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Crossing fems detrimental for vigour?

Cvh

Well-known member
Supermod
Hi all,

Somebody recently asked me a question I couldn't answer and couldn't find good info about.

But as the title says, is continuining crossing fems with reversed fems between unrelated individuals (not inbreeding) detrimental for the vigour in the long run in a line? Because there aren't any males used anymore.

Aren't in the end the plants going to start suffering from the lack of male alleles? Would they end up missing something?
 

Carraxe

Well-known member
Veteran
That's a good question. I've always heard and read about how wrong is to breed with just females, but I miss some rational approx.
 

CannaZen

Well-known member
Selfing a plant may result in vigor loss possibly? females don't carry male alleles and vice versa as far as i know so i wouldn't worry on that front but if that is the case how does the plant produce male flowers without male alleles?


I don't know.
 

Switcher56

Comfortably numb!
Hi all,

Somebody recently asked me a question I couldn't answer and couldn't find good info about.

But as the title says, is continuining crossing fems with reversed fems between unrelated individuals (not inbreeding) detrimental for the vigour in the long run in a line? Because there aren't any males used anymore.

Aren't in the end the plants going to start suffering from the lack of male alleles? Would they end up missing something?
I guess a metaphor one could use is... Remember when we copied VHS tapes, how the quality suffered with each copy of a copy. :)
 

djonkoman

Active member
Veteran
no.

genetically, there's not really any difference between a reversed fem or a male, except the y-chromosome not being there. selfing a plant has the issues(and benefits) of inbreeding, it's just a bit more severe inbreeding as brother/sister, since they're not 2 closely related individuals, but one and the same individual crossed onto itself. but crossing 2 unrelated fems is the same as an unrelated female and male.
 

MintyMick

Member
I haven’t had an issue with loss of vigor when crossing unrelated females from the same strain using fem pollen.

I’ve been doing this with two different super lemon haze phenotypes in order to inbreed them a bit and then go trait hunting. No loss of vigor so far and I’m just about to pop some S4s.

I’m going to subscribe to this post and if i end up with an elephant man pheno I’ll let you know.
 

Hookahhead

Active member
This is not a definitive answer, but I do have a bit of knowledge in this area. There are many different organisms that have all female populations. The scientific name is parthenogensis. This is accomplished via reproduction without sex (asexual). In cannabis, this is what occurs when we take clones from a mother. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthenogenesis


However, this is not what occurs when we pollinate a plant. Regardless of whether its male or female pollen, sex is occurring. Therefore genes are being mixed and recombined. Sexual reproduction tends to be regarded as more advantageous because the mixing of genes creates novelty. Personally, I don't think running an all female breeding program would have detrimental effects. That being said, this is what I know based on other organisms. I have no experience with breeding cannabis in this manner.



Here's a fun related read.

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/asexual-lizards/
 

Hookahhead

Active member
I guess a metaphor one could use is... Remember when we copied VHS tapes, how the quality suffered with each copy of a copy. :)

It's a good metaphor, but unfortunately not applicable in this situation. The VHS metaphor explains parthenogensis very well. Reproducing asexually does have its advantages, but the biggest disadvantage is susceptibility to pest and disease. An example of this would be Panama disease, which wiped out most of the commercial banana grows in the 1950s. The problem was that everyone worldwide was growing the exact same clone of a single banana plant. The seeds of commercial bananas are reduced and sterile, because that makes it "better" for consumption (think of seedless grapes, watermelon, oranges, etc). Therefore, resistance couldn't be bred into this "strain" and the fungus destroyed the line.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panama_disease

However, the OP specifically asked about crossing two UNRELATED females. This is the same as classic sex, and we do have a mixing of genes. From a scientific standpoint, there should be nothing wrong with this type of breeding.

As for maintaining vigor and such, that is dependent on the breeder and "luck". Genetics is complicated, and breeding for a specific trait may have unexpected consequences. A good example of this would be what we are currently seeing in the breeding of English bulldogs.

"Take that cute, flattened face. Breeding for flat faces has resulted in an extreme form of brachycephaly—a shortening of the skull—that is now the leading cause of death for bulldogs. The condition leads to a variety of breathing troubles and overheating. The misshapen heads also affect reproduction, because bulldog puppies cannot fit through their mother's birth canal and must be delivered via cesarean." https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/07/bulldogs-dogs-animals-science-breeding/
 

Switcher56

Comfortably numb!
"Take that cute, flattened face. Breeding for flat faces has resulted in an extreme form of brachycephaly—a shortening of the skull—that is now the leading cause of death for bulldogs. The condition leads to a variety of breathing troubles and overheating. The misshapen heads also affect reproduction, because bulldog puppies cannot fit through their mother's birth canal and must be delivered via cesarean." https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2016/07/bulldogs-dogs-animals-science-breeding/
... you can add collies to that list.
 

Big Nasty

Active member
Hi all,

Somebody recently asked me a question I couldn't answer and couldn't find good info about.

But as the title says, is continuining crossing fems with reversed fems between unrelated individuals (not inbreeding) detrimental for the vigour in the long run in a line? Because there aren't any males used anymore.

Aren't in the end the plants going to start suffering from the lack of male alleles? Would they end up missing something?
If one of the female comes from regular seeds there are male alleles in the cross,as for crossing 2 feminized plants(which i've later discovered being related)i haven't noticed any loss of vigour,these plants are actually very vigourous,i'm harvesting the second one in a couple of weeks.This is the first try for me so take it with a grain of salt.
 

Cvh

Well-known member
Supermod
Thanks for all the replies guys. :)
I'm still not convinced that in the long run it will be harmless.
But the link to Parthenogenesis is intriguing. As so many people I had walking stick insects as pets so I can see the connection.
 

Cvh

Well-known member
Supermod
I respect that a lot.

I heard from Dutch breeders that 98% of Cannabis seeds sales nowadays are fems.
I think I saw my first fem seeds 15yrs ago.

I'm worried what will happen to the species if we continue working with only females.
 

Hookahhead

Active member
I only breed with regular seeds because I want reliable seeds. :tiphat:

There is no evidence that reg beans are any more reliable then fems (reversed only). Personally I expect in 5-10 years, almost all of the breeding will be done with feminized pollen.

There are many advantages to it, since we are only after females for flower production, it makes sense to use two females rather than try to infer what traits a male may or may not pass on. Also since we are after females, femed beans just makes sense in terms of production. Currently there is no reason to devote time, energy, and space to grow a male other than for breeding. However in cannabis and other organisms, males are not necessary. When something is not necessary, and there's is a large advantage obtained from removing it... eventually it will be eliminated. Again I'm not trying to convert anyone, people are more than welcome to cling to their beliefs for as long as they're comfortable. The science willl still progress regardless.
 
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Big Nasty

Active member
Thanks for all the replies guys. :)
I'm still not convinced that in the long run it will be harmless.
But the link to Parthenogenesis is intriguing. As so many people I had walking stick insects as pets so I can see the connection.
as long as you outcross the seeds on and on i think you're not going to lose neither vigour nor diversity,a plant carries the genes of each parent regardless if it's a male or a female but making a outcross of a outcross doesn't make much sense,it could be fun and you could be lucky to find something special but that's it.breeding implies a bottleneck in the genepool to fix traits and to have predictable results,it's potentially detrimental in the long run no matter if you use regular or fem.I like fem but regular seeds are still the way to go.
 
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