The history of G13 Haze

Timeline

1. 1960sHaze takes root in Santa Cruz, California, from Colombian, Mexican, Thai and South Indian genetics; High Times credits the Haze Brothers and says Nevil later backcrossed and stabilized it in Amsterdam.^5,6
2. Late 1960s or 1970sThe G13 legend places its breeding at a government program at the University of Mississippi: Leafly’s version says the late 1960s, the Barney’s Farm account relayed by Weedmaps says the 1970s. Weedmaps says almost none of it can be proven.^2,7,8
3. Circa 1986According to High Times, the G-13 cutting is “secretly procured and brought to Holland”.⁶
4. 1986Derry opens Barney’s coffeeshop on Haarlemmerstraat in Amsterdam, the start of Barney’s Farm.⁴
5. 1987Neville’s Seed Bank catalog lists G-13 as “an outstanding indica cutting reputedly ‘liberated’ from the government research program in Mississippi”, one of the best breeding plants in its collection.¹
6. 1999In American Beauty, Ricky Fitts sells Lester Burnham “G-13. Genetically engineered by the U.S. Government. Extremely potent. But a completely mellow high, no paranoia” for two thousand dollars.⁹
7. Oct 2001Erowid answers a reader’s question about the film: it is “highly unlikely that ‘G13’ is anything but a Hollywood product”, noting that the government’s own Mississippi cannabis tested at roughly 2–5% THC.¹⁰
8. 2006Barney’s G13 Haze finishes second overall at the 19th High Times Cannabis Cup, behind Green House’s Arjan’s Ultra Haze #1; SeedFinder also lists a second place at the IC 420 Growers Cup.^3,11
9. 2007G-13 Haze wins the 20th High Times Cannabis Cup outright, ahead of Grey Area’s Chocolope and Green House’s Super Silver Haze.^3,4,11
10. 2008Green House’s Super Lemon Haze takes the next overall title, the first of two in a row.^3,6
11. 2010–2011Two more Barney’s crosses of the parent G13 win the Cup: Tangerine Dream (G13 × Neville’s A5 Haze, crossed again with G13) in 2010 and Liberty Haze (a G13 male × Chem Dawg 91) in 2011.^3,12,13
12. Oct 2014High Times ranks G-13 #12 among the 25 greatest strains of all time and names G-13 Haze as the 2007 Cannabis Cup winner.⁶
13. 2015–2022The 14 state lab tests of G13 Haze flower in our dataset date from these years, 10 of them from 2019.¹⁴
14. Oct 3, 2026Weedmaps shows G13 Haze flower at 3 store listings in 2 of 27 US markets, 2 of them near Boston.¹⁵

Why the name carries weight

The legend sells. Weedmaps calls G13’s origin one of cannabis’s all-time great stories, a folklore collector in 2008 thought growers had invented it to promote the plant, and a Hollywood film repeated it to a mass audience.^2,9,16 Neville’s catalog already treated G-13 as a breeding plant rather than a product, and SeedFinder now counts 125 direct descendants, most of them, as High Times notes, carrying the parent’s name.^1,6

The Cup did the rest for the Haze cross. Barney’s Farm’s win in 2007 came between its Amnesia Haze (2004) and two further G13 crosses (2010, 2011), and six breeders now sell a “G13 Haze”.^3,4,17 It stayed a growers’ strain: GrowDiaries lists 73 grow diaries, while US dispensary menus rarely carry it (see where to find it).¹⁸

The disputed parts of the story

• The legend itself: High Times states the government origin as fact, Leafly hedges with “according to some accounts”, Sensi Seeds with “according to legend”, Weedmaps says there is no reliable evidence, and Erowid thought the strain a Hollywood product (see genetics).^2,6,7,10,19
• The second parent: Hawaiian Sativa (Barney’s Farm), Haze (Leafly, and Barney’s own regular-seed text) or Hawaiian Haze (Weedmaps, AllBud).^{8,20,21,22,23}
• The 2006 result: second place overall, behind Green House’s Arjan’s Ultra Haze #1, per Wikipedia’s winners list and SeedFinder; Barney’s Farm’s own history page lists only the 2007 title, so the strain is a one-time overall winner, not a two-time one.^3,4,11
• Database lineage fields: Leafly’s G-13 page lists Tangerine Dream × Love Potion as G13’s parents, although Barney’s Farm describes Tangerine Dream as a G13 cross, and Leafly’s Hawaiian page lists Pineapple Express × Amnesia Haze, although its Pineapple Express page gives Hawaiian as a parent. Neither field is used here.^7,12,24,25