Cinderella 99
Gypsy Nirvana
Hybrid
Origins: Jack Herer x Shiva Skunk
Flowering: 50-60 days
Harvest: early October
Cinderella 99 received her name because, like the well-known fairytale heroine, she is a high-class girl with humble origins. Originally, the Brothers Grimm developed the F1 generation of Cinderella 99, but they discontinued their business, making the strain unavailable. Gypsy Nirvana commissioned the breeders at Nirvana to produce the F2 generation. They selected two top parents and concentrated on reviving a version of Cinderella that retained the “traits package” of delicious flavor, sativa high, and a quick finish.
The F2 Cindy was selected and stabilized. When planted in an 11-liter (3-gallon) soil bucket, Cinderella 99 yields 50 grams (almost 2 ounces) of dried bud on average – not a huge cornucopia of pot yield, but a respectable-sized harvest of premium slow-smoking buds. Cinderella’s bud construction is very dense for a sativa-dominant plant, with a fruit aroma and a nice sugary resin coating. Gypsy Nirvana’s stabilized F2 Cindys finished flowering between 57 and 61 days under a 12/12 indoor light cycle. Although developed for indoor growing, Cinderella has fared very well outdoors too, yielding of up to one kilo of bud per plant.
The abundance of fine leaves typical of sativas can make Cinderella 99 difficult to manicure, but she is easy to clone. Abundant trichome development can be seen two thirds of the way down her first leaves, closest to the buds.
Cinderella 99 gives a silly, bubbly yet lucid head high with a few inhalations of her pineapple -like smoke or vapor. Sweet taste and giggle fits make Cindy 99 fun for occasional smokers while her classic sativa mind stimulation – and her growing traits – will please the old school congregation of devoted tokers.
A Cinderella Story
As told by Mr. Soul of the now defunct Brothers Grimm
Cinderella’s Story begins in 1997, when I discovered a few surprising seeds in a bud of Jack Herer (a Sensi strain named after the famous hemp activist) that I bought from the Sensi Smile coffeeshop. I wasn’t really expecting much when I grew them, but one of those seeds produced an undeniably special female. I called her “Princess”.
I’d also bought some seeds on purpose during the same trip to Sensi Smile, and from these I got a few more promising females and several males. I used pollen from one of these males on a heavy yielding, dense, resinous Shiva Skunk female from Sensi Seedbank, then used the resulting seeds t grow a crew of males worthy of crossing with Princess.
At this point, I began the cubing process. I crossed one of the males with Princess, making seeds that were 50% Princess, or P50. I then used males that grew from this batch of P50 seeds to backcross with the original Princess, creating a P74 (75% Princess) batch of seeds. I again backcrossed the original Princess with pollen from a P75 male to get a P88, then once more to get a P94, which is “Cinderella”, a cubed version of Princess.
C99 is the F2 generation of this Cinderella plant that Brothers Grimm developed. True-breeding reliability is something that takes a while to prove itself, but the F2 generation of C99 is very much the same as the original F1 C99 in my experience. I feel, but can’t say for certain, that subsequent generations will continue to produce plants with the essential traits of the original C99. That’s the theory of cubing.
Aside from her stability, Cindy 99 stands out because she finishes flowering in under 60 days, like an indica. but delivers a delicious and pleasurable sativa high. This makes her attractive to both commercial grower and the cannabis connoisseur.