# Landrace

> A landrace is a traditional, locally adapted cannabis population kept by farmers in one region over many generations, with its own type and plenty of internal variation.

- Canonical: https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/landrace.html
- Also written: landraces, land race, landrace strain, landrace variety, traditional variety
- Glossary category: Genetics and breeding · Evidence: Established
- Status: Draft: awaiting expert review · Updated: 2026-10-31
- Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/), attribute "GenetixBay cannabis glossary"

A landrace is a population of a crop shaped by farmers and local conditions in one region over a long time. It has a recognisable type, local adaptation (to climate, [day length](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/photoperiod.md), pests and use) and more internal variation than a modern cultivar. It is maintained by saving seed from the best plants each season (Villa et al. 2005).

## In practice

Cannabis landraces from Afghanistan, Pakistan, India, Nepal, Thailand, Mexico, Colombia, Jamaica, Lebanon, Morocco and other regions are the foundation of almost every modern line. [Hashish](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/hashish.md), [charas](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/charas.md) and [sinsemilla](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/sinsemilla.md) traditions show those farmers mastered high-quality cannabis long before modern breeding.

True landraces are under pressure. Imported hybrid seed has been crossed into many source populations, and modern genomic work shows how much mixing has occurred. Seed sold online as "landrace" may be a recent collection, a reselection or a hybrid. Ask when and where it was collected, how many parents were used and how it was maintained.

## Don't confuse with

- **Heirloom**: a line kept outside its source region, often for decades; a landrace is kept where it evolved.
- **IBL**: inbred and [stabilised](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/stabilisation.md); a landrace is [open-pollinated](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/open-pollinated.md) and variable.
- **Wild cannabis (feral)**: escaped populations, not farmer-maintained.

## Myth check

Old landrace cannabis was not weak. See [old cannabis was not weak](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/genetics-history/old-cannabis-was-not-weak.md) and, on collection ethics, [landrace hunting and biopiracy](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/genetics-history/landrace-hunting-and-biopiracy.md).

## Related terms

[Heirloom](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/heirloom.md), [Open-pollinated](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/open-pollinated.md), [Gene pool](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/gene-pool.md), [Accession](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/accession.md), [Introgression](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/introgression.md), [Hybrid](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/hybrid.md)

## Read more

- [Landraces of the world: an overview](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/genetics-history/landraces-of-the-world.md)
- [Polyhybrids vs landraces: what each gives a breeder](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/breeding/polyhybrids-vs-landraces.md)

## Sources

1. Villa TCC, Maxted N, Scholten M, Ford-Lloyd B. 2005. Defining and identifying crop landraces. Plant Genetic Resources 3(3):373-384. https://doi.org/10.1079/PGR200591
2. Clarke RC, Merlin MD. 2013. Cannabis: Evolution and Ethnobotany. University of California Press. https://doi.org/10.1525/9780520954571
3. Ren G, Zhang X, Li Y, et al. 2021. Large-scale whole-genome resequencing unravels the domestication history of Cannabis sativa. Science Advances 7(29):eabg2286. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abg2286