2025 Grow Diaries indoor contest winners

Dutch Passion’s contest highlights at a glance

The 2025 Grow Diaries Indoor Contest delivered three outstanding indoor grows, each showcasing a different strength of Dutch Passion genetics. Two exceptional Orange Bud 2.0 diaries dominated first and second place thanks to their vigour, resin production and striking visual appeal, while Ice Cream Haze secured third place with an ultra-fast, frost-heavy organic grow that impressed the judges with its efficiency and aroma.

First place was awarded to GERGrowDesigns for an outstanding Orange Bud 2.0 grow featuring extreme frostiness, vibrant blue and purple hues, rich terpene development and flawless plant health—even under challenging heatwave conditions.

Second place went to HippyHemulen, also growing Orange Bud 2.0, who delivered rock-hard, high-yielding buds with exceptional bag appeal, beautiful colour fades and a tropical orange-forward aroma in an NFT hydro setup.

Third place was claimed by GoodTimesOrganics with Ice Cream Haze, an impressively fast-flowering organic grow that produced dense, resin-drenched buds, a sweet fruity-caramel aroma and an XL yield relative to plant size in just 48 days of flowering.

This year’s winners highlight not only the versatility of Dutch Passion genetics, but also how different growing styles can achieve elite results indoors.

First Place: Orange Bud 2.0 by GERGrowDesigns

GERGrowDesigns claimed first place with a breathtaking indoor grow of Orange Bud 2.0, awarding the strain a perfect 10/10 rating. What stood out most to the Dutch Passion team was the exceptional visual quality: stunning blue and purple hues combined with extremely frosty, sticky buds and a rich, zesty sweet-fruity aroma.

Both plants performed consistently, with one finishing a full week earlier while still delivering the same high-quality results. Despite challenging conditions caused by a heatwave, the grow remained stress-free thanks to careful light management and elevated CO₂ levels.

The diary featured excellent photography that captured Orange Bud 2.0’s dense, resin-rich flowers in full detail.

An extremely beautiful strain with special terpenes and outstanding visual appeal.

Grow setup & key details:

• Indoor tent: 220 × 150 × 150 cm (7ft × 5ft × 5ft)
• Medium: Narcos Organic Mix soil
• Lighting: Dual 720W LEDs (dimmed to 400W during heatwave)
• Training: Multiple toppings
• CO₂: Enriched to 800 ppm
• RH: Reduced to 50% during bloom
• Temperature: 20–27°C (68–81°F)
• Final height: 1 m / 3.3 ft
• Total cycle: 107 days (7 weeks veg, 8 weeks bloom)

Orange Bud 2.0 had to cope with a heatwave. To prevent temperatures getting too high the lights were temporarily dimmed on the hottest days. Using elevated CO2 levels, as seen here, allows grow rooms to operate at higher temperatures without causing plant stress. The plants showed no major issues, rewarding the grower with the trademark gorgeous, terpene-rich buds.

GERGrowDesigns wins a €500 seed voucher from Dutch Passion—congratulations on an inspiring first-place grow!

Grow Diaries journal:
Full Orange Bud 2.0 grow diary by GERGrowDesigns

Second Place: Orange Bud 2.0 by HippyHemulen

Second place went to HippyHemulen, who delivered another outstanding Orange Bud 2.0 grow, this time in an NFT hydro setup. The grow impressed with rock-hard buds, heavy trichome coverage, beautiful purple fading and excellent overall bag appeal.

A well-executed ScrOG allowed the canopy to fill perfectly, resulting in larger-than-average buds and a tropical aroma dominated by orange and mandarin notes with subtle sour undertones. The grower praised the strain for its ease of training, fast vegetative growth and excellent response to topping.

Orange Bud 2.0 was awarded a perfect 10/10 for potency, delivering a euphoric head high followed by a strong body stone.

Easy to grow and train, with a fast vegetative and stretch phase and excellent response to topping. Buds were slightly above average in size, very dense and rock hard with heavy trichome coverage, finished with attractive purple fading on both leaves and buds. Aroma was tropical and fruity, dominated by orange and mandarin with subtle sour notes.

Grow setup & key details:

• System: Indoor NFT hydro (0.81 m² / 3ft × 3ft tent)
• Nutrients: CANNA Aqua Vega & Flores, CalMag
• Training: ScrOG from week 4, topping & defoliation
• Flowering time: 54 days
• Veg time: 6 weeks
• Final height: 92 cm / 3 ft
• Yield: 159 g dry from one plant
• Temperatures: 24–31°C day / 22–30°C night
• RH: 50–70% veg, 50–60% bloom

HippyHemulen wins a €300 seed voucher from Dutch Passion—well done on a frosty, high-yielding runner-up! Beautiful fan leaves with dense trichome edges too!

Grow Diaries journal:
Full Orange Bud 2.0 grow diary by HippyHemulen

Third Place: Ice Cream Haze by GoodTimesOrganics

GoodTimesOrganics secured third place with an impressively fast and resin-drenched grow of Ice Cream Haze, showcasing her XL potential in a compact indoor setup. Ice Cream Haze is a cross of Crockett’s Haze and Ice Cream Cake; a cup-winning sativa known for flavour and potency.

The Dutch Passion team were particularly impressed by the extreme frostiness, dense bud structure and rapid flowering time of just 48 days, combined with a powerful sweet fruity-caramel aroma that filled the room. The organic approach and training techniques produced a healthy, homogeneous plant loaded with chunky, resin-rich blooms.

An unbelievably fast and compact strain with extreme resin production and intense aroma. Sweet and fruity notes rounded off with a strong caramel finish filled the entire space. Flowering took just 48 days after switching to 12/12, delivering an XL yield relative to plant size. After trimming, the scissors were extremely sticky from heavy resin coverage — top performance all round.

GoodTimesOrganics has also shared an earlier Ice Cream Haze regular grow diary, offering useful insight into the strain’s performance from regular seed.

Grow setup & key details:

• Medium: Soil/coco blend with BioTabs
• Nutrients: Weedefix Organics, BioGrow & BioBloom
• Lighting: Sanlight Q6W Gen 2
• Tent size: 1.2 × 1.2 m (4ft × 4ft)
• Training: Topping, LST and defoliation
• Final height: 96 cm / 3 ft
• PPFD: Up to 830 µmol/m²/s
• VPD: 0.7–1.21 kPa
• Yield: 98.6 g (3.5 oz) dry
• Total cycle: 14 weeks (7 weeks veg, 7 weeks bloom)

GoodTimesOrganics wins a €200 seed voucher from Dutch Passion—fantastic job capturing this strain’s speedy, frosty magic!

Grow Diaries journal:
Full Ice Cream Haze grow diary by GoodTimesOrganics