Month: May 2023

When choosing cannabis seeds, there are two main types to choose from – regular and feminized. Understanding the difference between these two varieties is crucial to your success as a cultivator.

Feminized seeds are a great option for growers because they eliminate the need to identify and remove hermaphrodite plants from your crop. However, regular seed still has many advantages that should not be overlooked.

They Are Unaltered Genetics

When you plant regular seeds, you are growing the way nature intended. They do not contain hermaphrodite plants, like feminized seeds do. Feminized seeds have been genetically modified to only produce female plants. Regular seeds, on the other hand, have a 50% chance of emerging as either male or female specimens.

Many growers use regular seeds to create hybrids for their breeding programs. The sex of the marijuana plant is important to breeders because they need male plants to pollinate female flowers with their pollen. This produces new strains that exhibit the desired phenotypes of their parents.

Without the need for hermaphrodite plants, regular seeds allow breeders to work with superior clones that are strong and vigorous. Clones are ideal for growers who want to reproduce specific phenotypes that showcase unique flavours, aromas and colours of their parent. Cloning is a process that requires patience, but is well worth it when you want to recreate a specific cultivar that has impressed you.

They Are More Vigorous

Regular seeds produce male plants a much lower rate, making them far easier to cultivate. The elimination of the need to separate and weed out all the male plants will save growers time and money.

Many old-school strains are only available in regular form. This is because they were never feminized and have retained their strength, aroma, and flavor as the result of years of natural selection.

Breeding is a big part of growing marijuana and can be a rewarding experience for those who have the time and resources. Using regular seeds will allow growers to preserve phenotypes that they like in their grow room and take clones from them for further cultivation.

Feminized seed is an excellent option for those who want to focus on yield, but breeding is more of a challenge for beginners and requires regular seeds. It is also more difficult to preserve the genetics in a feminized plant as it must be sexed each time a harvest is made.

They Are Better for Breeding

One of the primary reasons that growers prefer regular seed is because it allows them to breed their own plants and create new strains. Feminized seeds must be pollinated by male plants in order to produce a female plant, and this process can sometimes introduce instability into the genetics of feminized plants.

On the other hand, with regular seeds, growers can work through a large selection of male and female plants to determine which ones are keepers. This process is ideal for experimenting with different phenotypes in the breeding process and can help to produce some of the most sought-after strains available today.

For the experienced cultivator, working with regular seeds is a great way to hone their skills and develop their own unique cannabis strains. This is the same reason that many professional farmers choose to plant regular seeds over feminized seeds in their gardens. Feminized seeds make it easier for them to focus on production and minimize the amount of time they have to spend on weed maintenance.

They Are More Affordable

Many growers that prefer regular seeds find that they are more affordable to work with. This is especially true for larger growers that are used to working with a larger sample size of plants. Using regular seeds can eliminate the need to cull 40% of your harvest which saves on wasted hydro system space, nutrients, growing medium and light.

For those that are experimenting with breeding and creating new strains, regular seed is a must. It can be a long process to create the perfect hybrid, but the joy of discovering a brand-new genotype and phenotype that has never been seen before is hard to beat!

In the end it comes down to cultivation experience, the primary goal of a harvest and time or space constraints. For small-scale indoor operations that are limited to a specific number of plants and those who love the classic, traditional approach, regular photoperiod seeds make sense. For the rest, feminized makes more sense.

Regular seed is a type of cannabis that produces both male and female plants. It’s not ideal for novice growers because it can produce up to 50% of male plants, resulting in lower yields.

However, it offers many advantages to discerning cultivators. Whether you are looking for extreme potency, a specific flavour profile or certain colours, regular seeds can help you achieve your goals.

1. They are cheaper

Regular seeds are a good option for beginners who want to try their hand at breeding. However, if you haven’t yet mastered the art of growing, your first attempts at breeding might be hit or miss, resulting in wasted space, light and nutrients.

Another advantage of regular seeds is that they can be sexed, which will save you time and effort by eliminating the need to remove 40% of your plants after sexing them. However, this may still result in a reduced yield. For this reason, many growers prefer to grow feminized seeds. This allows them to practice the art of cultivation, ultimately making them better at it. They can then apply their skills to breeding their own strains of cannabis. These strains can be sold or given away as clones.

2. They are more stable

Regular seeds produce both male and female plants that can be smokable, but they’re also good for growers who want to breed their own strains. Cannabis breeding is a time-consuming process, but one that can be done by experienced growers or even home growers with a bit of experience.

Regular plants go through a much less traumatic genetic tampering than feminized ones, so they are far more likely to produce robust descendants. This is why many growers choose to use regular seed for their breeding projects.

SSSC has a great selection of regular cannabis seeds that are ideal for any breeder or hobbyist. Whether you’re looking for the best yield or potency, we have a variety of different strains to suit your needs. Check them out today!

3. They are easier to breed

If you are a cannabis grower who wishes to create clones of certain cultivars, regular seeds provide the best way to do it. It’s possible to produce a wide variety of hermaphrodites with feminized seed, but breeding with regulars ensures that the resulting plants are the most stable and have stronger genetics.

When you grow regular cannabis seeds, they operate just as nature intended, and have a 50% chance of emerging as either male or female plants. For serious breeders, this is perfect because it allows them to produce a variety of hermaphrodites to test out various traits and qualities. For example, many landrace strains are bred using regular seeds. They are considered more authentic because they haven’t been tampered with in any way.

4. They are more resistant to pests

Despite the excellent feminized seeds on offer, many cultivators choose to go with regular seed. This is due to a number of reasons.

Cultivators who choose regular seed often grow multiple clones of their favourite strains, allowing them to explore different phenotypes of their chosen cultivar. This is a great way for beginner growers to learn and perfect their cultivation skills without investing a lot of time and money into their growing environment.

As regular seed can produce male cannabis plants as well as females, it is important for growers to separate the two and cull any male plant early on in the growing process. This prevents pollen from being released and contaminating the female cannabis plants. This can reduce the yield of a grow.

5. They are more resistant to diseases

Regular seed is often a good choice for growers who want to cultivate and produce their own seeds for the next harvest. This is important for many amateur growers who may not have the funds or resources to purchase feminized seeds.

Regular seeds will produce both male and female plants. When you plant these seeds it is important to monitor the sex of your plants throughout the growing process, so that you can make sure that all your plants are female.

Regular seeds are also usually more resistant to diseases than other types of seed. However, it is important to note that disease resistance traits do not transfer between different varieties. It is recommended that you retest disease resistance traits when selecting new varieties to propagate.

Regular seeds are a great option for growers who prefer to produce their own seeds. It’s also a good choice for those who want to experiment and preserve phenotypes that have not been feminized.

Just like how nature intended, regular seeds have a 50% chance of producing male or female offspring. This is ideal for breeding and producing superior clones.

Breeding

Many growers choose to use regular seeds to preserve a strain’s genetics or create their own cultivars. Since these seeds have not been altered, they will produce both male and female plants. This can be an advantage for some growers who are looking to achieve a certain ratio of male to female plants for breeding and cloning purposes.

Breeders need to work with plants that show both sex in order to pollinate them and create new hybrids. Using regular seeds will give the grower access to more genetic variation and allow them to discover unique phenotypes that may not be possible with feminized seeds alone.

Occasionally, growers will also plant regular seeds in the wild with the intention of re-establishing cannabis’ natural habitat. This allows the plants to be pollinated by male flowers and to produce their own seeds – thereby re-establishing a small pockets of natural cannabis in the wild. It is an intriguing and somewhat counterintuitive process that can yield some interesting results.

Cloning

For gardeners who want to take it a step further than merely breeding their own strains, cloning regular seeds is an important aspect of the growing process. Cloning allows gardeners to keep their best and most robust female plants as mother plants and produce a large crop of buds without the risk of pollination.

Unlike seeds, clones do not need to go through the germination and seedling stage, which can add three weeks to the overall grow time. As a result, clones are more able to withstand stress throughout the growing process and can be more easily taken care of.

Clones must be carefully disinfected before being cut to ensure that they are free of pathogens and other potential contaminants. It is also recommended that clones be cut from the lower and healthier branches to encourage root growth. Once a clone has roots, it can be transplanted into a new pot or growing medium. It is essential to feed clones regularly with a balanced nutrient solution.

Pollination

Typically, plants are hermaphrodites, producing male and female flowers. To produce seeds, a flower needs to be fertilized with pollen from another flower of the same species. This can happen when pollen from a flower’s stamen (anthers) falls on the stigma of another flower, forming a pollen tube that will later carry sperm cells to the ovary of the flower. Fertilization is completed when the sperm cells reach the egg cells inside the ovule, creating a seed. This process is aided by a variety of biotic and abiotic agents, such as wind, water, birds, insects, hummingbirds, bats and other mammals. These are known as pollinators.

Unlike feminized seeds that can be grown without the need to separate male and female plants early into flowering, regular seeds must be separated in order to prevent the production of pollinated buds, which will have minimal cannabinoids and will produce harsh smoke. This process is referred to as sexing.

Genetics

The majority of seed banks only stock feminized seeds nowadays, but regular seeds are still available. Feminized seeds are a better choice for commercial growers, as they produce only female plants and can save a lot of space and money from not having to remove 40% of their crop after sexing.

However, for beginner growers it can be an interesting option to work with regular seeds. The genetics of regular weed plants can be more varied, which gives the grower a wider range of options to experiment with and create their own unique strains.

Regular plants also have a lower chance of going hermaphrodite. This can be beneficial for the grower, as it means that there is a greater possibility of achieving more clones and making more crosses with their plants. However, if the plant is stressed by techniques such as topping, fimming, lollypopping or defoliation it may go hermaphrodite and start producing male flowers.