Feminizing Seeds by Soma
Published at 2006-08-17 in Growing tips
Creating feminized seeds is an art, there are a few different methods of application. I have written about some of my different methods of making seeds in previous HIGH TIMES articles. I have use gibberellic acid, light stress, ph stress, and fertilizer stress to force my plants to make seeds. All these methods are harsh on the plants, and some like the gibbrellic acid, are not organic. In my search for cleaner more earth-friendly ways of working with the cannabis plant, I have found a new way to make feminized seeds.
Article by Soma
Feminized seeds occur as a result of stress, other than genetics. All cannabis plants can and will make male flowers under stress. Certain strains like a higher PH, some like a lower one. Some like a lot of food, some like a lot less. There is quite a lot of variety in marijuana genetics, and you canít treat every plant the same way.
It takes many harvests before you really get to know a particular strain. Just like getting to know human friends, it takes time. I have grown strains for a decade and am truly getting to know every nuance the different plants exhibit. I can recognize them from a distance. I must say that I get a lot of help from my friends, both in making seeds and learning new and better ways of working with this sacred plant.
I named this new method ìRodelizationî after a friend who helped me realize and make use of this way of creating female seeds. After growing crop after crop of the same plant in the same conditions, I noticed that if I flowered the plants 10-14 days longer than usual, they would develop male ìbananasî. A male banana is a very slight male flower on a female marijuana plant that is formed because of stress. Usually they do not let out any pollen early enough to make seeds, but they sometimes do. They are a built in safety factor so in case of sever conditions, the plant can make sure that the species is furthered.
To me a male banana is quite a beautiful thing. It has the potential of making all female seeds. Many growers out there have male banana phobia. They see one and have heart palpitations, they want to cut down the entire crop or at least take tweezers and pluck the little yellow emerging devices out. I call them ìEmergency Devicesî because they emerge at times of stress.
In the Rodelization method, the male banana is very valuable. After growing your female plant 10-14 days longer than usual, hang them up to dry, then carefully take them off the drying lines and inspect for bananas. Each and every banana should be removed and placed in a small bag labeled very accurately. These sealed bags can be placed in the fridge for one to two months and still remain potent.
For the second phase you need to already have a crop thatís already 2 Ω weeks into flowering. Take your sealed bag of pollen out of the fridge, and proceed to impregnate your new crop of females. To do this, you must first match the female plant and the pollen from the same strain in the previous crop. Shut down all the fans in the grow room. Then take a very fine paint brush, dip it in the bag of pollen, and paint it on the female flower. Do this to each different strain you have growing together. I have done it with ten different kinds in the same room with great success.
I use the lower flowers to make seeds, leaving the top colas seedless for smoking. This method takes time(two crops), but is completely organic and lets you have great quality smoke at the same time you make your female seeds. If youíre one of those growers that has never grown seeds for fear of not having something good to smoke, you will love this method.
You can also use this pollen to make new female crosses by cross pollinating. The older females with the bananas can be brought into the room with the younger, un-pollinated females when they are three weeks into flowering. Turn all of the circulation fans on high, and the little bits of pollen will proceed to make it around the room. Do this for several days. Six to seven weeks later you will have ripe 100% female seeds; not nearly as many as a male plant would make, but enough to start over somewhere else with the same genetics.
As a farmer who has been forced to move his genetics far away from where they started, I know very well the value of seeds. My friend Adam from THSeeds in Amsterdam has a motto that I love to borrow these days: ìDrop seeds not bombsî.
