2024 State of the genepool discussion.

[mudballs]

What's DLI?

"DLI stands for ‘Daily Light Integral’ and is defined as a measure of usable light your plant receives over the course of a day"
it's nerd speak for raise or lower your lights really, but outdoor it's diff, you have to time it seasonally to avg out during flowering to get fluffy boof like ICare wants.

 

[kro-magnon]

Do you think the cannabis gene pool is more diverse today than it was 100 years ago?


With all due respect, it’s ok to say “I don’t know.”


That is correct. This is one of the primary issues that many in this thread are either ignoring or glossing over as if it isn’t a big deal simply because they themselves now have access to seeds that grow plants they like. This mentality is at the root of the issue. People just focus on what they want. Fuck everyone else. Modern cannabis “breeding” encapsulates this well.

To illustrate the above point, consider the process of making F2 seeds of a given line. Let’s assume it is a proper F1 hybrid. Any selection of the F1 gen will reduce the gene pool of the F2 gen.

It is one of the primary reasons why, if preserving the line and maximum genetic material is a concern, you shouldn’t reduce the population prior to making F2s unless there is a clear and obvious reason to remove an individual.

And yet how many of us have seen someone make F2s using only 2 plants, the “keeper” female and whichever male survived or they “selected” for the task. Even using 4-6 plants is insufficient.

Is there a magic number? Not exactly. But this is one instance where less isn’t more. More is more, and we don’t have nearly as much as many of the optimists in this thread appear to assume. That is a problem, and one without any apparent solution.

The war on drugs has been effective in this regard. It has altered the cannabis gene pool forever, and not in an entirely positive manner despite however strongly one may feel about the current offerings at seed banks and shared on forums.

We are the last line of defense, and as this thread illustrates, we are fucked because of that.

I don't know how has the gene pool changed compared to 100 years ago, none of us do because we can't compare today's data to before , there is nothing to compare.
I live in a prohibitionist country and yet there is a lot of preservationists, what are people in legal countries waiting for to do it on big scale as they can do it legally now.

 

[dogzter]

Are you guys saying buy two packs and you will get a stable,consistent plant from pack to pack?
Like cherry tomato consistent or something merely similar?
I have never seen what I would consider the same from seed.

 

[led05]

Are you guys saying buy two packs and you will get a stable,consistent plant from pack to pack?
Like cherry tomato consistent or something merely similar?
I have never seen what I would consider the same from seed.

cuz it's like popping apple seeds, but that's all part of the fun.....

But the dood is correct in a sense, especially if you have very old Big Bud seeds

 

[kro-magnon]

Are you guys saying buy two packs and you will get a stable,consistent plant from pack to pack?
Like cherry tomato consistent or something merely similar?
I have never seen what I would consider the same from seed.

Most of the seeds sold by Dutch seedbanks in the 90's were quite stable and consistent with few variations between individuals, they had some huge greenhouses with thousands plants to make the breedings back then. Today it's rare to see some breeders work with high plant numbers but there is still some packs who can give some very predictable and similar result from each plant, right now I'm growing Sowahh(SDbx4) it's not as regular as tomatoes can be of course but for cannabis the differences are minimal.

 

[xtsho]

I don't know how has the gene pool changed compared to 100 years ago, none of us do because we can't compare today's data to before , there is nothing to compare.
I live in a prohibitionist country and yet there is a lot of preservationists, what are people in legal countries waiting for to do it on big scale as they can do it legally now.

There is no financial benefit. Suppose someone did invest in a large scale operation focused on preservation. How are they going to recoup their costs? While there may be a small segment of growers that would be interested in acquiring some of the genetics the majority of growers are still just going to be interested in the latest Pink Lemonade Cheesecake Sundae Haze being hyped on Instagram that flowers in 4 weeks and has 47% THC.

 

[Tynehead Tom]

lol please don’t inflate Sam’s ego any more than it already is - haha

A lot of people weighing in here on Skunk; I wonder if they even grew up in Skunk country like many of us to know the various smells coming from a skunk based on numerous factors, distance a huge one, the smell changes wildly y’all - ever been sprayed or your dogs…?

You ever hear the song video killed the radio star…?

NL & Bubblegum killed off skunk (they were the new fad & risk in growing them significantly less); those of us there & whom lived it remember it well - skunk was in everything domestic in the 80’s & into early 90’s then poof it was gone, overlap the timelines…

PS: Tom is a drunk muppet that a long time ago grew huge plants and had the balls to post them; man has he rested on them laurels for decades !!

PPS: his haze is filled with deep chunk, all of us in the know including him know that !

The truth can hurt but it remains the same

Tom Hill is an intersesting character that is for sure. I didn't do internet forums when he was really active so I can't judge. That said, it is his basic soil recipe from the archives of the old overgrow that I have been using for many years now for my greenhouse plants. That is after trying all kinds of "cannabis specific organic soil recipes"..... that basic recipe grows killer plants.
I've posted about Skunk a few times and while I did not grow it, members of my family did. I believe that the plant people call Road Kill Skunk/RKS is an internet forum myth. That said, the real skunk existed as my Uncle was one of the big cash croppers back in the 80's and 90's until they got busted with 16,000 plants in the BC Interior when I was younger. When we talked about the skunk days, his story mirrors what I have heard from other older heads (guys in thier 70's now) is that the cash croppers stopped growing Skunk because it was getting everyone busted. Carbon filters and Ozone generators were not a thing until well into the 90's for Ozone and a decade later for Carbon filters. Here in BC Canada the government and law enforcement was going exceptionally hard on growers, as were the courts. There were busts nearly every day in the Delta, Surrey, Langley, Cloverdale areas of the BC lowermainland as well as the interior in many smaller rural farmland areas like Keremeos, Kelowna, Vernon and the Okanagan.
The heat on growers is what drove them to seek cash crop strains that didn't reek in veg and only stunk up neighborhoods at harvest. My uncle and other older heads that I've talked to that grew back then told me, that BC Skunk reeked in veg and the smell stuck to everything. Flying under the radar meant growing something else...... enter Northern Lights, Hawaiian Indica, Afghani 1, Purple Afghani, , UBC Chemo, BC Big Bud, , Juicy Fruit, Champagne Blueberry ect ect ect.
The skunk wasn't bred out of skunk...... at least not here in BC Canada where "BC Skunk" was making headlines all the time when i was a kid and teenager. It was a major export product (to the USA) of the bikers at the time and they were getting busted left right and center until they wised up and started growing stuff they could get away with.
RKS is a MYTH , straight up.

 

[kro-magnon]

There is no financial benefit. Suppose someone did invest in a large scale operation focused on preservation. How are they going to recoup their costs? While there may be a small segment of growers that would be interested in acquiring some of the genetics the majority of growers are still just going to be interested in the latest Pink Lemonade Cheesecake Sundae Haze being hyped on Instagram that flowers in 4 weeks and has 47% THC.

You don't have to invest a lot of money to grow those old landraces, most of them are better grown outdoor or in a greenhouse, some growers with the same interest could buy a piece of land and grow there at minimal costs then sell the seeds to the people interested via this typeof forum; There is obviously a growing base of customers for those type of old strains or we would not see so many different brands selling them, just from memory, there is:
-The real seed comapny
-Landrace warden
-landrace collective
-ACE
-Khalifa
-Indian landrace (I don't remember the nameof the co but it's available at ACE website)
All those seeds company would not exist if there was no customers willing to buy their seeds.
I bought 1 hectare of land where you can only grow plants or raise animals(agriculture related) no build house and it's cheap, I paid 2 000€ for 1,1 hectare and as soon as it's legal to grow in my country this field will be full of different strains, able to grow in the local condotions.

 

[Old Piney]

Outdoors breeding is hard to do: you cant have several males side by side and control your breeding process.

I've found it's best to start late so you have small plants easily transplanted into pots I move the males and collect pollen to use for controlled pollinations

 

[xtsho]

You don't have to invest a lot of money to grow those old landraces, most of them are better grown outdoor or in a greenhouse, some growers with the same interest could buy a piece of land and grow there at minimal costs then sell the seeds to the people interested via this typeof forum;
I bought 1 hectare of land where you can only grow plants or raise animals(agriculture related) no build house and it's cheap, I paid 2 000€ for 1,1 hectare and as soon as it's legal to grow in my country this field will be full of different strains, able to grow in the local condotions.

You're not getting a hectare of land here in the United States anywhere with decent growing conditions for what you paid. To do what you're talking about would take a significant amount of capital. Then who's going to maintain the plants? Workers don't come cheap. It's not financially feasible. It would be a constant outflow of capital with no return on the investment.

 

[dogzter]

You're not getting a hectare of land here in the United States anywhere with decent growing conditions for what you paid. To do what you're talking about would take a significant amount of capital. Then who's going to maintain the plants? Workers don't come cheap. It's not financially feasible. It would be a constant outflow of capital with no return on the investment.

The irrigation bill alone will be staggering unless you rely on rain in which case........good luck.

 

[kro-magnon]

You're not getting a hectare of land here in the United States anywhere with decent growing conditions for what you paid. To do what you're talking about would take a significant amount of capital. Then who's going to maintain the plants? Workers don't come cheap. It's not financially feasible. It would be a constant outflow of capital with no return on the investment.

Really? I thought remote pieces of land were not so expensive in some part of the US. The requirements to grow are:
-enough sun
-access to water(by pipes or stream)
- choosing the Lat.N depending on what you plan to grow
-Not too close nosy neighbors
And the work can be done by the people regrouping on the project. How much would cost a project like this seriously?
If the goal is to make seeds for preservation the need of watering is much mower than bud production, specially with landraces coming from countries where they grow during the dry season.

 

[Old Piney]

Yes we cannot grow sativa's outdoors in northern Michigan unless they're Durban or Trainwreck. It was full on body buzz couch lock with just enough great euphoria. My father and I still talk about the weed. I tell him that he just got lucky and never realized at the time how lucky we were to run into those genetics. It was definitely cool having a hippy dad growing up. He got me into growing in around 88'. With that Afghani and the Friesland..so ya my cannabis standards are pretty high these days lol.

That's cool having you'd dad get you started .you still got his Afghani and Friesland going? BTW there are some pure sativas that will definitely mature for you.

 

[dogzter]

Really? I thought remote pieces of land were not so expensive in some part of the US. The requirements to grow are:
-enough sun
-access to water(by pipes or stream)
- choosing the Lat.N depending on what you plan to grow
-Not too close nosy neighbors
And the work can be done by the people regrouping on the project. How much would cost a project like this seriously?
If the goal is to make seeds for preservation the need of watering is much mower than bud production, specially with landraces coming from countries where they grow during the dry season.

Laws regards natural waterways are very restrictive here you divert any natural source and you will get the full force of government authority.
Not gonna happen like that.
So you are either on a irrigation system be it canals or well electric or gravity or reliant upon rain.
If the area supports with rain alone lands gonna be very expensive or vertical.

 

[Hammerhead]

There is no Deep Chunk in THH. THH is positronic haze#19 AKA O haze.

 

[CharlesU Farley]

I for one have never had access to genetics like I do today... I have almost unlimited genetics from inbred lines to landraces to true wild genetics.... I've read and skimmed this post and comments quite a bit and I disagree with 99% of whats said, some may become angry at me for saying this, but I feel like most of the information given has just been parroted from others who are also on the outside of the growers circles due to unlikable personalities.

Here in the US, since the hemp laws were passed, ordering quality seeds has been easy as it could be. The fear and paranoia of being arrested simply for ordering seeds is now a distant memory, thank God. Most of y'all have no earthly idea the hoops us old dinosaurs had to jump through to get quality cannabis seeds in the '90s:

Microorganisms for soil - recommend me a good product

Case closed. Bought a 100g pack for 7 euros, which is a good deal compared to the stuff in grow shops. It contains unspecified Mycos and Rhizobacteria. If Mycos don't work after all, rhizobacteria seem to be a useful addition to the soil. The girl selling it said she heard back from both olive...

www.icmag.com

Gene pool altruism aside, you are entirely correct, people have easier access to high quality cannabis seeds now than they ever have.

 

[kro-magnon]

Laws regards natural waterways are very restrictive here you divert any natural source and you will get the full force of government authority.
Not gonna happen like that.
So you are either on a irrigation system be it canals or well electric or gravity or reliant upon rain.
If the area supports with rain alone lands gonna be very expensive or vertical.

So you expect other do the job you don't want to make yourself? You can't complain the gene pool is degrading and wait for other to do something about it;
As I said in my first post here seeds offerings and quality have never been so diverse and easily accessible to growers but some like you still complain and won't do the minimum to preserve the genes they fear losing. You can't rely on the market and complain it doesn't give you what you want if you're not ready to do it yourself.

 

[xtsho]

Laws regards natural waterways are very restrictive here you divert any natural source and you will get the full force of government authority.
Not gonna happen like that.
So you are either on a irrigation system be it canals or well electric or gravity or reliant upon rain.
If the area supports with rain alone lands gonna be very expensive or vertical.

Natural streams or rivers are almost impossible to get access to for irrigation regardless if they run through your property. There is no guarantee that you'd even be allowed to drill a well on your land and if you were then there's those costs. Once you go over a certain amount of plants you'll need to have a commercial license. That costs money. It would be a drip drip drip of cash with no return. Sure you might be able to sell a few seeds but that income would be negligible and would not come anywhere close to covering costs.

If I could find a hectare "2.5 acres" of good land for 2000 euros or $2200 US I'd have done it already.

 

[RobFromTX]

Tom Hill is an intersesting character that is for sure

Thats putting it very lightly. I always wondered what gave him such a big following. The dude would just hop on the forums and insult everybody

 

[xtsho]

So you expect other do the job you don't want to make yourself? You can't complain the gene pool is degrading and wait for other to do something about it;
As I said in my first post here seeds offerings and quality have never been so diverse and easily accessible to growers but some like you still complain and won't do the minimum to preserve the genes they fear losing. You can't rely on the market and complain it doesn't give you what you want if you're not ready to do it yourself.

Lots of us are doing it on a small scale for ourselves that doesn't require a continuous outflow of large amounts of cash. Some of us share different genetics with each other as well.

The thing is that most people don't care about preserving anything especially here in the USA. The people growing heirloom strains are a very small percentage of growers. Probably less than 1%. The rest are just chasing the next strain with a cool sounding name, high THC, short flowering times, bag appeal, high yield, etc... And commercial operations already growing for the medical and recreational market are operating on slim margins and are not going to do it as they have to grow what is profitable or they go out of business. They don't have resources to do any large scale preservation.

It's a noble goal and one that could be achieved but it would require someone with deep pockets to fund it indefinitely.