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Thoughts on femed seeds...

Robert Planting

New member
Just wondering why so many people hate on femed seeds? Looks to me that they could be quite usefull. Here's my reasoning: Let's say (for what ever reason) you don't like to mess with clones. You buy a pack of regular seeds and you have a 50/50 chance of getting (desired) females. Ok, you then have to wait for the plants to show sex, during which time you are spending your time, ferts, space etc., growing what MIGHT be totaly useless male plants that you then have to destroy. And if your room is designed to hold let's say 6 females through flower and you only end up with 3 fem's out of a pack of 10 then your grow room is running ineffeciently. Now, I realize that folks say there's always a chance of hermies popping up and I'm not disputing that that might be the case, but wouldn't it be worth the minor inconvience of having to pick a few seeds out of your stash to compensate for the decreased overall yeild you would have if you could only have 3 true females in your garden from regular seed? I personaly would prefer to have to discard a few seeds out of a large quantity of fine bud than to end up with just a few ounces of grass with no seeds. As a secondary note I do tend to stick with regular seeds just because I feel there are better, more potent strains being produced in regular (M/F) form. But I have to say if someone would come out with something like femed AK47 or a femed Sour strain or something REALLY potent I would make the switch-over in a heartbeat. Just my .02 but I'd like to get others opinions on this as well... Thanks
 
G

Guest

I will never use femmed seed. i have enough problems with hermie plants using regular seeds that i don't need to torture myself anymore.

and males arent always useless.....

i would rather just go through the hassle of getting the 3 fems, clone them all, and keep the best one as a mother...

it's not like you wont have a chance to grow again..... 1 inefficiant crop is not the end of the world.

THC
 

Sinfuldreams

Basement Garden Gnome
Veteran
Thats up to each grower, I was thinking about Femd seed when I 1st started.
While Hermies may not be a big deal to a smaller grower like us, it IS a BIG Deal to a large grower, who can't be looking for hermies everyday.

As I understand Soma has stopped producing his seed in fem form. Not sure of His Reasoning, perhaps too many complaints about hermies? I don't know.
While it is certinly true about time and money wasted on Vegging out Males, you get the same effect when in the last 2 weeks of flower and you see nanners on just 1 plant, that Seeded the enitre room!

Then you get knuckle heads like me who might try to back Cross these beans and produce Hermie seed by the Bag full.

There ARE reasons for try to get a Particular Plant to Hermie, perhaps no more seed is avaiable for Crossing, or it has some special property you want to breed into seed,you need to hermie that plant, to get seed.

So while Femmed seed may not be such a bad thing for smaller growers or those who want to TRY and cut down Wasted space, they are not the best thing to be growing in a larger scale. There for Clones.

Many a grower here have tried Femmed seed and Sworn off them!
But each thier own.
Good Luck!
Sin :)
 

mybeans420

resident slackass
Veteran
well, i just did my first grow of femmed seeds.
14 fem master kush from dutch passion.
8 turned hermie by week 4.
i ended up chopping them all because i didnt want to deal with the hassle.
as i was chopping the buds to try and salvage what i could by making bubble hash i noted HUNDREDS of immature seeds. IMHO this is a little more than a minor inconvenience.
fortunately i flowered them in a seperate room from my standard seed plants and pollen contamination only produced about 2 dozen seeds. but they WERE effected.
for this reason i wont try any femmed or selfed or whatever you want to refer to them as seeds again.
 

Okie grown

Active member
Veteran
Well i have 4 strawberry cough fem. ladys 7 weeks into flower and have not shown them selves to be nothing but 100% ladys in every way.This is my first run with fems. so i can only say dp strawberry cough are great!! Thay smell sooo good .Heres a few pics.Thay are streachy and not gonna be the best yeialders but most connis. strains are not big yeialders
 

Robert Planting

New member
Thanks for the replies guys, this is a subject I've been struggling with for some time now. But I didn't know that the hermi problem could be on a scale that bad. I can def. understand why people would give up on them for completely ruining a whole crop. I was under the assumption that there might be a FEW male flowers on the plants at worst. But now I understand. Thanks for clearing that up. Peace...
 

King

Member
Regular Feminised seeds = I'll pass
Selfed Feminised seeds = I've got some in veg right now, and have faith

I have heard of one person having hermie problems with 3C's S1 Cali-O. There's 3 seedmakers I know of that make selfed seeds. Hermies look to be about the same as regular m/f seed ratios so far. It very well could have been the grower. We'll see as more results surface.

I'll post my grow results up, and I saw one other person growing out a few of ORGNKID's selfed seeds. A few mod's are growing the selfed blackberry so there will be more results. I'm not worried at all. Selfed plants aren't stressed into producing pollen, like regular feminised seeds are. They are fully sexually reversed with a chemical and become a male.
 
G

Guest

Rez on femmedFuckingSeeds:
I don't like ANY of them,(though they have use within a breeding program,but that's not what we're talking about-we're talking about home-growers.)and until I'm happy w results that I (personally) see,I won't consider offering them,no matter how 'in demand' or profitable (who cares) they may be.
If I was to release Sour Diesel S1 and it didn't produce the phenotype that I wanted it to at least 80% of the time,then Imo it'd be a waste of mine,and everyone that grew the seeds out's,time, space and energy....
I know to be fact that my current Sour Diesel produces two phenotypes,one's like DSD,a sat-dom w a limey-fuel taste/smell,and a Sour Diesel pheno,that is almost identical to the Sour Diesel Clone mom.
Why,if I have it down to two phenos m/f would anybody want to bother with unstabl-ish femmd seeds that won't be as naturally perfect as the regular seeds,naturally created by SELECTION,not chemicals.
Those who fuck with mother nature don't laugh last very often,and I've run enough femmd seeds to know that they essentially suck ass.
I'm running DP's Straw Cough right now,for fun,and I'll letcha' know what I think when it's all said and done.
I'm not expecting anything great,so I'm quite sure I won't be disappointed.
I also own most of Orgnkid's seeds,and will do some of his S1s in 2005,unless I hear bad things beforehand.
Anyhow,cutting corners will get you kickedin the ass by Ma Nature ninety times plus out of a hundred.
Why bother?



Cheers!
 

mybeans420

resident slackass
Veteran
my thoughts exactly rez,
i only ordered the masterkush because they were for someone else, but then they gave me 15 of the 70 ordered. i hate to think of what their results will be. i tried to talk them out of ordering them but to no avail.
my thoughts on femmed seeds, selfed or not are...
garbage, pure garbage
 
G

Guest

I grew some Master Widow,from Jeast,that were femmd,I don't know by which process.
One of those was aan outstanding,narcotic,p.m. indica,a good plant.
I grew some DP femmd stuff,all shite.
I grew some from Soma,and didn't like them,at all.
I'm running the DP SC because I was told about Henck's obsession w getting this one to turn out righteous.If it's like the other DP seeds I've run,it'll be compost and won't see round#2,hopefully,I'll find em tolerable,but I wouldn't bet on it to turn out more than passable.We'll see.
Allegorical statement du jour: Mother Nature won't take it from behind without giving YOU a kiss with a shovel while YOUR back is turned....
 

King

Member
Damn Rez. I wasn't attacking you. I apologize if you took it that way. I just ordered up 3 of your strains. I think highly of you and your projects.

But since you bring your genetics up.......... (The following is my opinion)I would 100% much rather grow a selfed SD. Being a grower, I want ONE pheno. The SD one, I'd buy DSD if I wanted DSD. And I'd much rather choose from 10 than 5, so I have no problem with feminised beans being a grower.

I know selfing isn't the big answer to breeding and wasn't trying to imply that.
 

Robert Planting

New member
Thanks for your input Rez... I think your strains rock! I didn't mean to offend you by calling on you to answer my post, I just really respect your opinion. The decision to buy femmed beans is something I've been tossing around for a while now and I just wanted to get some input from someone as skilled as yourself before I jumped into something that I would be let down by. So anyway, I'll stick with the regular seeds. As a matter of fact I think your Firecracker will be next for me. Thanks to everyone who replied as well, I really appreciate the insight. Peace.
 

CalcioErba2004

CalErba
Veteran
I was reading some Rosenthal and he said and I quote:

"Plants turn Hermaphroditic in two ways. Some plants are programmed genetically as hermaphrodites. These plants will produce male flowers on female plants no matter what environmental situations they face. Other plants are induced to grow male flowers under stress conditions. Some plants mey be gentically predisoposed to hermaphrodite under stress, but all plants may exhibit male flowers as a sign of stress created by growing conditions. This hermaphroditism is not genetic and does not affect the plant's progeny. Sometimes plants that aren't hermaphroditic outdoors will grow male flowers when grown indoors as a stress response. Stresses can include liging regimen irregularities, low light conditions or response to hormones.
If a genetic hermaphrodite is crossed to a non-hermaphroditic female, about half of the resulting plants will be hermaphroditic. If the hermaphroditism was caused by environmental factors, then none, some or all of the progeny will exhibit male flowers depending on whether the plants have inherited a tendenct towards hermaphroditism under stress conditions and whether the plants face those conditions."

Cannabis Culture Issue 51 Ask Ed

This is what I used as my basis for buying fem seeds. I bought through SD and got Dutch Passion Gentics because they have been doing it for a good bit. Think of it this way, the more expensive it is from a reputable company the better the outcome of female seeds. It takes a lot of work to find a female with hardly any hermaphroditism in its line and mate it to another female and get quality seeds with at least a 75% all female rate.

EDIT:75% is my rough estimate. I have no idea what the actual numbers are. This is my personal goal when I get feminized seeds.
 

JohnBudd

Active member
My experience with feminized seeds is spelled in one word..."hermies." I really hope, and it sounds like the StrawberryCough may be stable....worth growin once!
Using chemicals to alter a natural phenomena in nature IMO is not quite right either.
I know a bit of work goes into seed crops, pulling the males, selecting mothers, but thats what keeps me so interested. Finding the "Paul Bunyon" father....crossed with the "Maryiln Monroe" of females. If I knew they were going to be the same each and every time.....half the fun of gardening would be gone.
I do love to smoke cannabis, but also love the personal challenge of picking and choosing natural stellar lineage.
Folks spend a life time perfecting a single grape for a special wine....a great feat for any wine vineyard guru. It should be the same for MJ. Props to all who breed, cross hybrids, and in general search for a better, stronger strain. Regardless of one day, one year, or 30 years, quality genetics speak for themselves. Those who bring such treats to the table should be thanked, not questioned on their morals or business plans.
Feminized seeds get the "Thumbs Down" from me.
 

mybeans420

resident slackass
Veteran
rosenthal has been a big dissappointment for me lately.
i studied his material exstensively for years when i was first getting into growing some 12 years ago.
2 years ago i met him at a seminar he was giving in berkeley. the stuff the guy was telling people completely contradicted everything i had learned from reading his books.
since then i dont really take anything he says or writes too seriously.
the big thing that bugged me was when he told everyone that they were waisting thier time growing from seed. that really turned me off from his work.
i just dont think he even knows what he thinks anymore... lol

the more expensive it is from a reputable company the better the outcome of female seeds

i'm not looking to argue, i just disagree with ya on this. it seems to me that marketing has more to do with the price than stability.
the reason i think this is because only the more popular well known strains such as blueberry, white widow ...etc are in the top price bracket
i think that if masterkush had ever won or placed in the cannabis cup it would be over 100 bucks.
just my opinion
 
G

Guest

- - - - - - - - - - - :bashhead:
There once was a grower from Leeds
Who purchased some feminised seeds.
In flower balls popped,
And ruined his crop,
Now he's left smoking on seeds.

-Rez
 
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