For a long time regular seeds were the only type of cannabis seeds available. Unlike feminized or autoflowering seeds, regular seeds do not contain any male chromosomes.
When grown, regular seeds have a 50% chance of emerging as either male or female plants. This is how nature intended, and it allows breeders to create new cultivars through cross-pollination.
Breeding
Regular seeds are a must-have for any cannabis breeder. Without them, growers can’t make clones that are true to strain or create a new cultivar. Clones can be a great way to preserve the flavour, morphology, and colour of a specific specimen.
When growing regular seeds, there’s a 50% chance that each plant will be male or female. This is a big reason why many gardeners prefer to plant feminized seeds. They don’t want to deal with the hassle of having to cull male plants at harvest time.
Feminized seed varieties also give rise to more consistent phenotypes. As a result, some growers choose to cross feminized plants with regular seeds to produce stable, uniform crops. This process is called back crossing. It gives rise to a hybrid strain with improved genetics, but it’s important to note that the resulting phenotypes might still vary. This is why many breeders stick to feminized seeds when it comes to commercial cultivation.
Cloning
Cloning regular seeds enables growers to duplicate an exact genetic copy of a particular specimen. This can be helpful if you have a strain that produces the terpenes and flavours that you love or a particular morphology that you admire.
It’s important to note that clones are generally more difficult to take than seedlings. They require a high level of humidity and are best kept in a dome (a plant propagator is the ideal accessory for this purpose).
The good news is that clones will often root well when they’re taken from healthy, mature plants. This means that you can keep the mother plants of your favourite strains and create a continuous harvest of your most potent, flavourful buds. Alternatively, you can buy a pack of feminized seeds and avoid having to deal with male plants altogether. This isn’t an exact science, however, and it is common to find a few male plants in any given batch of seeds.
Pollination
In nature and in plant breeding, seeds can only be produced if pollen from the male anther of one flower is transferred to the stigma of another flower. This transfer is called pollination and it can be facilitated by animals or wind.
The transfer of pollen between flowers takes place when the anther cells of a male flower rub against, drop on, or stick to a “pollinator.” The pollinator then moves from flower to flower, depositing pollen where it can be absorbed by the stigma. Fertilization then occurs, and the ovule develops into a seed capsule.
Growers and breeders interested in crossing regular seeds must carefully separate males from female plants to control the pollination process and ensure that they produce only female seeds. This is often easier said than done, since males mature about two weeks earlier than females. Depending on the growing method used, breeders may collect male pollen and cold-store it before applying it to female plants with a brush or their fingers.
Genetics
Regular seeds are used by growers who wish to cross strains to create new phenotypes. This is because they have both male and female chromosomes (XX) in their genome, whereas feminized seeds have been genetically modified to produce only female plants. When grown from regular seeds, growers can expect to have a 50% female/male ratio of offspring, but this can vary depending on luck and environmental conditions.
Ultimately, while most growers prefer feminized cannabis seeds, there are still a number of advantages to using regular seeds. They offer more genetic diversity, which can be useful for creating new strains with specific traits such as flavour profiles, morphology, or colours. They also allow for cloning, which is vital to the process of growing cannabis, and they are cheaper than feminized seed. However, it is important to keep in mind that regular seeds are not as effective at preventing the growth of male plants, and therefore may require more frequent culling.
