OG Kush: 7 Questions About Its Name and Origins

What does OG stand for in OG Kush?

Josh Del Rosso, known as Josh D, explained in a 2018 Forbes interview that OG meant “Original” for his crew’s Kush. “Ocean Grown” and “Original Gangster” also circulate as explanations, but they should not be presented as his account of the name.

Where did OG Kush originate?

The historical account reviewed here traces it to Florida in the early 1990s, followed by a move to Los Angeles in 1996. Florida is its reported early home; Southern California is where it became widely associated with the local cannabis scene. Those are different parts of its history.

Who is credited with OG Kush’s early history?

Matt Berger and Josh Del Rosso are central to the Florida-to-Los Angeles account. Josh’s published timeline credits Berger with bringing cuttings west and describes Josh and his crew preserving and sharing the surviving plant. That account does not establish a single person as its original breeder.

What are OG Kush’s parent strains?

Its exact parentage is unresolved in the sources reviewed. Chemdawg, Lemon Thai and Hindu Kush appear in a frequently repeated ancestry theory, but Josh D’s published record explicitly disputes treating that formula as established history. A repeated family tree is not the same as a verified pedigree.

Is OG Kush the same as Hindu Kush?

No: the names should not be treated as interchangeable. The published OG Kush account describes a Florida-associated cultivar, not a documented landrace imported from the Hindu Kush region. The shared word “Kush” alone does not establish a direct geographic origin or confirmed parentage.

Is OG Kush indica or sativa?

It is generally described as a hybrid, but a fixed indica-to-sativa percentage should not be mistaken for a verified genetic measurement. A 2021 Nature Plants study found that indica and sativa labels did not separate its samples into distinct genome-wide groups. The study was about cannabis labels broadly; it did not establish OG Kush’s original pedigree.

Additional source for the hybrid description: Hiatt (2021)

Are SFV OG and Tahoe OG the same as OG Kush?

They are names associated with the wider OG family, rather than names to automatically substitute for the original cultivar. Josh D’s record lists SFV OG and Tahoe OG among related descendants. That historical relationship does not authenticate the identity of every plant carrying one of these names.