mothers and stabilising genetics — say cultivar.

We grow our own clones from mothers we selected, so we picked the growers’ word.

Nothing about the plant changes

Here’s the part that matters at the counter: nothing about the plant changes with the name. If you’ve always called them strains, we know exactly what you mean, and nobody here will correct you mid-sentence. Ask for a strain and you’ll get the same unhurried answer as everyone else.

The word on the site is just the site being accurate. The conversation at the counter is in whatever words you brought with you.

Curious what else we get asked? The FAQ covers the counter’s greatest hits — and if yours isn’t there, ask it. We have time.