Is it ever safe to breed with Hermis?

[stickshift]

I had to read the thread again thanks for the good info GMT but i am set on this and will do it regardless, these F1 plants look way to good not to be given a second chance. this crop should be a short one though jan-feb harvest so i will let you guys know the outcome soon enough, thanks for all the info so far but i think this needs more discussion way more, i am with Tom on this one, the hermi trait should not be too hard to breed out imo.

is that why with the progeny of these so called plants you see more of the same?

I am looking at Breeding a good strain to help me so that i don't have to work extra to compete with the others in my area. I am also assuming an intersex plant would be XY* almost the same for a male XY. i read somewhere that the y chromosome is faulty on inter-sexed plants. is that why a intersex + female don't throw back full males?

no intersex can be both.. a female(XX) cannot genetically throw out males of the XY type.. it can show as an XX but that indicates a problem to me, be it in pathways or with an "sry" type gene.. the Y imo has TE (transposable elements) these could lead to problems, some plant types seem to stop recombining due to degeneration on the Y. Some say dosage compensation can kick in and evolve de novo like with silene, but we could turn it on its head, what if the lack of Y caused it? some say the Y chromosome in males controls a relative larger proportion of genetic variance..

 

[GMT]

GMT have you ever breed with an intersexed plant?

I am looking at Breeding a good strain to help me so that i don't have to work extra to compete with the others in my area. I am also assuming an intersex plant would be XY* almost the same for a male XY. i read somewhere that the y chromosome is faulty on inter-sexed plants. is that why a intersex + female don't throw back full males?

A quick question, the batch of plants in question are F1 Hybrids but not all of them are intersexed 16% i am just about to start crossing them to make a F2 batch, i run batches of about 60, how much of these do you think i would have to chuck because they go hermi? statistically speaking of course. I only need 1 pair, a good male/female.

No, nor would I under any circumstances, but then the line I'm using doesn't have them within them, under any circumstances. So you could say I don't know what I'm talking about.

If all you are looking for is sparkles and stink for bag appeal, then I'm the wrong guy to be speaking to really.

Stickshift is correct, an intersexed plant can begin life with either xx or xy chromosomes, well begin live and die with them, they don't change, but some are broken, just like in people, some are born unwell. Tom doesn't believe in eugenics, for plants I do, for people I'm undecided. intersexed females can't give you male offspring because in order to get a male offspring, you need to have a male contributing their Y to the offspring. With females you only have X's to pass on, it is always the male that determines the sex of the offspring, as he passes an X to 50% of his children and a Y to 50%. The females can only ever pass on one of their X's.


25% give or take, so lets say 12 to 18 of them.



If it's your intention to breed that trait out, then you aren't with Tom on this one. If you read what he says carefully, you will see that he feels it's not relavent to the selection process at all. You should neither select them nor count them out of candidates, but instead, use them all. Tom is big on open pollination, though I'd rather leave him to speak for himself. I prefer 1:1 matings, if the wrong one is chosen, that generation can always be redone several times until the right 1:1 is found.

 

[Shelby]

I think what Tom Hill is saying has alot of merit towards finding the best plants and I believe that's his point. The best parents are the oneswhich get you to your ideals or goals,regardless of if your male throws a pistil or two, if it's the best pollen donor than that's what it is, the best pollen donor. Would you not use a mother who sprouts a couple male flowers at the end of her cyclefor fear the same may happen with the progeny or is she the best pistillate plant you have and therefore the best mother to use, I would think the latter. Sour diesel has no male(per se ) pollen donor yet it's touted as some of the best product out there will this stop people from growing and breeding with it the answer is obviously no and why would they if it's the best product to be had. The best parents are the best parents and deviating from that for a more tangible trait is quite irrelavent if your breeding goals are looking for the best smoke period. Took me a couple reads to get my head around it but I think Tom is making alot of sense on this subject.

 

[stickshift]

I think what Tom Hill is saying has alot of merit towards finding the best plants and I believe that's his point. The best parents are the oneswhich get you to your ideals or goals,regardless of if your male throws a pistil or two, if it's the best pollen donor than that's what it is, the best pollen donor. Would you not use a mother who sprouts a couple male flowers at the end of her cyclefor fear the same may happen with the progeny or is she the best pistillate plant you have and therefore the best mother to use, I would think the latter. Sour diesel has no male(per se ) pollen donor yet it's touted as some of the best product out there will this stop people from growing and breeding with it the answer is obviously no and why would they if it's the best product to be had. The best parents are the best parents and deviating from that for a more tangible trait is quite irrelavent if your breeding goals are looking for the best smoke period. Took me a couple reads to get my head around it but I think Tom is making alot of sense on this subject.

if that's the plan we may as well drop all breeding criteria and get to OPing via rodelization or whatever soma called it! for sour diesel it shows it's tendency early on when the lights are flipped it's already in it,, still a nice smoke though.. it's heritable to me hence I don't want it.. there's a world of difference for me in a female having a hormonal balance change at the end of the cycle typical of thai types to something that appears as a male early on! I'll judge the best parents by what they collectively pass on and if it's that then i'll personally pass..

 

[midsummer]

Sorry!! I forgot my audience. This post is too subtle to make my point. These passages could easily be misinterpreted by someone with a little too much substance on board or maybe a little too little thought.

I admire the strong beliefs; but I do not think that strong beliefs give me the right or makes it right for me to tell someone to go to hell. Speaking to someone like that is destructive.

About the hermi's; my historical observation is consistent with the use of hermis in a population. FYI I am anti bottlenecking.

But who really gives a bit about my opinion? Well one person does.

Sorry Tom; I admire your intense sentiment; but, in the course of human interaction, I do not think that is a wise or decent thing to do. I might agree to disagree.

Side note:

Since traditional farmers must rely on their marijuana(annual) seeds produced each season for the next crop; I think that intersex concerns, in general, have been irrelevant for them. Of course I am thinking pre-seed bank/ refridgeration.

Traditional farmers likely selected seeds from the best plants for future generations. They did not have the atrificial light gardens and cloning techniques that make marijuana into a virtual perineal.

This is not to say that this is the "best way" forward. I think that way remains to be seen. Hope I have not hurt any feelings.

 

[GMT]

A quick word on bottlenecking:

In the wild, each generation only has 1 opportunity to pass on their genes to the next generation. The tallest males who produce the most pollen pass on their genes to the most females etc. In a tiny population, we all know this to be a problem for the long term health of the population. However, each seed of the next population is the result of a 1:1 mating, it doesn’t matter how many even there are in a population, every member of the next population is still the result of a 1:1 mating. The most successful of these pass on their genes to a higher proportion of the next generation than the least successful. But that too will be a 1:1. This is Darwinism in action. In a controlled environment, we aren’t limited by the one shot deal. We can have half as many attempts to find the best parents (depending on our selection criteria) as we have seeds from a generation. We can even breed one generation to another generation. So rather than needing competition and open pollination to determine the best parents, we can look for something other than the tallest males, the males that produce the most pollen, the female who produces the higher number of seeds etc. If we find that the wrong parents have been used, we aren’t then screwed, we can go back and do it again. This is an advantage over nature, and so we aren’t held back by the same process that occurs in the wild. We can have every member of the next generation coming from the parents that gave us the offspring we wanted. So in a controlled environment, the whole bottlenecking thing is an irrelevant argument. 1:1 in a controlled environment, simply means that we end up with the parents who pass on what we want passed on. And those who pass on things we don’t want passed on, don’t have their genes infecting our chosen offspring populations. Open pollination does give us a better chance of finding exceptional individuals from any one mating generation, but 1:1 means we can ensure that the parents of that exceptional individual are the parents of all individuals. Successfully completing a single generation may take the same amount of time as several generations of open pollination, but you have already excluded a high number of individuals that you don’t want to see in the next generation. This is a problem for commercial seed producers, as commercial considerations means that time equals money, however for obsessive private breeders, this is an irrelevant consideration.

 

[midsummer]

A quick word on bottlenecking:

In the wild, each generation only has 1 opportunity to pass on their genes to the next generation. The tallest males who produce the most pollen pass on their genes to the most females etc. In a tiny population, we all know this to be a problem for the long term health of the population. However, each seed of the next population is the result of a 1:1 mating, it doesn’t matter how many even there are in a population, every member of the next population is still the result of a 1:1 mating. The most successful of these pass on their genes to a higher proportion of the next generation than the least successful. But that too will be a 1:1. This is Darwinism in action. In a controlled environment, we aren’t limited by the one shot deal. We can have half as many attempts to find the best parents (depending on our selection criteria) as we have seeds from a generation. We can even breed one generation to another generation. So rather than needing competition and open pollination to determine the best parents, we can look for something other than the tallest males, the males that produce the most pollen, the female who produces the higher number of seeds etc. If we find that the wrong parents have been used, we aren’t then screwed, we can go back and do it again. This is an advantage over nature, and so we aren’t held back by the same process that occurs in the wild. We can have every member of the next generation coming from the parents that gave us the offspring we wanted. So in a controlled environment, the whole bottlenecking thing is an irrelevant argument. 1:1 in a controlled environment, simply means that we end up with the parents who pass on what we want passed on. And those who pass on things we don’t want passed on, don’t have their genes infecting our chosen offspring populations. Open pollination does give us a better chance of finding exceptional individuals from any one mating generation, but 1:1 means we can ensure that the parents of that exceptional individual are the parents of all individuals. Successfully completing a single generation may take the same amount of time as several generations of open pollination, but you have already excluded a high number of individuals that you don’t want to see in the next generation. This is a problem for commercial seed producers, as commercial considerations means that time equals money, however for obsessive private breeders, this is an irrelevant consideration.

Very well said! And I agree with this form of breeding as a way to find and isolate individuals with special characteristics. In a few generations you can breed for terpene, canabinoid profiles, yields, growth patterns and other desirable traits. In a few generations you can have large shifts.



But you do not always just amplify characteristics by this type of breeding. As an example you might try to "breed out" hemaphroism. That would seem like a worthy goal in an indoor environment when a premium may be placed on flower development. We should recall that the traits we see are determined by the plants genes. Phenotype is the resultant plant characteristic that we see when the plants genes interact with its environment. Once the traits are breed out of your plants (and those genes coding for that trait) the future generations will not have the trait. The genes are lost that will code for that particular trait.



It is useful to consider each generation of seeds as a pool of genetic material from which future plants can draw upon. So if we breed out the hermi's or other traits from a population; subsequent generations will not display the trait because the gene that codes for the expression of that trait has been eliminated from that population. Future generations will not show the trait unless the gene is reintroduced by breeding to other populations or by spontaneous mutation.



Many traits are determined by more than one gene and there exists such genetic concerns as dominance, homozygosity, heterozygosity and penetrance however I think the above begins to illustrate what happens to the genes when we breed for traits and as GMT has rightfully pointed out this happens much faster in a one on one pairing.



We need to be concerned with the larger picture for cannabis and for her future. If we select our populations in the indoor environment the plants are not exposed to the varied pressure found outside. There are fewer plagues and droughts indoors. The plants are not challenged by nature. During the selection process we will not only be losing certain genes and their expressions (for example genes that express intersex characteristics) that we wish to lose; but we will inevitably lose genetic material that codes for resistance to various challenges of nature. So while we might breed a hermi free line; when that line is returned to grow in nature we may find we have removed genes that coded for drought resistance, or certain infections. That population of plants then may be entirely wiped out when challenged in one season.

Whereas had the population retained all of its genetic pool in the wild the plants would have had individuals with resistance to these plagues and droughts and these individuals would have survived to carry on the species.


Also with the one on one breeding and selecting you not only end up concentrating the good genes but also bad genes and this leads to a phenomena known as inbreeding depression.


Open pollinations of large enough populations allow for maintenance of the gene pool that cannabis has evolved over the course of billions of years; thus ensuring the chances of survival in the wild of the cannabis genome. Open pollination is a necessary evil for the maintenance of landrace cannabis populations.

 

[GMT]

Given that as you say, it has taken a couple of billion years for the species to evolve, it is difficult to imagine that any individual will not contain these resistances at the start of a breeding program. Given that to be true, it would be hard to find individuals that will not pass these traits on to the next generation. Of course it is for the indoor breeder to ensure that the plants chosen are resistant to as many hardships as possible, that is where stress testing comes into play. Though you are right that not all of the hardships that are faced in an outdoor environment can be created in the indoor environment. It is not only those tests that the plant has survived in the past, but given in an outdoor environment there is always a race going on, between defenses and the offences of predatory insects etc. it is true that the ability of outdoor bred landraces will be superior in an outdoor setting. We will always require some landrace strains to be preserved, and the goals of preservation and development are separate goals. That is why I feel it is important for both goals to be chased by separate breeding programs. We are fortunate that there are people doing both. This way, we can not only choose whether to buy indoor or outdoor genes, but at any point we can cross the two together, and select individuals that contain the best of both worlds. After all, a genome is not a private members club, and does not have limits on the number of genes that it can accommodate, if one candidate does not contain some genes from another line, they can always be added to that line.

 

[Thule]

What can you expect from seeds from a plant that hermies early during flower but after being hit with pollen? The father is a pure male.

 

[Thule]

Well I guess we don't really know alot about hermies if no one can answer a basic q like that. Cross a solid male to a partial hermi, what are the possble outcomes? Increased number of females?

 

[GMT]

read the thread, and you'll get an answer.

 

[Thule]

I thought I did, I just don't see that particular scenario explained, I guess I'm fishing for experiences.

 

[FOE20]

But you do not always just amplify characteristics by this type of breeding. As an example you might try to "breed out" hemaphroism. That would seem like a worthy goal in an indoor environment when a premium may be placed on flower development. We should recall that the traits we see are determined by the plants genes. Phenotype is the resultant plant characteristic that we see when the plants genes interact with its environment. Once the traits are breed out of your plants (and those genes coding for that trait) the future generations will not have the trait. The genes are lost that will code for that particular trait.

love it midsummer...on ward and Forward!...

If anything GMT.....Im obsessive..heh....

not sure why Im even gana try to answer but I'll give it a shot...
Thule the seed will be fine...The Mother prob stressed and hermi tendency showed..
What would matter to me most is How Easily did it Hermi?...As this could be a trait you don't want to pass on...
For example...Was it heat stress, nutrient stress, over watering, light stress?...
Was the Mother used from a Selfed line that has a rep of showing hermi's easily?....
Is the Mother line very Solid to start?...and if so why did you see a hermi after mid bloom?...Specially after it had already been pollinated...
My thought is its something that happened in your enviro to cause the Mother to hermi..
Enviro factors are everything in the world of your plant, in your realm not its original realm...
Genetic factors are what you have less control over but your enviro will control allot of that expression...knowing the parent lines fully is the first step in any breeding IMO...and not just knowing them well but as well as your own kids...what they need, like, smell, taste, poop, pee, attitude...everything...the whole package up and down all sides..
So when you know them to this degree you have a great chance in working them forward in the ways you hope will become as familiar as the orig Parents are..or Better as Improving upon...
So what caused it is my main question?...gl and hope thats some help...
FOE20

 

[Thule]

So what caused it is my main question?...gl and hope thats some help...
FOE20

Well definitely stress, being taken inside from cold wet environment, then going to 12/12 and a reversed photoperiod.

We're talking about a very sativa line, some history of hermies under stress, but both parents were clean.

I'm not plannnig on doing the same mistake with the progeny, so what i've gathered they should be fine as long as the mother was a true fem to begin with. Thanks for the input.

 

[ahortator]

Hello

If I can choose I prefer to avoid intersexed plants for breeding (making seeds). But sometimes you can find an interesting strain from a far and away exotic country. Where perhaps you will never can travel and you cannot get more seeds from there. And all you get from a handful of seeds are only many intersexed plants in several degrees, ranging from almost pure female to 50/50% intersexed.

What can I do? Could I expect to find a true male?

IB: The natural state in which hemp appears was and is dioecious. Monoeciousness is artificial in hemp, it can only exist with the help of man, and without selection, the dioecious state will return in two or three generations.

From the research conducted by McPhee, von Sengbusch and Hoffmann we know that when a monoecious hemp plant pollinates a dioecious female the offspring (F1) consists for over 90 % of females, for 3-5 % of monoecious plants bearing mainly female flowers and for only 2-3 % of true males.

http://druglibrary.org/olsen/hemp/iha/iha01215.html

Are this 2-3% "true males" actually true males, useful for breeding?

Are this true males XY males or only intersexed plants (females) bearing no pistillate flowers?

Could I get a mainly dioecius line from this seeds in some generations? A few intersexed plants (10-20%) are no problem for me.

If I find some almost male plants would be better use them to make seeds than a more female intersexed plant? Or this almost males produce less females in their offspring? Of course mating them with an almost female or a true female plant (at least a plant bearing no staminate flowers).

Best regards.

 

[Thule]

Been reading the same stuff recently.

Hemp breeders have been trying to do exactly the opposite as pot farmers by trying to create monoecious varieties. That however has proven dfficult because the plants tend to revert back to their dioecious form after a few generations!

"The male ratio increases linearly wth the size of the area and can never be completely eliminated."

"In the french hybrid population of Felina höppner and menge-hartmann found 8 percent male hemp, despite the fact that, according to the standard it should have contained none at all."

 

[ahortator]

Hi Thule

That is very interesting. Perhaps it could be possible to get a dioecious line from a monoecious strain.

I was very interested in the Ukrainian hemp strain USO 31 for breeding, but it is monoecious. It is a fast flowering strain, which produces a great amount of biomass even in cold latitudes as Lithuania. And what it is very interesting it is very healthy and not mold or pest prone which is a great problem with many fast flowering hybrids. The seeds are not very difficult to get and they are not expensive.

http://www.lzi.lt/tomai/97(3)tomas/97_3_tomas_str9.pdf

I think that it would be very interesting to get a dioecious line from this cultivar and then try some back crossings with an almost psychedelic sativa strain such as a Thai Stick. And see what happens.

It would be much better and easier to get seeds from Altai. But I think that it is very difficult or almost impossible to get seeds from there.

https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=83312

Best regards.

 

[Thule]

Hi Thule

That is very interesting. Perhaps it could be possible to get a dioecious line from a monoecious strain.

I was very interested in the Ukrainian hemp strain USO 31 for breeding, but it is monoecious. It is a fast flowering strain, which produces a great amount of biomass even in cold latitudes as Lithuania. And what it is very interesting it is very healthy and not mold or pest prone which is a great problem with many fast flowering hybrids. The seeds are not very difficult to get and they are not expensive.

http://www.lzi.lt/tomai/97(3)tomas/97_3_tomas_str9.pdf

I think that it would be very interesting to get a dioecious line from this cultivar and then try some back crossings with an almost psychedelic sativa strain such as a Thai Stick. And see what happens.

It would be much better and easier to get seeds from Altai. But I think that it is very difficult or almost impossible to get seeds from there.

https://www.icmag.com/ic/showthread.php?t=83312

Best regards.

It certainly is possible. There was a time you could buy Beniko seeds in this country for ornamental purposes. The seeds had been reproduced here for a number of years and had aclimatized very well, autoflwered and gave both male and female plants. The strain was originally monoecious but I never saw an intersexed plant. The problem was the low % of males.

In your case it would be so much easier to start with standard m/f plants, they aren't too hard to get ahold of, it's cbd your after right?

Altai would be a paradise for seedcollecting, that is if you do your best to avoid getting caught doing that.

 

[ahortator]

Yes, it would be easier to start with common m/f hemp.

No, I'm not after CBD.

When I started to grow cannabis many years ago, I was only able to get hemp bird seed. For a few years I was growing hemp, and I had never seen problems with mold, pests or intersexuality. I have never seen a healthier strain.

The headache begins with psychoactive strains. It is almost impossible to get a harvest because here all plants are whipped with oidium year after year.

At first I thought that it was due to mold weakness from the indica side in hybrids. But with 100% wild sativas the problem is even worse.

My goal is to get a strain like a Thai, Colombian, African but with no oidium problems. A little faster would be good but it is not very important because here the weather is not very cold.

I have read that hemp breeders select hemp plants for no THC and high CBD because CBD makes the THC loose effect.

On the other hand I have read that some hemp strains are selected with no THC and no CBD because females buds lack trichomes.

I think that it would be better for breeding a hemp strain that adds no change in the cannabinoid profile, in order to get the full same high from the psychoactive strain with as many back-crosses as needed.

I don't know if the hemp mutants lacking trichomes can restore its high CBD profile when they are crossed with a low CBD and high THC strain. But some research is needed.

It is very interesting what you say about Beniko because some landraces have a very low % of males too, and perhaps that is the answer.

Altai seems very interesting because if plants there are sativa trees with trippy sativa high effect but aclimatized to far north day length and weather seeds from there could be the dream for many growers. And it wouldn't be necessary to make hybrids, only the pure strain that any grower can reproduce each year for more seed.

Cops are the problem again.

Greetings.

 

[bajangreen]

Wow it seems like i created a monster! i like where this thread is going and the discussion is very interested indeed i was wondering though does the intersex gene "replace" the Males, Females or both from the ratio? meaning does more intersex = less male?