Thai ganja strains - one explanation for the hermaphrodites

[guest123]

we had lots of trouble afew years back where i hail from with hermi plants ,, they were everywhere it seemed ...
to the point i was clicking my heels when i grew some plants and got a few males ,, i figured males meant i would be dealing with a t ypical male , female strain ... and yes i did get some pure females , but also hermies ,, they were ok for an early harvest ..
i have heard pollen can travel quite distances too , but in areas of high humidity and jungle , i think it would have trouble going too far ...
ideally i would like to grow a large population of thai seed to see what the frequency of hermies was , ahh well looks like another trip to thailand is in order . hehehehehe
also as far as collecting seeds from your ounces of weed ,, not that reliable , u can only have an idea of the mother plant , who or what was the father ...
ive gotten hermies from weed in bags with lots of seeds , and again with few seeds per bag ...
i try to avoid taking any seeds from buds that have large clusters of seed , unless i know what the mum and dad were ...

 

[Chaman]

I was think'n that seed seldom found in thai sticks...jejee man that would be so nice too see in person, but is that seed a mature well made seed deep in the cluster or a medium size seed mid flower, or a young seed on the outside of a cluster ?

Reason I say this is, deep in the flower it could have been from when they had left the last of the chosen males to polenate the nearby females for next season....the flower you had might have been from a plant distant to that male, then the male was killed.

Mid way, or outer flower would be from a late flower'n hermi.

Thats my opion, as too other wise how would these farmers make seeds for next cropp, sure they wouldn't use those seeds found from a late hermie i'd imagine at least.

My 2cents. from early conversation in thread, still make'n my way through it, great reads so far, thanks Raco !

Chaman

Hey everyone jeje finished read'n up now was think'n...My first pure destroyers hermied realy late, as i didn' t want to cut them cuase they just kept on putting out fresh pistels all the time and looked great aside from a little mold here and there from such a dense flower during my rain season. These 25cm plants each gave me an oz of awesome bud, the seeds grown out later where during my dry season from these and wow what a difference, as these made it too about 3 feet something and looked very sativa as too there squat dence mothers, these where your tipical satica very Thai dom, but remember Destoryer is a 3 way cross, so colors and smells and taste of her delecious Colombian stand out too. Exclent plant that i truely love, but not ment for this conversation.

The Thai p2 x China is doing excelent due to maintianing in contianers and root bounding, plus water deprivation shes kept a about 4 foot tall size and is getting very nice flower clusters now, slowing down on her growth...then agian this was a cross to a China Indica

My Dalat x China is doing excelent a little shorter to my surprise ! jeje but agian a cross.

My Mulumbimby Madness first time around from Loaders seeds, was an extrem Thai plant and did excelent also in contianer and water deprived made it under 6 feet tall, and decent flower period, but was told by 20' that it didn't seem too be Mulumbimby to him... But I trust Loader, and also know that when these where made a great deal of Thai genetics where the main influence.

The Dalats jeje Monsters indeed...all but one hermied on me....this one was the ugliest slowest runt you done ever see, but what a delicuos female she was !

Crosses i've made with the Dalats like Dalat x Bangladesh X Colombian R&G have all come out realy nice indeed ! with no herm problems as of yet...and polen was from the hermi Dalat in any Dalat cross i've made.

I now have a Thai meao X Haze and a Colombian R&G x Haze, these from jan15th till today have done nothing but grow monsterously ! jeje I cut back with my machete today...No joke. I ve had to do this with Dalats, and my 3way DxBxC cross too. Seems anything with Thai over grows ! They show sex early, about a month maybe a month and a half at under 3 feet, but around 6 feet and looking sad in good flower, decided to put them in soil...about early july or late june...man was that a bad Idea jeje mush like the dalats they just infested my greenhouse in everdirection in the sweetest smelling stick branches in the first signes of flower....sad as I cut down more then half the plant volume what a harvest it could have been ! No signs of hermie yet, and give'n thanks and priase !

My Colombians have only shown hermie when light contamination at night, and estreme light crazyness....friends who would pull a plant out today...forget tomorrow and so forth, he was growing at home and needed to hide his plants often, and didn't give them correct light times so plants whent crazy. But no problem with root bounding or water stress. A friend in spain transplanted a male in good flower from a getting bad cold season to a grow room in a small contianer...prob light diff and new soil promoted a good condition and warth that he put our female pistels eventualy. Onlt cases i've seen my Colombians hermie so far taht I'm aware of.

Only plants i've had truely hermie problems are from comercial Jamican called Alaskan, and The South east Asia or Thai type strians that are from some reading in hashish posible all inter crossed from the trade'n days as many triats found in my Dalats down in Vietnam are the same a those in high hills of Thailand and Laos and many other places as I read reports and see pics from growers.

I live under thier home conditions as im under the 10*N and have no cold season, just wet and dry under 12/12 as they are too, with that red volcanic rish soil and rainforest jungles just on the other side of the farms up the mountians where I live. Before I put up my gate, I had cows and chickens in my yard all the time !

So i'm in great conditions, and have worked with many great Sativas and prety much thats what I grow day in day out verious times a yr jeje hybirds due great but sativas feel at home and due great normaly, it's the indicas that suffer, they should for your and thier sake only be done coming into dry season. These don't seem to hermie...just the pure sativas, and these Jamican hybird plants prob cuase they are grown in "I don't care just give me money conditions" Been told by a few herbs man from down under that thier early seeds shared with me could show hermies, but this in consideration just goes back to the same, south east asian genetics and thais wher what they first worked with, and from the home lands, not seed banks.

Great thead indeed.
Chaman

 

[Chamba]

you could spend 4 or 5 years trying to develop a hermaphodite free Thai strain (as many have done before you and failed.....including many experienced breeders who had access to high selection numbers and original pre-80's Thai seed)..but if you were working with real (pure) Thais, (not some seedbank pseudo Thai or Thai/Dutch hybrid sold as "Original" or whatever? ..or seed from bags of post 80's Thai commercial) then I almost certainly guarantee you would end up having hermies popping their ugly heads up somewhere down the line regardless of whether you selected only true females..

..as I said before, from my experience, the best highs I grew were from Thais described below by Ed Rosenthal in the late 70's (iow Thais that were hermy prone, with asymmetrical growth ..these were more like a bush or Willow tree with lots of thin flexible branches and took longer than others) the ones that didnt herm that I grew usually had a less cerebral buzz and had more of a druggy stone than a high...these were mostly taller, slimmer and more like Xmas tree in shape with stronger, less flexible branches

.....but if do attempt it then I wish you all the best!

..but.. I'd suggest that if you want to breed with 100% pure unadulterated Thais (that's if you have access to 60's or 70's Thai seed..not some bag seed from today's less than outstanding "Thai"...or perhaps search out old Thai ganja farmers in the Nth East of Thailand would be one way to get close to the old Thai genes?) you would ideally need to do this outdoors in a tropical or sub tropical locale so they will mature ...and then do what others in the past have not done and concentrate purely and solely on selecting and breeding specimens with the best high regardless of whether they hermie or not and also with the ones that have very long flowering durations as well as those that linger on and never seemed to mature - this is what I would do differently if I wanted to go down that road again.........'cos by selecting for "non-hermy" early finishers you will most likely only end up giving something unsatisfactory after years of hard work (and they would still have the tendancy to herm!).....select solely for excellence of the high and disregard all other traits and you should, with luck and the right foundations, develop an excellent line for a small % of growers who love the trippy, strong, complex, long lasting highs that only long flowering sativas will give...not commercially viable, but definitely a worthwhile goal.

Katoey-ism ...lol..you read it first on OG...I wrote it and lots more about Thais under another non de guerre......another poster on OG was "20ftThai" ...he was the most experienced, knowledgable and observant sativa landrace grower on OG that I read...he was the first to fully describe the various stages of flower development of long flowering landrace sativas in complete detail ...but his writing style was bit scattered and long winded......but there were gems among his Aussie-speak

I would also like to hear from one of the pioneers of cannabis breeding - Sam the Skunkman on this subject of Thais ....as I'm sure he grew them in the 60's and 70's in Cali when developing Haze and other hybrids..his comments would be very valuable!..but he was a bit of a grumpy old bastard on OG and I didnt particularly care for his attitude when he would mentioned he invented the method for the world's best dry sifted hash and then wouldn't share it! ...some would say he was an arrogant wanker...but I guess he had his reasons

here's what Ed Rosenthal wrote about Thais in the late 70's in the "Marijuana Growers Handbook"..see chart 2-1

"the Varieties at a Glance"

Variety - Thai
Maturity - Dec~Jan and continuing
Outdoor size - 5~9ft H, 4~8ft W
Branching pattern - asymmetrical, long branches seek open spaces
Bug type - dense, under high light, runs otherwise
Aroma - medium, dry-sweet, spicy
High - strong, druggy, has energy
Buds, density of buds indoors - fluffy, mature sequentially over months
Color (flowers) - medium green
Comments - Many hermaphodites make growing hard. Buds ripen but plant sends out new flowers

(All of the descriptions are tentative guidelines. They are affected by cultivation technique, microenvironmental conditions, variations in climate, nutrients available, latitude and other factors. Often, several districtive varieties can be found in the same areas. The most common varieties are described.)

Ed describes 10 varieties in this chart....no hybrid strains, just landraces (Colombian, Nigerian, Jamaican etc)..it makes interesting reading to see what strains were like prior to greed and widespread genetic pollution from faster finishers introduced by the ton+ weight export dealers back then..they don't write grow books like that anymore! good one Ed!.

.if introduced genes weren't the main the cause of the decline of Thai ganja then perhaps commercial production and poor or no selection helped weaken the strain?..the last time I smoked Thai in Thailand 4 or 5 years ago I could of sworn I was smoking a Thai/Haze mix..I wouldn't be surprised if haze hybrids were introduced into Thai/Cambodian commercial production in the past ten years in an attempt to produce a decent smoke.....but that's just me guessing, it's not based on solid facts.....but having said that I'm sure somewhere there in the far away rice growing areas are old Thai farmers who still have the same or similar genes from 30 or 40 years ago and still grow a stand or two of ganja for medicinal/relaxation use.

chock dee kup! (good luck!)

 

[dubi]

Good day!

Chaman, the Thai Pattaya came from commercial weed bought in Pattaya. Pattaya is not a production zone so the seeds could came from any zone but she is a true tropical thai for sure. I grew Gypsy's Pattayas and they were very hermie and were pulled early. The other Pattayas (and mother of your cross) came from a friend that travelled there.

This thai Pattaya females i grew didnt had hermie tendencies. I grew them 3-4 years ago indoors with low light and intense hot during the summer so conditions were not very good but they resisted and i could harvest them after more than 4 mounths of flowering. The result was quite mediocre, but i believe it was the short vegetative period and the bad flowering conditions.
I crossed her with chinese Yunnan indica to learn dominances in both strains but i was not totally happy with the F1. Maybe they show their full potential there in your tropical climate.

Dalat would be the typical SE asian hermie line. It grows tall, lanky and asymmetrical with the classic yellow/green SE asian appearance. The flowering time is around 5 mounths and the finished product is very similar to thais. The line has strong hermie tendencies being most of the plants hermie females and with less frequency pure females, hermie males and pure males.
The quality and personality are very similar in all the plants but some are hermie and other not.

Chaman, we are growing Loader's Bangladesh this year and they are showing an extreme SE asian profile. They are growing very columnar with almost no branching in their young stage. The leaves are thinner and yellowish than most thais and nams. Most of the plants showed some purpling in the stems. We have females and males so we expect reproduce her this season.

 

[dubi]

Namkha, yes i work for ACE Seeds.

The best non hermie thai i've tried is the meao thai from CBG. It's grows tall and columnar with the typical thai appearance. It also has the classic acrid,lemony and spicy thai aroma and taste, but the resin production, flower/leaf ratio, potency and quality are far superior to others thai i've tried.

Another great non hermie thai is the koh chang thai clone i've been growing the past 3-4 years. It came from the same friend which travelled to Thailand, but this seeds came from Koh Chang Island ( a island with small but high quality ganja production ) and it was clearly the best thai he tried. He came with a few seeds and passed me a clone of this female.

She grows with a bushy structure.The leaf trait, branching, aromas,flowering time, flower structure ... are totally thai. It has a lovely citric and spicy taste with a dense long lasting sensorial high.

I've been growing her the past years and i have never seen any hermie trait (male flower or bannana) in her even when growing under very strong stress like very cold temps, changes in photoperiod etc ...

Here are some pics of the Koh Chang Thai clone grown the past season.

Some pics in September. Notice she's still growing!

 

[dubi]

Some pics in October. She's starting to flower seriously!

 

[dubi]

And here's the Koh Chang Thai close to harvest in early January.

She suffered very cold temps and strong storms during the late flowering but she resisted very nice.

 

[dubi]

hiya Raco,

"Meao Thai" would I think describe a plant originating with seeds obtained from Hmong tribes, one way or another. I am 99% sure that "Meao" is another name given to the Hmong tribes, If memory serves, the Hmong do not call themselves Meao, rather it is name sometimes used by outsiders to describe them. Feel free to check, I am rather too lazy to bother right now.

What I mean for this point to imply is simply that I imagine the Hmong grow quite a wide array of different types of ganja, most frequently, or at least most visibly, I would guess they grow hemp for clothes etc.

I would also bet reasonable money that, for instance, if you were to travel to some of the areas of Southern China where Hmong can also be found, such as Yunnan, you could find them growing plants that a botanist would describe as indica

Yes Namkha, The Chinese Yunnan indica has similarities with the thais. The aroma and taste is acrid and spicy but the taste is denser in terpenes like a good indica should be. The high is also very cerebral, sensorial and long lasting but the growing strucuture, bud density, resin production and flowering time are on the indica side.

 

[guest123]

great looking sativa there dubi very reminiscent of many we grow in oz , i think there has been quite a lot of influence from thailand in the aussie sativa ...

 

[Guest]

..but.. I'd suggest that if you want to breed with 100% pure unadulterated Thais (that's if you have access to 60's or 70's Thai seed..not some bag seed from today's less than outstanding "Thai"...or perhaps search out old Thai ganja farmers in the Nth East of Thailand would be one way to get close to the old Thai genes?)

heya Chamba - honest man I can vouch for the quality of the Thai around Chiang Mai in the doi
I've smoked sativas in the jungles of Guyana and in Jamaica, in the former case with the craziest Rasta wildmen I have ever met, charas with Sadhus in the Himalaya etc. etc.
only as far back as '94 mind (lol), but I know good smoke when I see it, or rather, experience it
the few seeds I would find in the Thai ganja were fully mature, or very close
[edit: they were large] and they would pop fast too

you seem insistent on Isaan though - generally speaking that is held to be a poor region to grow anything - very infertile soils
I am aware it does have a dope tradition though, but not as renowned as the tribal regions around Chiang Mai, from what I hear, and from talking to guys who worked there
I don't know Isaan itself well though, just passed through on the way to and from Laos, so needless to say, I claim no priveleged knowledge on that one

...and then do what others in the past have not done and concentrate purely and solely on selecting and breeding specimens with the best high regardless of whether they hermie or not and also with the ones that have very long flowering durations as well as those that linger on and never seemed to mature - this is what I would do differently if I wanted to go down that road again.........'cos by selecting for "non-hermy" early finishers you will most likely only end up giving something unsatisfactory after years of hard work (and they would still have the tendancy to herm!).....select solely for excellence of the high and disregard all other traits and you should, with luck and the right foundations, develop an excellent line for a small % of growers who love the trippy, strong, complex, long lasting highs that only long flowering sativas will give...not commercially viable, but definitely a worthwhile goal.

spot on!!!

Katoey-ism ...
Rico - just to explain if you're not clear - Katoey = ladyboy


Hey dubi, lovely plants -
I've never visited Koh Chang, but I would be curious to visit - the island is very close to Cambodia, so I wonder how much influence there has been from recent Cambodian strains, if at all

Generally can I reiterate my suspicion about any talk of the "degeneration" of landrace sativas... I don't believe this to be nearly as much of a problem as some would claim, and I believe my scepticism is well-founded after years in many of the countries in question

yes, there is more bad weed about, but the real deal is still easily availabe, or it has been IME in India, Jamaica, South America, Thailand and to a morre questionable extent (from the point of view of authenticity, not quality) in Laos, IME

I think my point about how the gnag-commercial and small-time grower economies are totally seperate is crucial in understanding this!

the Thai I smoked was psychedelic in the extreme, not remotely druggy, with a wholly authentic smell - intense, sometimes almost overly so, but eminently pleasurable nevertheless

furhtermore, is their any hard evidence for seedsters trying to make a fast buck selling seeds to commercial grows in sativa landrace countries?
I just don't see it happening in Thailand
I am 99.9% persuaded the Thais would make the seeds themselves
why pay inflated prices if you are Thai?
or from the Dutch perspective why sell down and in bulk, when you can sell at such inflated prices to small time growers?

Namkha

p.s. Pattaya eh? lol! not top of the list of places to look for weed so much as sleaze... incidentally it is a lot closer to Cambodia than it is to the traditional gorwing regions of Thailand... that said the Klong Toi slums in BKK are all of an hour away, and that is where all the yabba and commercial shite pours in... I would sooner spend a few days in Klong Toi than Pattaya... don't forget to have your jabs and pack your machete though

 

[Chamba]

Nam - of course Thai caren't paying for Dutch seed.......I was talking about the 70's when the 10 ton per shipment guys moved in when the world's market for bud increased dramatically.........

and apparently it's common knowledge that a large majority of commercial "Thai" ganja is grown in Cambodia and has been since the 80's..or so I've been told by those in the biz back then and others since...but I'm sure there are many pockets of production in Thailand producing better quality product....I heard from first hand accounts of lots ganja grown in Isaan for personal consumption...I've also seen Thai/Haze from Thailand/ grown up north for sale in Dutch coffee shops so there's def haze up mixed in in some areas.

and Dubi it's good to see some of the original looking Thai sativas still around...have you seen or grown any that grow the same as the one in the photos but produce hard golf ball nugs and lose all leaves at harvest? .....and it's a pity there's not enough sun at harvest time when they really need it!

 

[Guest]

heya Chamba,

you so you see there are some major gaps in my hostory, knowledge and experience here
I wasn't even born for the best part of that decade, but I started being a nomad young mind

I think the Cambodian would impact on BKK and the South coast - Pattaya being a good example (these are big brush strokes I am using here of course)
my point being merely that to smuggle weed from Cambodia up to the (Lanna) North would be a nonsense, I reckon, from a logistical perspective not least

I was once told that the weed on the Gulf islands often comes from Chumpon, or is grown in small amounts there on the islands - another guy told me me that some comes all the way from the North too

blah blah

Namkha

 

[Chamba]

I would sooner spend a few days in Klong Toi than Pattaya... don't forget to have your jabs and pack your machete though

I'd want more than a machete and flu shots to walk around that Klong Toey at night!

give me Patt-tay-yah anyday or night..though now, as I'm older, it's not my scene.

I've had some great times in Pattaya...stoned as, bar hopping, young and silly....laugh a second!

I caught a cab one time from Bangkok's Don Muang airport direct to Pattaya...it was my first time to Pattaya....half way down we passed a cool looking Thai guy with long hair riding a chopper with a tear drop tank, ape hanger bars and forks way out there..paint job.. the works (which was rare as back then) .I wound down the window and gave him a smile and thumbs up and made signals if it was ok to take his photo..he smiled and yelled out with a fist in the air and big smile on his face " Pat-tay-ya!" as I took a photo ....it was the best pic I ever took...... it was a fun place in the 80's, more carefree than now, less dangerous, freer....years later the same guy ran a "biker" themed bar in Phuket and a friend of mine gave him the pic to hang in his bar .....later the bar burnt down and all was lost...over the years I lost the neg ...ahhhhh well, never mind ..mai-pen-rai krrrrrrrrrrrup

 

[glock23]

From the sure volume of Dutch people going in and out of Thailand, I'm sure some Dutch genetics have made their way in. Doesn't Sensi have a resort out there? I heard you can buy weed there like it's a coffeeshop...

 

[Guest]

Chamba - lol

(the jab thing is just a running joke round these parts of the UK about going into shit bits of town)

Hey Glock - yeh I think it might be on Koh Tao, though I've never been .. certainly I heard something along those lines

edit: Koh Tao is just a small place, but it is very popular, and the busy beaches are pretyy dreadful IMHO
I'm very fond of a family place called Cookies, in it's own bay and only accessible by foot or boat - 400 baht (6 quid) a night for a large tatty old place right by the water, with large covered outdoor area etc.

 

[dubi]

great looking sativa there dubi very reminiscent of many we grow in oz , i think there has been quite a lot of influence from thailand in the aussie sativa ...

Great to see you wally!

The results with the koh chang thai were not bad for being grown at 37 ºN
We are lucky to have a warm and humid mediteranean climate.

SE asian sativas are the most probable origin for aussie sativas and other sativas from your part of the world. Although i've heard aussie sativas recived influence from other parts too.

Out of of topic, the ducksfoot x webbed indica is showing beautiful pinkish pistils!

 

[guest123]

ahh , pretty pink pistils .. just like these ??


also an african sativa just for fun ....

 

[Chamba]

lol ...Wal..that African looks like the type of strain where the grower tops it during veg and later it regrets...I've been there

 

[dubi]

you could spend 4 or 5 years trying to develop a hermaphodite free Thai strain (as many have done before you and failed.....including many experienced breeders who had access to high selection numbers and original pre-80's Thai seed)..but if you were working with real (pure) Thais, (not some seedbank pseudo Thai or Thai/Dutch hybrid sold as "Original" or whatever? ..or seed from bags of post 80's Thai commercial) then I almost certainly guarantee you would end up having hermies popping their ugly heads up somewhere down the line regardless of whether you selected only true females..

Well, there's a high probability to find hermie plants in a SE asian sativa population but it's not impossible to breed against hermaphroditism and get positive results.

All the hybrids available today came from selections did one day from landrace plants, which populations are many times highly hermie. It’s obvious that breeders and growers have had success in the past breeding against hermie plants ( thai or not thai) or it’d be very difficult to finish a ‘sinsemilla’ grow from seed nowadays.

The long cycles of the tropical sativas (you need almost a year to breed only one generation) and the need of a tropical climate ( or a very warm climate) to make proper selections, makes more difficult to get postive results.

A good example of an old thai dominant non hermie bred would be haze. We have tested 30-40 old haze parents past season and we have not found any hermie trait growing them in very different ambients. It's a perfect example of good selections when breeding with SE asian sativas.

The main ‘variables’ to achieve any breeding goal are the genetics involved, the ambient, the skills, experience and intuition of the breeder and the good or bad luck in the process.

 

[Guest]

hmmmm yeh, I am still mulling

it's a shame I cut my hair...
... I could have mulled with a mullet

oh to have kept some of those seeds

has anyone factored the fondness many Thais have for doing as little as possible into this lol?

would that weigh for or against hermies do you think? lol

damn, I shock myself with my own appaling prejudice
dreadful muh dear rully druhdful

Namkha