There's a lot of interest in feminized seeds, for obvious reasons, and we've had some discussion on the susceptibility of plants grown from feminized seeds to turn hermaphrodite. I'm going to track 14 feminized seeds for 14 strains from seed to harvest to see how they fare during flower, as well as experimenting with ways to stop the banana production once hermieing begins, and ways to keep the plant from hermieing to start with.


My feminized strains are:


Alaskan Ice - Greenhouse
Arjan's Haze #3 - Greenhouse
Blueberry – Dutch Passion
Blue Moonshine - Dutch Passion
Big Bang - Greenhouse
Cheese - Big Bhudda
Flo - Dutch Passion
Jack Flash #5 - Sensi
Red Diesel - Barney's Farm
Strawberry Cough Dutch Passion
Super Silver Haze - Greenhouse
Taiga (autoflower) - Dutch Passion
TrainWreck - Greenhouse
White Widow - Seedsman


***thanks to Pick n Mix for the fem singles


I have already flowered out Dutch Passion's Blueberry and Strawberry Cough a couple times and have Barney's Red Diesel at 6 weeks flower. I'm going to germ a new strain every 2 to 4 weeks, depending on space in the garden. All plants will be grown in Pro Mix with Fox Farm nutes for soiless and General Hydroponics for hydro; good, dechlorinated water; 1000W 2100K Hortilux HPS during flower (air cooled hood for no heat stress) and 125W 10,000K HO CFL for veg, UVB lighting in late flower.


I only know a few gardening issues to keep plants from hermieing – consistent lighting, med-light nutes, good water, good air. Once the plant turns hermaphrodite I only know to uses tweezers and Dutch Master Reverse. We'll all have to all chip in to develop a strategy for growing feminized seeds without having Herman messing with our garden.


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Blueberry (fem) - Dutch Passion
1st grow: the mother and 4 clones hermied only slightly, very few bananas. I just picked bananas.
2nd grow: 16" double topped in RDWC, virtually no bananas
3rd grow: clone in pro mix, 29” single cola – quite a few bananas that grew back when picked. Sprayed with Reverse. Still some banana production after 2 days, re apply Reverse after 10 days if needed. This will be the last grow for this strain, the current plant has been a poor producer, probably the bad pheno I read about. Beautifull plant though, starting to turn purple hues the last few days.


Strawberry Cough (fem) – Dutch Passion
1st grow: mother in pro mix and 4 clones in RDWC, a few banana bunches, picked now and again but not a problem
2nd grow: 18" double topped in RDWC, virtually no bananas.
3rd grow: 2 clones in RDWC with General Hydroponics, not a single banana 6 weeks into flower. No need to spray with Reverse.


Red Diesel (fem) – Barney's Farm
1st grow: mother in pro mix, 18” clone in RDWC. The clone was packed with bananas, I picked once and none grew back, sprayed with Reverse anyway. The clone was in the same RDWC as the 2 Strawberry Cough clones from above, that didn't hermie. The double topped mother in pro mix is still producing bananas after being sprayed with Reverse.


Flo (fem) – Dutch Passion 1 week into veg
Taiga (fem) – Dutch Passion 1 week into veg


As my control strains, to be sure it's the seeds and not my gardening causing hermieing, I have these strains:


Big Laughing (reg) – Dr Greenthumb: 2 years in garden, never a problem – 6 weeks into flower
Kali Mist (reg) – Serious Seeds: 2 weeks into flower
Bubblegum (reg) – Serious Seeds: 6 weeks into flower


Super Strawberry Diesel (reg) – Elite: 1 week into veg


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Add ideas as you have them, lets find a way to grow these beasts into beauties.


Any stories of plants hermieing, things that worked, things that didn't work, anything that will help us develop tactics and a strategy for growing fems with no hermies.


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__________________
"I will have my money for my fine and a joint in the other hand."

- Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada, on marijuana decriminalization

I love you, I can't help out with my experience as I have none, but this is gonna be hell of a help for people all around here.

Many thanks man, can't wait to see what's gonna happen

I have Jack Flash #5 (sensi) and Blue Moonshine (DP) over 6 weeks into flowering and no sign of a hermie yet....Looking beautiful too. I also have feminized SSH, Hawaiin Snow, and Arjan's Haze babies coming up for next garden. So far so good...Hope my good luck continues with that lack of hermies.

From other threads:

"I would like to know if it is worth the extra money to order feminized seeds."

I feel that fem seeds are worth the money TO TRY A STRAIN and that Pick n Mix is the best way to try a lot of great strains, inexpensively. (more to your answer soon)

(ok, more to your answer now)

"do they have a very high chance of being herm?"

I have 3 strains from feminized seeds in my garden, 4 strains from regular seeds. All three strains from feminized seed plants have hermied slightly or excessively, all 4 of the regular seed plants are perfect.

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The feminized seeds are made by hermieing a great pheno clone by using a chemical, then using the plants own pollen to pollinate the clone or other clones from that pheno-mother, to produce all feminized seeds. Since the hermieing is a result of chemicals/stress and not of poor genetics there should be no more hermieing traits passed on to the S1 seeds than the parent had.

Here's where the problem starts. Except for IBLs like Bubblegum or Rez Sour Diesel inbreeding two children (F1s) will produce less stable offspring. For those not familiar with this - White Russian seeds are made by crossing White Widdow with AK47. When Serious Seeds wants to make more White Russian seeds they would cross the WW x AK47 again, not let a male white russian pollenate a female white russian - because that would produce less stable seeds. Except in stabilized InBred Lines like RSD and BG.

So, your S1s are going to be slightly less stable than their parent. If I want a mother to take clones off for years I'll order a set of regular seeds and pick the best female as my mother. If I want to try a lot of strains quickly and inexpensively to decide which strains I want in my garden - while doing the least amount of work planting, caring for and weeding out males and caring for extra females - I'll order feminized.

Both have their places, both strengths and weaknesses.

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__________________
"I will have my money for my fine and a joint in the other hand."

- Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada, on marijuana decriminalization

.if you do get some slight hermi going on all the seeds should in theory be feminized correct?"

The seeds from a self pollinating S1 would be an S2 I believe, feminized for sure. A study a read a few months ago said that by the time breeding gets to S3 or S4 the plant is so unstable it's ungrowable for our purposes. The S2 would be less stable than the S1, which hermied to make the seeds for the S2.

My feeling is that any pollen from a plant that hermies when you don't want it to is not pollen you want to make seeds with. (Except for late flowering hermieing of course)

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.im really hoping one hermi doesnt ruin the whole bunch. that is possible right?"

Yes it's possible. The pollen could float around your room and pollinate all of your plants. Most likely only those close by would be heavily seeded anyway. Get some tweezers and pick out every banana.

".....now would those seeds be considered femenized? because they were pollenated by a hermi? or is it only when a bitch knocks herself up they are femenized?"

It's only when a plant self pollinates that feminized seeds are made. So hermie pollen on a sister plant will not make fem seeds, but hermie pollen from a clone from the same mother as the female clone being pollenated, will produce feminized seeds.

If a plant from a feminized seed (S1 - Self Pollinated Generation 1) hermies for no reason and pollinates herself to make S2 seeds we can expect the S2 to be less stable than the S1. A study I read a few months ago said that by the time a breeder gets to S3 or S4 the plant is too unstable to grow for our purposes.

If you don't know why a plant hermied it's probaby because of poor genetics, and in my opinion you don't want to use pollen from an unstable plant for breeding. You'll just produce unstable offspring.

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__________________
"I will have my money for my fine and a joint in the other hand."

- Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada, on marijuana decriminalization

Pick n Mix for feminized singles (no USA delivery)
Attitude for fem singles - smaller selection (USA delivery)
Greenthumb for fem packs - (USA delivery)

http://www.pickandmixseeds.co.uk/

http://www.cannabis-seeds-bank.co.uk/

http://www.drgreenthumb.com/cannabis...dsEntrance.htm


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__________________
"I will have my money for my fine and a joint in the other hand."

- Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada, on marijuana decriminalization

i read on the greenhouse website that there feminised seeds are 100% female and 100% hermie free, is this 100% bullshit???

__________________
any reasonable judge is bound to let you off

nothings 100% any plant female fem or not can herm. anyways ive grown seeds that were from grows that hermed and i had good results no herm issues so far and these were seeds made from herm grows but when i grew them they stayed female.

It'll be interesting to see how stable Greenhouse's fem seeds are - they've perfected color coding their seeds and they have lots of great strains. I've got feminized Greenhouse seeds for 5 strains waiting to germ, I'll run them close together and keep a tally.

Greenhouse Strains waiting to germ:
Alaskan Ice
Arjan's Haze #3
Big Bang
Super Silver Haze
TrainWreck

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__________________
"I will have my money for my fine and a joint in the other hand."

- Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada, on marijuana decriminalization

I sprayed my feminized seed plants with Reverse again last night - after the first dose of Reverse last week both the Red Diesel and Blueberry's bananas dried up for a few days, then came back at a slower rate - a half dozen to a dozen each day. I picked the bananas every day this week before re-spraying last night, there were no bananas grown back this morning.

The Red Diesel clone in RDWC had only a couple of bananas for the whole week, amazing difference from it's mother in Pro Mix. The two Strawberry Cough clones in RDWC have produced no bananas 8 weeks into flower, while all other SC clones and the SC mother have hermied in past grows.

My control plants from regular seeds - Big Laughing, Bubblegum and Kali Mist - are all flowering perfectly. The 2 BL are at 7 weeks (1 pro mix, 1 RDWC); the two BG are at 8 weeks (both pro mix); and the Kali Mist is at 4 weeks (pro mix). My growing seems OK, at least for not overly stressing the plants.

I'm doing a preemptive spray on the next Red Diesel clone going into flower this weekend. I want to see if a few small doeses of Reverse during transition into flower will keep the plant from hermieing, rather than using a lot of Reverse to stop a hermie 4 or 5 weeks into flower. This Red Diesel clone is a good test since the mother and first clone hermied so excessively.

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__________________
"I will have my money for my fine and a joint in the other hand."

- Jean Chretien, Prime Minister of Canada, on marijuana decriminalization