I picked the Medical marijuana Grower's Bible the other day. It's a great read and should be a helpful resource. I finished reading the chapter on breeding last night, but still have some questions.

1) What exactly is an elite? There was a reference to it in a chart in the book, but didn't actually mention it. I have heard the term before just not sure what it is exactly. The chart also referenced land races.

2) I assume there is no recognized body for cannabis breeding. Is a pure line (a.k.a. variety or strain) a pure line when the breeder says it is? The book hinted that a true variety or strain is when the plant can be open pollinated from other other plants in the same variety and all of the key characteristics are present in all of the decedents.

3) The book also made mention that many breeders nowadays are really seed makers and not true breeders. Plants derived from makers could have a lot more variation in their products and that overall were doing more harm than good as far as genetics were concerned. Is this a 'get what you pay for' market and maybe I should be looking at the higher dollar breeders before making my next seed purchase?

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i would suggest searching around for reviews and grow logs and base seed purchases on that not price or marketing imo.

Variation is a good thing.

1. An elite is pretty simple. Strands that show several exceptional traits, ie. vigor, smell, color, potency etc. A few examples Skunk #1, NL #5, Romulan, etc, old pure strains.

2. Nothing is nothing just because someone says it is. A seed company or "breeder" could advertise whatever they want. A pure line is something that hasnt been inbred with other strains. In todays world it is becoming more and more difficult to obtain true landraces. There are a few breeders who travel the world and bring back seeds from rural corners of the world, but for the most part almost everything on the market is an IBL, inbred line. Because of continuous inbreeding and lack of stabilization thereafter, when you buy a pack of seeds more likely than not each seed will have significant differences and characteristics. You are correct in saying a pure plant should be able to be open pollinated and show the same characteristics.

3. You pose a few good points here. It's sort of like dog breeders. You have the ones who are just letting any two old dogs fuck to sell the puppies and make a dollar. Then you have the TRUE breeders who select parents over a long period of time, choosing out of MANY mothers and fathers (whether dogs or plants). You will find alot of variation due to the fact that people are making hybrids and crossing different genetics, and then on top of it, selling the seeds to the general public w/o any effort at stabilizing the strain, and locking in the desired traits. What i hate, and find very misleading is when a guy like you looks in High Times and and sees a pic of this incredible bud and now says, "OK, i want to grow that new strain called Purple Mumbo Jumbo by Asshole Seedbank that i saw in high times". So what do you do you order Purple Mumbo Jumbo, a pack of 20 seeds. You get them, germ them, and grow them all the way out just to find not one plant that looks even slightly similiar to the one in the picture. This is because of poor breeding practices and techniques. This is because of people using unstabilized hybrid strains and breeding them unstabilzed hybrid strains.

We haven't even gotten into the fun part like hermie prone genes and good stuff like that. Very few breeders know wtf they are doing, and even fewer care. Most are in it for a buck. I would strongly reccomend buying seeds from TGA/Subcool, GreenHouse, Soma, TH Seeds. These are people who care about what they are doing. GL Hope this answered a few of your questions. Order at www.hempdepot.ca

Thanks for the response purrrrple. Very helpful. I would like to do breeding myself some day, truly breeding, and establish a pure line strain. I take that can only be done from land races. If I found traits I liked in a random plant from an online order and did my best to stabilize it, it would still be considered an IBL at the end of the day, correct? At any rate that is a long way off.

Any thoughts on Barney's Farm?

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Leave breeding to the professionals.

and these professionals were just born as professionals? Every professional starts out not knowing a thing unless they somehow were born with the knowledge....

yes the professionals are often people who manged to get established who then bad mouth and stop others from getting exposure lol. i have spoken with a number of pro breeders who were not very pro at all but had a known name. the thing is people are stupid and by into hype real easy. it sucks for new breeders who are serious and want to do things properly as its very hard to get established.

It's only a book. If you're hear, you must value multiple rescources. Sounds liek this book is only one good rescource.

The seeds I have bought, and seen bought, were usually in the judges packet of the Canubus Cup. These sealed packets could be visually compared to the images online, so I feel pretty good about them, but here is the deal.

Your gunna have one plant whihc does best under your sepcific grow conditions, once you find your beauty, you're good to go.

I should have said "experts" instead of "professionals".