Strong smell & sticky in veg.

I’ve often heard it said that there truly isn’t any way of being able to determine a keeper, purely from attributes in the vegetative stage.
I’m reaching out to experienced growers to give their take on good signs in veg that paid off.
Now I know people look for different criteria too but I’m mainly after strong aroma, terps and of course potency.
So I have a plant I’ve been vegging for about 8 weeks (In-house genetics Slurricane #7) and she smells the strongest in veg of any plant I’ve ever grown. I’m not the most experienced gardener but I’ve popped quite a few seeds now and this thing is noticeably more stinky. Also, when training and defoliating, I’ve noticed insanely sticky and resinous sap.After a round of defoliation I can almost roll finger hash, no joke! I popped a few of this cultivar but didn’t have space for the other ones, so I got rid, but kept this for clones.
Obviously I will find out when I flip her, but I’m assuming this is a very good sign.
Anyone else have a similar experience?
Does it mean anything? Should I prepare myself for disappointment or am I in for a treat?
thanks in advance.

All the plants I've grown smelled quite a bit half way through veg. And sap doesn't equal resin inside the trichomes so that doesn't matter. You never really know until you've harvested the plant, dried it and smoked it.

best smells in veg were always on the males.
this veg has been the stinkiest yet. i have this sour ripper plant that smells dank as hell...it's female. the rest don't stink much

ismann said:

All the plants I've grown smelled quite a bit half way through veg. And sap doesn't equal resin inside the trichomes so that doesn't matter. You never really know until you've harvested the plant, dried it and smoked it.

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I take your point & iappreciate sap and resin aren’t the same thing but as much as any other plants I’ve grown smelled during veg and such, the sap on this actually gums my fingers together and is visible! (Not exactly brown but there’s some discolouration) I’ve never seen that before.
I’m still excited for it haha and I’ve taken some cuts in anticipation.
If it turns out shit or average well fair enough.

Splinter7 said:

best smells in veg were always on the males.
this veg has been the stinkiest yet. i have this sour ripper plant that smells dank as hell...it's female. the rest don't stink much

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Oh wow! That’s interesting, the males smelling stronger, in this instance these are feminised seeds, so it’s highly unlikely, at least I hope it’s not a male.
fingers crossed for your sour ripper too!

Deadmagician said:

Oh wow! That’s interesting, the males smelling stronger, in this instance these are feminised seeds, so it’s highly unlikely, at least I hope it’s not a male.
fingers crossed for your sour ripper too!

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the sour ripper is female for sure. in week 2 of flower and fem too lol.

If it has a strong smell and it's sticky.........run away.

So… incase anyone was interested how these Slurricane #7’s came out?
Well, probably some of the most frosty girls I’ve ever had. Good right? And somewhat validates my hunch no?
Well, nothing is straightforward with cannabis genetics because although this particular pheno of Slurricane #7 is super sticky and frosted with trichs it’s mainly sugar leaves and barely any bud to speak of!!! It’s not even fair to call it ‘poor bud structure’ because there’s not a lot of bud there to have any structure!!!
Hash making was INSANE off this and yielded far more in the trim bin than anything I’ve encounted before, which I guess is interesting, if you wanna make hash.
I’ve only just harvested, dried and trimmed but crucially haven’t cured or smoked yet, I suspect it will be nice from the earthy, berry aroma and very purple hue kinda know what to expect, but I can’t help but be disappointed.
I have more seeds and may give it a run in the future because if I got a pheno with decent buds it would be great, because the small buds on this one are dense and such.
Also the plant herself despite having little buds, is actually quite big & heavy, because those sugar leaves are so loaded I guess?

Okay so another update. Not that anyone seems bothered hahaha
But it would appear that in this instance the strong smell in veg was somewhat of an indication of just how sticky, triched out and ultimately… and perhaps most importantly, how terpy and potent the bud was.
This stuff smoked, beautifully. Very tasty and so pungent, burned clean and pretty much everything you could ask for, truly Slurricane #7 S1 was impressive to consume.
Shame the yield wasn’t great, I’d have liked to have more of it.
Well now I have because I took a clone and having grown it out again I vegged the plant longer and therefore made her a bit bigger and ripened her an extra week or so, she yielded slightly better buds, if still a pretty abysmally small amount.
But the bud that is there… well it’s pretty special.

Imagine a Pheno which had these attributes but with bigger and more abundant nuggs!!! wow!
That would be a true keeper, I’m not complaining though.

I've had plants that reek in veg and become real winners. Often that's the case. I have had some really nice plants in early flower that don't turn out how I would want. Then, there's strains like Fleur Du Mal's Indiana Bubblegum that smelled okay in flower, but when harvested and cured, reeked like bubblegum, blew me away...

When you get to yield, that's a whole other thing. Often getting the best of all of it is never as good as one strain that is just awesome, but perhaps lacking yield or something else.

Trainwreck is the winner on all levels for me, followed by Strawberry Diesel, they also yielded well. And then Kryptonite because its such an awesome plant...

I've never had one that I loved early on turn out bad. But I have had a couple that didn't look so good early on turn out exceptionaly well.

Deadmagician said:

Okay so another update. Not that anyone seems bothered hahaha
But it would appear that in this instance the strong smell in veg was somewhat of an indication of just how sticky, triched out and ultimately… and perhaps most importantly, how terpy and potent the bud was.
This stuff smoked, beautifully. Very tasty and so pungent, burned clean and pretty much everything you could ask for, truly Slurricane #7 S1 was impressive to consume.
Shame the yield wasn’t great, I’d have liked to have more of it.
Well now I have because I took a clone and having grown it out again I vegged the plant longer and therefore made her a bit bigger and ripened her an extra week or so, she yielded slightly better buds, if still a pretty abysmally small amount.
But the bud that is there… well it’s pretty special.
View attachment 5326027
Imagine a Pheno which had these attributes but with bigger and more abundant nuggs!!! wow!
That would be a true keeper, I’m not complaining though.

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This is what some deem to be a good example of “ headstash”. Low yielding but kickass results.. well done.

I've had a few plants with exceptional aroma in veg, but never "stickiness" prior to any trichome development.

My favorite are the vegging plants that smell kinda like cigarette ashtray or old-lady chainsmoker. I've had a few of those.

I’ve had stickiness from African and Thai based strains, stem rubs in veg give sticky fingers.
It’s actually a trait I look for in my Ciskei line from tropical seeds. A good African should have sticky stems in veg.
Plant ‘sap’ is never something I consider though that’s just not likely to mean anything.

I have seen trics on the leaves in veg of a female dairy Queen from TGA one time.

Insane resin production usually is more dominant on low yielders in my experience.

I saw that with an f2 I made one time where the yield went down but the resin went up, and the strain was already caked before I f2’d it.

Antidote Man said:

I've had plants that reek in veg and become real winners. Often that's the case. I have had some really nice plants in early flower that don't turn out how I would want. Then, there's strains like Fleur Du Mal's Indiana Bubblegum that smelled okay in flower, but when harvested and cured, reeked like bubblegum, blew me away...

When you get to yield, that's a whole other thing. Often getting the best of all of it is never as good as one strain that is just awesome, but perhaps lacking yield or something else.

Trainwreck is the winner on all levels for me, followed by Strawberry Diesel, they also yielded well. And then Kryptonite because its such an awesome plant...

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Oh cool! Sounds great. I will have to try those cultivars.

pegboy said:

I've never had one that I loved early on turn out bad. But I have had a couple that didn't look so good early on turn out exceptionaly well.

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Yes, I think generally speaking the smell in veg (although not reflective of the ‘real’ smell of the finished flowers) is a really good indication that something might give favourable results. But as some have mentioned, more often than not the lack of smell in veg is not necessarily indicative of a poor result and these ladies can always surprise you. Same way sickly, deformed or mutated seedlings can deliver great results.

PopAndSonGrows said:

I've had a few plants with exceptional aroma in veg, but never "stickiness" prior to any trichome development.

My favorite are the vegging plants that smell kinda like cigarette ashtray or old-lady chainsmoker. I've had a few of those.

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Honestly, I know some people are bullshitters or just mistaken on grow forums and such… haha and I respect your experience as a grower, but honestly they were incredibly sticky, in a way I’ve never experienced before. I’ve grown quite a few different varieties and defoliate a shit load of plants almost on a daily basis and my experience was similar, ie: they don’t get sticky until flipped and the trichs arrive, but this Slurricane was different.
Love the old lady/ashtray description, it’s funny I kinda get what you mean about that haha

HenryTheEighth said:

I’ve had stickiness from African and Thai based strains, stem rubs in veg give sticky fingers.
It’s actually a trait I look for in my Ciskei line from tropical seeds. A good African should have sticky stems in veg.
Plant ‘sap’ is never something I consider though that’s just not likely to mean anything.

I have seen trics on the leaves in veg of a female dairy Queen from TGA one time.

Insane resin production usually is more dominant on low yielders in my experience.

I saw that with an f2 I made one time where the yield went down but the resin went up, and the strain was already caked before I f2’d it.

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Ahhhh hah!!! Yes I’m glad someone else has had this experience.

Interesting stuff about the resin production.

From my exp if you get some resin in veg on fan leafs.flower will be a high thc

The terpenes change as the buds ripen in my experience, I don't think you can find a keeper as far as terpenes go until you've grown it out and taken clones of it for reproduction.

I have strains that get oily/sticky branches and reek in veg. It usually is no reflection of the final product though.