The History of Herms

[Psyco G]

We (the british) have collected plants (stolen) from all over the world since we learned how to sail. If you drive through our village mid summer there are literally thousands of different plants growing in people's gardens. It really is beautiful. But I'm sure the rest of the world has caught up by now, I'm sure the village next to me was used to grow hemp, the name gives it away really, Hempton. Henry the 8th passed a law that if you owned suitable land you was required to grow a certain % hemp! I forget how much 15% I beleive. They say it was for the sails and ropes on ships, but you can't tell me they didn't have some decent smoking specimens. I wish I could go back and look.

 

[Tipz]

So, if Herms are genetically recessive, and we are seeing a significant proliferation of herm expressions, do you think the entire genepool is moving homozygous recessive as well?

There must be a thc, recessive correlation? Just a question.

 

[Illuminate]

the British report on ganja growing in India from the late 1800s or early 1900s talks about how there was a dude who's job it was to go to all the fields and cull the males, they left the herm plants to collect some seed from.

This, 'sensi' tech when applied to farms way back when.. is where the plant became more likely to herm, because when ya males are killed off the girls know and this stresses them out, they think: Fuck, where did all the studs go, we need to make seed.

 

[KiefSweat]

mathematically, like someone was referring to Sengsbusch and Bosca earlier, depending on the cross but if a monoecious herm male was used you could have up to 96% females in the offspring. They claimed 1% true males and the rest where herm, if the right plants where selected every time you have an artificial population of females that would revert to normal ratios if left on its own.

 

[harry74]

Go for a walk and breath some fresh air...

 

[KiefSweat]

Germans are good with math that was 96% over 800 plants with thousands more grown and analyzed. This was also without chemical emasculation, things may be even skewed higher nowadays....

They've been breeding hemp for a while and the sexual orientation/determination was one of the first things studied

Bosca was also the first to make "unisexual" hemp commercially viable in the late 50s

 

[KiefSweat]

here's what bosca had to say about it

"From the research conducted by McPhee, von Sengbusch and Hoffman we know that when a monoecious hemp plant pollinates a dioecious female the offspring (F1) consists of over 90% of females, or 3-5% of monoecious plants bearing mainly female flowers and only 3-4% of true males. This small number of males however is sufficient to ensure adequate pollination of the crop. As the stand consists mainly of seed-bearing (female and dioecious) plants, with the same habit, we called it unisexual hemp. Such a stand yields 60-80% more seeds than a dioecious cultivar. The seed produced on this stand (F2) is used as sowing seed for fibre production. We called this cultivar Uniko-B. It is, in fact, a 'single cross' between Kompolti and Fibromon, but it is the F2 generation which is commercialized. Von Sengbusch and Hoffman described the phenomenon, but they did not think of its practical use... we make the cross between Kompolti and Fibromon on a surface of 5 hectares; this yields 2500 kg of F1 seed. The F1 seed is sown on a surface of 500 hectares, yielding 400,000 kg of F2 seed, which is used to sow 3,000-3,500 hectares of fibre hemp.

 

[DrFever]

An S1, or selfed first generation, comes from a female that pollinates herself, be it by natural or forced show of stamen that pollinates the pistols of the plant.
An R1, or reversed first generation, uses pollen from one female plant to pollinate a separate female plant, perhaps a sibling..but not a clone of itself which would be an S1.

When the genes of two plants meet, the chromosomes all get thrown into a proverbial bag, shaken well, and thrown out in different combination.
The resulting progeny show characteristics of both plants in various ways.
Often times when recombining two plants that are polar opposites of one another, ie...a short season indica and a long flowering sativa, the resulting progeny will often show a good high degree of hybrid vigor and health.

On the other hand, if we breed two sibling plants, or plants of the same strain, the resulting progeny are far less diverse. A continuation of generation of a cross of similar genetics can eventually run into a phenomenon of inbreeding depression. The genetic material available (or lack of) for each subsequent breeding can lead the plant to less vigor and sometimes mutations that were once latent, can now show themselves.

When we force a female to pollinate herself, she has a stand of DNA that contains her genes, which is bred to an identical strand of genes. If we think about it, we have cut the available genetic material in half when we self a female. And the result can often times lead to the inbreeding depression I mentioned.

Yes, the two genetic maps of a forced female and herself are identical, but they get shaken up in the proverbial bag I mentioned, and the result can be close to the original but not always. It will depend on how the shake out takes.
Thing is, we have shorted ourself genetic material when we create an S1 and luck must be with us if we are to hope to get seeds that will be identical to the mother and donor.
And we will still need to do a grow and selection of the progeny to find the ones that shook out similar to the moms. We simply can't trust that S1 seeds will result in the same plant. Chances are there that it can, but also that it won't.

A pollination for R1 seeds is almost identical to using a full on male for pollination. The recombination will take place exactly the same, only there will be no male chromosome to work with.

 

[DrFever]

Here's my take on that whole thing...
I have my suspicions that a very intersex trait laden plant will show male most often during preflower. The plant may well have been a female that showed male stamen and was then culled.

It may well be that when we subject a seed to an ethylene gas soak, it allows triggers to be in place from the get-go to cause the display of the female portion of the plant. In these instances, the male stamen would not be seen at preflower, but rather the female pistol.
How would one know if the plant was indeed a male, or a hermie at preflower by just seeing the first stamen? It would certainly be called a male. But was it a male, a hermaphrodite, or a female that held the intersex gene in high regard and was simply showing her male bits?

Oh sure, we may have caused a high percentage of plants to show female, but perhaps we would have culled them early on had they shown us their male bits? Now we grow these seeds out to find out they hermie on us...but that part never hits the original "70% female" stats.

A couple of facts that are often disputed but hard to argue, are; 1) the ratio of male to female is about 50% all of the time, every time. 2) A seeds has it's sex predetermined and set in stone, or more specifically in the tenth pair of chromosomes in the DNA strand, and cannot be changed by simple environmental stresses of any sort. A seed is what it is as far as sexually from the moment of meiosis.

 

[Tipz]

An S1, or selfed first generation, comes from a female that pollinates herself, be it by natural or forced show of stamen that pollinates the pistols of the plant.
An R1, or reversed first generation, uses pollen from one female plant to pollinate a separate female plant, perhaps a sibling..but not a clone of itself which would be an S1.

When the genes of two plants meet, the chromosomes all get thrown into a proverbial bag, shaken well, and thrown out in different combination.
The resulting progeny show characteristics of both plants in various ways.
Often times when recombining two plants that are polar opposites of one another, ie...a short season indica and a long flowering sativa, the resulting progeny will often show a good high degree of hybrid vigor and health.

On the other hand, if we breed two sibling plants, or plants of the same strain, the resulting progeny are far less diverse. A continuation of generation of a cross of similar genetics can eventually run into a phenomenon of inbreeding depression. The genetic material available (or lack of) for each subsequent breeding can lead the plant to less vigor and sometimes mutations that were once latent, can now show themselves.

When we force a female to pollinate herself, she has a stand of DNA that contains her genes, which is bred to an identical strand of genes. If we think about it, we have cut the available genetic material in half when we self a female. And the result can often times lead to the inbreeding depression I mentioned.

Yes, the two genetic maps of a forced female and herself are identical, but they get shaken up in the proverbial bag I mentioned, and the result can be close to the original but not always. It will depend on how the shake out takes.
Thing is, we have shorted ourself genetic material when we create an S1 and luck must be with us if we are to hope to get seeds that will be identical to the mother and donor.
And we will still need to do a grow and selection of the progeny to find the ones that shook out similar to the moms. We simply can't trust that S1 seeds will result in the same plant. Chances are there that it can, but also that it won't.

A pollination for R1 seeds is almost identical to using a full on male for pollination. The recombination will take place exactly the same, only there will be no male chromosome to work with.

Well said.

 

[TedNugget]

Oh man, I LOVE this thread! I no longer feel like I am going crazy, thinking I am the only one with this problem. I know my seeds from back in the day did not do this. I'm talking just a few of those tiny tiny male fingers growing out of a bud or 2 (very easy to miss, unless you go over the plant with a fine tooth comb). A lot of times the only way you notice is when you see the female pistils start dying back mid flower...
And just because it don't produce a viable seed don't mean it didn't mess the plant up.

So, does anyone have a good list of strains and/or breeders who produce reliable plants that are both very high quality and have no hermie issues?

 

[Tipz]

Here's my take on that whole thing...
I have my suspicions that a very intersex trait laden plant will show male most often during preflower. The plant may well have been a female that showed male stamen and was then culled.

It may well be that when we subject a seed to an ethylene gas soak, it allows triggers to be in place from the get-go to cause the display of the female portion of the plant. In these instances, the male stamen would not be seen at preflower, but rather the female pistol.
How would one know if the plant was indeed a male, or a hermie at preflower by just seeing the first stamen? It would certainly be called a male. But was it a male, a hermaphrodite, or a female that held the intersex gene in high regard and was simply showing her male bits?

Oh sure, we may have caused a high percentage of plants to show female, but perhaps we would have culled them early on had they shown us their male bits? Now we grow these seeds out to find out they hermie on us...but that part never hits the original "70% female" stats.

A couple of facts that are often disputed but hard to argue, are; 1) the ratio of male to female is about 50% all of the time, every time. 2) A seeds has it's sex predetermined and set in stone, or more specifically in the tenth pair of chromosomes in the DNA strand, and cannot be changed by simple environmental stresses of any sort. A seed is what it is as far as sexually from the moment of meiosis.

Well, Its MR. Fever now, theres not to much to disagree with here!

 

[Tipz]

Id like to take a break here..... and thank the contributors to the thread.
Everybody

 

[Infinitesimal]

ill have to read all the posts later but I wanted to tag the thread

here is a genetic herm from a landrace sativa cross using a landrace known for herms, though I selected a female that didnt herm as the mother plant to the cross... the paternal pollen donor has similar genetics back in it's ancestry so it could be the result of a reccessive regulatory gene maybe IDK

after 9 males showed sex, 7 of them began producing female flowers at the tops at around week 2.5 like this one...

 

[harry74]

Germans are good with math that was 96% over 800 plants with thousands more grown and analyzed. This was also without chemical emasculation, things may be even skewed higher nowadays....

They've been breeding hemp for a while and the sexual orientation/determination was one of the first things studied

Bosca was also the first to make "unisexual" hemp commercially viable in the late 50s

I can´t take seriously Works performed with less than 20.000-25.000 individuals.

Ask Sam...

 

[KiefSweat]

Sam avoids most of my questions.
You gotta remember these are also traits they select for when breeding hemp, its somewhat the opposite with herb to smoke.
Shit even Rob Clarke talks about selfing herms and what happens in cannabis botany, its not new.

 

[TedNugget]

We really need to get a list going of the reliable strains and breeders that do not produce any of those little male pollen sacks. I'm not talking full hermaphrodite, I'm talking about the buds that grow a few tiny little yellow male fingers.

 

[NEGT1]

We really need to get a list going of the reliable strains and breeders that do not produce any of those little male pollen sacks. I'm not talking full hermaphrodite, I'm talking about the buds that grow a few tiny little yellow male fingers.

Are you the guy who wants a stable OG that represents the original cut verbatim?

 

[stihgnobevoli]

I can´t take seriously Works performed with less than 20.000-25.000 individuals.

Ask Sam...

not quoting you for any other reason than you're the first to make this point. i just wanted to counter that popular notion that breeding programs are only valuable if you select from thousands of individuals.

maybe if you're going for looks like a purple plant with red leaves and blue pistils. but if you're breeding for a high or a flavor or even just a smell you can single that out in a small handful of plants. if you only had 2 seeds to start from you make more seeds from those 2 plants and then search for what you're looking for in the offspring which may take you growing out 25,000 plants. but you might find it in 10 seeds and the next 24,990 were just a waste of your time since they were all pretty much in line on a small scale.

i take seriously any breeding program where you can isolate what you intended to and not just a random crossing of 2 popular names

 

[stihgnobevoli]

We really need to get a list going of the reliable strains and breeders that do not produce any of those little male pollen sacks. I'm not talking full hermaphrodite, I'm talking about the buds that grow a few tiny little yellow male fingers.

good luck with that shit, hermies are as necessary as seeds. it's like trying to breed all female people. chicks need dicks, they're gonna get em somehow even if that means sperm bank. basically i highly doubt you can ever breed out hermies, i'm thinking hermies are where it started and then branched out to male and female.