We’ve tested hundreds of marijuana seed strains from almost all breeders that have international retail sales, and many smaller breeders, including craft connoisseur breeders.
The harsh truth we’ve discovered is that there are very few fire strains that grow out to be what’s claimed by breeder marketing, do not have hermie traits, and are potent/tasty enough to get the attention of stoners who can barely feel dabs anymore.
This review is about a strain from underground craft breeder HazeMan. We wrote about him a long time ago, you can read that here. we’ve heard only great things about HazeMan, so even though we don’t like growing regs (non-feminized) seeds, we finally risked ending up with one or more male plants, and tested his Cocoa Puffs strain.
We planted five regular photoperiod seeds in Pro-Mix HP. The seeds were five years old. All germinated within three days.
We were excited to grow Cocoa Puffs due to its old-school but high-potency, rare lineage. The strain is a cross between a male Darwoh 2.5 Chocolate Thai and a clone of Chocolate Trip.
Chocolate Trip is an exceedingly rare strain made from crossing a non-Darwoh Chocolate Thai with an Indigo Diamond.
Indigo Diamond is the rarest of strains, containing African and Afghani genetics, known for a balanced, potent effect.
Hazeman says you need 68 days for this strain in bloom phase, but because almost all its lineage genetics are vibrant Sativas, two of five plants we grew needed 73 days in bloom and could have gone longer, none of the plants’ buds were fully mature before 64 days bloom.
This strain is very easy to grow, a heavy feeder, responds well to apical topping to create multi-branched plants with even canopies and sturdy limbs. We always use Pro-Mix HP in cloth pots under professional SANlight LED grow lights, feeding with TPS nutrients.
Bud growth started out fast, slowed around days 40-53, then sped up again with internodes filling in, buds filling out, and resin glands gaining stalk height and head size.
Starting around day 43, some gland heads started going cloudy, and an increasing number of white pistils started turning a beautiful sienna color, but it wasn’t until after day 55 when more than a few glands were 100% cloudy, accompanied by stalks starting to collapse from senescence.
Terpenoid presence was intense from day 30-45, faded a little, only to come back strong in the last two weeks before harvest. The smell is somewhat like cocoa puffs cereal, but also like pepper, and is extremely noticeable if you’re growing without adequate odor control.
Cocoa Puffs plants were victimized by red spider mites when other strains were not; the infestations were quickly dealt via Azamax spray. The presence of mites partially overlapped with, but might not totally have accounted for, the growth slow-down in mid-bloom.
We were careful to wait a few days to ensure the Azamax had done its job, then lowered the humidity (because the buds were thick enough to hold gray mold) and sprayed the plants with pure rainwater to wash the Azamax off.
Everybody loves the Cocoa Puffs high. It comes on like a creeper, then hits hard. We estimate an average 24.5% THC. Euphoria, visual and audio enhancements, sociability, and energy are primary effects, but there’s enough “Indica” effect to reduce pain and prevent a jittery spin-out Sativa high.
Bloom phase stretch was about double the starting height; at harvest time between 63-73 days, we found 70% of each branch was bud, no wasted space. This led to impressive dry weight per plant yields, with one plant producing a few grams more than five ounces of dried bud.
Dried bud has the color of cocoa puffs, rich and amber-ish, but it isn’t a super-gooey strain, and the scent and taste while smooth and pleasant, aren’t going to be the main selling points of a strain like this.
The harsh thing is, we can’t find Cocoa Puffs in HazeMan’s menu anymore. Nor can we find HazeMan.
But if you look online, you find at least two companies selling his gear for him. Given that the guy has been hiding out making craft connoisseur seeds for years, and we’ve never once heard anyone say his strains go hermie or are anything other than absolute fire, it would be useful to contact his seller reps to ask which of his available strains are most like Cocoa Puffs or otherwise worth growing. His strain menu is much larger now than when we first talked to him.
Let’s face it, the marijuana seeds industry is where 95% of the big players are frauds producing generic gelatos, wedding cakes, lemon this, rosa that, apple gas diesel, garlic fart, gorilla gluegoo doll, animal cookies, runtz, permanent mark-up, stupor silver haze, gross train haze, shitzzles, bruce banker, granddaddy burple, and of course all that autoflower shite.
That’s why the few legit breeders like HazeMan are the only kind we work hard to find and tell you about. Take a look at our HazeMan Kush strain review too.
