Pollinating

If I choose to pollinate a plant for some seeds, will it ruin the buds or smoke potential of them??

I have read some weird threads where people say be careful to not pollinate your girls or you will end up with hermies or waste of time. I know most people use clones but I just want to get a stash of seeds !

the only risk of pollination is seeds, and that is pretty much garrinteed, but once the plant is pollinated it puts all of its energy previously used in resin producion into seed production so obviously you will get less potent buds, but with selective pollinating you can save your sinsimilla

Ok thanks, I may try and pollinate one branch only!

that'd be much dankeliouser

I'm trying to cross pollinate some plants I have with some exotic male flower.
To explain what I have been doing... I put the male flower in a plastic zip
bag and selectively pollinate the buds I want my IVF program to work on.
Then rattle the bag with bud inside.


This is the first time I have attempted this. And it doesn't seem to want to
work for me. I get a reddening of the hair on the bud within a couple of
days. Now when I look at then the white hair is pushing back through and
no indication of seeds forming. I know the male flower is good.

So my Q is. maybe I'm not doing it at the right time... Is there a prefered
time in the monthly cycle that I need to do this?

Any help would be muchly appreciated

regards

xrekcor

i think its your method that is causing the problem. instead of using a plastic ziplock you should take the male in another room and get the pollen sacks into a film canister. dry out the pollen sacks and then break them. then paint the flowers you want to pollinate

it will reduce the potency of the bud but its a price you have to pay for some seeds, be selective and save the top cola for yoursef

could be something else though.

i have seeded grows a number of times. the seeded buds were not less potent but yield was lost because of seed production and it is annoying picking out seeds. its also annoying paying ridiculous prices for seeds when 1 plant can easily produce 500.

Thanks Juntistik,

I have given your approach ago with some new (but dried) male flower. You could see
the pollen dust coming off the pollen sacks as I loaded it into a film canister. Hopefully
I'll get a hit, not worried about loss of potentacy. If this fails will have to try my first
attempt at cuttings... yikes!

regards,

xrekcor

i dont think you can fail at this. my problem is way too many seeds. be very carefull with pollen one male flower will pollinate a whole grow. once you have pollinated the branch you want(i use a q-tip or small paint brush) keep the pollinated plant by itself and blow a fan over it for a hour or so(gently)this remove excess pollen. then mist branch with water to make sure none can blow away this way you dont pollinate your whole grow like me. obviously do this in another room. it is very easy easier than cuttings

webwalker00 said:

Ok thanks, I may try and pollinate one branch only!

Click to expand...

What I do is build pollen collection cups that won't allow the pollen to spread via your fans and what not. I also usually cut the male plant so that only one node is left and the pollen collection cup catches it all. A better way is to simply not have the male in the same room as the females, but my goofy method of manipulating the male and the collector cups seem to work well.

One tip is crucial, shut off all your fans and ventilation when you pollenate the one branch you select, and more importantly than that, pollenate from the bottom up, otherwise gravity and your breath can spread the pollen where you dont want it, you don't want pollen getting away from you and pollenating the whole grow, it doesn't take much pollen to pollenate, so just be careful and shut off your fans until your done.

If you search on my posts, I posted a snapshot of my pollen cups and a how to simple guide; very easy to do, takes all of 5 minutes to make it and affix it to the plant.

Juntistik said:

i think its your method that is causing the problem. instead of using a plastic ziplock you should take the male in another room and get the pollen sacks into a film canister. dry out the pollen sacks and then break them. then paint the flowers you want to pollinate

it will reduce the potency of the bud but its a price you have to pay for some seeds, be selective and save the top cola for yoursef

could be something else though.

Click to expand...

Well it looks like my effort has paid off, although I did another selective
pollination using your method. I do selective (ie: pick a point/bud) so
I dont destroy the plant. Which is currently about 9' and in full flower
that would make for a lot of seed .

Thanks for the tip, I haven't seen the results yet but it appeared a lot easier
and more strategic.

regards,CS

xrekcor

When are the pollen sacks ready to use? I started flowering about a week ago, got 1 male and 2 ladies. Do I cut the sacks off now and wait....? When do you put the pollen on the females and where?

the balls will open then they are ready. after a while you can tell when there about to open and can pluck and dry them then for later use

I just did a whole seed grow.
I just dried the male plant(no fan)in a closet I then brought in 3 females strains
closed the door behind me and turned a fan on for just 20 secs.I then kept the females in the closet over night and tossed the male plant into a grabage bag and tossed it around for the pollen then collect and stored.I ended up with alot of seeds maybe 50 per plant plus still an oz(per) to smoke on.its a pain in the ass to pick the seeds out all the time...but I got the seed bank out of my pocket for awhile and not a difference in THC to the other 7 females who didnt get seeded.-I did this about 6 months ago and I'm happy I did I have a monster grow going now and still alot of seeds.facter in I clone, it might be yrs before I ever buy a seed out of need and not want.

you lose yield when you seed but not potency thats a myth it seems

I will trying pollination methods this summer for the 1st time I really need to do my homework on this one.

Hank.

i dont think you will have any problems it is easy

So how long do you have to wait till the plant produces mature seeds? And also I believe I have read about a kind of acid you can use on a female plant that makes it change into a male. Anyone know if this is true?

Yes you can use an acid to change the sex, it starts with a G and if I wasn't so high I could remember. Any seeds normally take 4 to 6 weeks to fully mature. You will see the calyx split open and expose the finished seed.

Gibberellic Acid