# Male/Breeding Questions...



## The Silver Bullet Special (Aug 16, 2012)

Since males arent really talked about unless your breeding I'm still a little confused on what to do with them. When I get things going and a harvest or two under my belt I want to make my own seeds.

When I find a male I want to keep can I keep them in veg just like females without worring about pollen releasing anywhere from those preflowers? To flower them do they just go automatically or are the a photoperiod just like female photoperiods? Even though they dont need as much light or care that the females need. Can I keep a clone of him around if I want to?

When I start breeding how do some of you keep your males around to keep collecting pollen to stabilize your genetics? I've read that you need to do something about cubing to lock in your genes (I'm a little foggy as to what its called at the moment). Is that necessary; and to do that is it using the same male pollen from your first seed run, with your second and third generation seeds? What will stabilizing your genetics do?

I'm just tryin to absorb everything I can to be ready for what I'm about to jump into.


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## tastyness (Aug 16, 2012)

Congrats on going on to this stage.  I too often wonder what other uses I can find for males- I'm still way to new to be attempting this- but will pull up a chair and learn for the future.


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## Old_SSSC_Guy (Aug 17, 2012)

Non-auto males are photo-sensitive just like females.  Even a single male can pollinate thousands of seeds in even a small grow.  They have to be killed ASAP or isolated from any females you wish to stay pure.  Only time I keep a male around is to isolate him to gather pollen.  Aside from that I kill them the moment I see them.  Males can go from almost no balls to dumping pollen in almost hours.

Males in the grow are evil.  There is no valid use for them to me.


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## The Silver Bullet Special (Aug 17, 2012)

Old_SSSC_Guy said:
			
		

> Non-auto males are photo-sensitive just like females.  Males can go from almost no balls to dumping pollen in almost hours.


 
So when I pull a male out of veg to start pollen production they explode quickly within a few hours and ready for pollination? So how would I keep the male around just cut a branch off put it in water and collect that pollen?


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## 7greeneyes (Aug 17, 2012)

yes, when you flip them to 12/12 they will begin to produce pollen sacs...but not UNTIL you flip them over to bloom, can you dig? it will take days for them to develope enought tho to release their pollen. 

Unless its an auto, then you just need to be uber vigilant...Males will show before females develope so just keep an eye peeled for balls 

And I assume you'd make cuttings from the male you like for multi-generation pollen collections.


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## The Silver Bullet Special (Aug 17, 2012)

Okay that makes sense now, now I don't know how many hardcore breeders there are here but is it necessary to "lock in" the genetics by using the same male for its children for 3 generations?


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## 7greeneyes (Aug 17, 2012)

pheno drift will be all over the place if you don't...I'm not a breeder, mostly a chucker...Would love to get into breeding if I could have others bloom for me whilst I toiled the hours away with my breeding stock, ahhh perchance to dream....

here's a good reference too:

 hMPp://www.1stmarijuanagrowerspage.com/growfaq/breeding/strategies/how-do-i-backcross-my-special-female


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## The Silver Bullet Special (Aug 17, 2012)

Oh well after reading that it had my brain spinning...  So when breeding If theres a trait that I really like in the mother would I keep the mother plant and rip clones to seed, then after those had seeded grow males from those and pollinate more original mother clones? Or do most people select good females and keep one father's pollen since females show traits better than males? 

I just dont want to distort or ruin the genetics I'm getting over time by breeding (good thing I'll try to always have my first original seeds to start over)

Ahhh soo many questions and new info! lol. I guess I should have paid better attention in biology class when I was in school.


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## 4u2sm0ke (Aug 21, 2012)

> Males can go from almost no balls to dumping pollen in almost hours.



This is wrong..Im sorry...Ive breed many plants and have never seen this happen...IMO..you have about 2 weeks under 12/12 for the Male to spit good pollen...the first few sacs that do open IMO are duds...Most want to pull the male when he shows...



> So how would I keep the male around



When I find a MAle I want to use in a breeding project...it must first meet The criteria..I have a Male chamber..( a home built box)  to put him in and let him do his thing



> Okay that makes sense now, now I don't know how many hardcore breeders there are here but is it necessary to "lock in" the genetics by using the same male for its children for 3 generations?



I can only speak of what Ive done and or learned...But locking in a strain..I think is when ya back cross to the first Mother...the locking in has zero to do with a male...Like I said befor ..the male is a one time thing...and most packs come 10 beans to a pack...so Male sollecting isnt the greatest...I allways make f2 if I pay big money for them..reguardless of the Male...Its the f3  I would do My solective male search:aok:

A great book to get IMO  is the "Breeders Bible"....and read all the stickies here...Trillion of Atoms has a collecting pollen in a baggie..never could work that one...but they are lots of Pollen chuckers that have diffrent ways  of doing things

take care and be safe
:48:


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## The Silver Bullet Special (Aug 21, 2012)

Okay 4u so when I go to start breeding I would grow to find a male and just keep it in veg till im ready. With the females that I get I would take a few clones off each and grow those out and see which pheno produced better and then just keep the mother I liked better for pollination. 

Then after those seeds are made thats the f2 right? Then I take cutting off that same mother that I liked for the f2 and grow out a male and pick the best one to pollinate those cuttings with f2 male pollen to make an f3?


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## SensiStarFan (Aug 22, 2012)

Howdy!  
Keep in mind that stabalizing the genetics will make the offspring seeds more uniform, but it isn't really a big deal if you are just growing for yourself.  If you were a professional breeder you would want as little variance as posible between offspring, especially since a 10 pack of seeds will yield you an average of only 5 females.  But this is not going to be something you have to worry about.  If you breed 2 plants together you could get literally hundreds of seeds so you will get to see every single pheno variation possible when you grow them out.  Also, I think I remember seeing something a long time ago about F1 hybrid vigor, meaning F2's, F3's, etc lose vigor which is why a lot of people prefer F1's.  I may be misremembering and I need to double check that.  On page #4 of my old journal (link in signature) I describe how I collected pollen and used it to make a cross with good success.  I was able to collect polen and paint it on one single bud on the plant (outside of the growroom). I put a fan on the plant to blow the extra pollen off and was able to pollinate just that one part of the plant, a useful thing if you do not want an entire plant full of seeds.  One pollen painted bud on the lower half of the plant yielded me dozens of seeds.

-SSF


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## SensiStarFan (Aug 22, 2012)

Found some information on F1 hybrid vigor and F2's, this is from Wikipedia;

_Production of F1 hybrids

In plants

Crossing two genetically different plants produces a hybrid seed (plant). This can happen naturally, and includes hybrids between two different species (for example, peppermint is a sterile F1 hybrid of watermint and spearmint). In agronomy, the term &#8220;F1 hybrid&#8221; is usually reserved for agricultural cultivars derived from two different parent cultivars. These F1 hybrids are usually created by means of controlled pollination, sometimes by hand-pollination. For annual plants such as tomato "hybrids" and "hybrid inbred maize, F1 hybrids must be produced each season.

For mass-production of F1 hybrids with uniform phenotype, the parent plants must have predictable genetic effects on the offspring. Inbreeding and selection for uniformity for a number of generations ensures that the parent lines are almost homozygous. The divergence between the parent lines promotes improved growth and yield characteristics in the F1 offspring through the phenomenon of heterosis ("hybrid vigour").

Two populations of breeding stock with desired characteristics are subject to inbreeding until the homozygosity of the population exceeds a certain level, usually 90% or more. Typically this requires more than ten generations. After this happens, both populations must be crossed while avoiding self-fertilization. Normally this happens in plants by deactivating or removing male flowers from one population, taking advantage of time differences between male and female flowering or hand-pollinating.[4]



F2 hybrid

While an F2 hybrid, the result of self or cross pollination of an F1, does not have the consistency of the F1 hybrid, it may retain some desirable traits and can be produced more cheaply as no intervention in the pollination is required. Some seed companies offer F2 seed, particularly in bedding plants where consistency is not as critical.[5]_

Hope that helps!  Good luck with the breeding!

-SSF


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## 4u2sm0ke (Aug 22, 2012)

The Silver Bullet Special said:
			
		

> Okay 4u so when I go to start breeding I would grow to find a male and just keep it in veg till im ready. With the females that I get I would take a few clones off each and grow those out and see which pheno produced better and then just keep the mother I liked better for pollination.
> 
> Then after those seeds are made thats the f2 right? Then I take cutting off that same mother that I liked for the f2 and grow out a male and pick the best one to pollinate those cuttings with f2 male pollen to make an f3?



I only keep the male in veg long enough to clone him..onece I have rooted clone  the Father gets kulled....I repeat this untill Im ready for His Goods...From what Ive read..pollen is best when used withing 90 days and stored properly...your f2 and so on are spot on....I am on f4 with My purple frosting...grew out 39 beans looking for the Male I want...Didnt get it..but did find the Female Pheno..we will see after smoke report...if she is then I will clone her through next summer...when I get to f5..I plan to back cross to the f1....but hell that could be another 3 years or so...Finding stella again in the f1 will be the chore..Have fun and be safe

:48:


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## The Silver Bullet Special (Aug 22, 2012)

Thanks for the LOADS of info 4u, SSF, and greeneyes I think I finally understand how to do things now lol   .

Now one last question; I just recieved my seed order and I got 3 femmed LA confidential and 3 Lemon OG from DNA; If I were to cross say a White Widow Male to those would it make it more susceptible to hermie since it was a femmed seed? This cross between White Widow and Lemon OG would be a new F1?


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## SensiStarFan (Aug 23, 2012)

The Silver Bullet Special said:
			
		

> Thanks for the LOADS of info 4u, SSF, and greeneyes I think I finally understand how to do things now lol   .
> 
> Now one last question; I just recieved my seed order and I got 3 femmed LA confidential and 3 Lemon OG from DNA; If I were to cross say a White Widow Male to those would it make it more susceptible to hermie since it was a femmed seed? This cross between White Widow and Lemon OG would be a new F1?


 
As far as hermies that is all going to depend on how your femmed seeds were femmed.  A cross between those 2 strains would be an "F1" assuming they met the qualifications described above for F1 hybrids, " _Two populations of breeding stock with desired characteristics are subject to inbreeding until the homozygosity of the population exceeds a certain level, usually 90% or more." _

-SSF


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## The Silver Bullet Special (Aug 23, 2012)

Ohh okay gotcha, Thanks!


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## orangesunshine (Aug 23, 2012)

morning silverbullet---i totally respect the pollen chuckers union and proudly boast that i have never ever purchased a seed---nor do i have any experience with autos and my comment herewith is based on my understanding of autos---so what's the point of my chiming in---well i want to see you succeed---IMO i would 1st wade the waters of breeding natural photoperiod strains till you get a feel for the task at hand---breeding autos have a higher  potential to waste your time and efforts by producing hermaphodites---


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## The Silver Bullet Special (Aug 23, 2012)

Sorry Orange. I think you may have misread, my strains are all photoperiod. They are just feminized seeds. The only auto seed I have was a freebie from my order and its flash babylon auto.

 I plan on tryin out breeding with just regular seeds first to build a stock to my strains I just ordered then play around with the crossing of my feminized seeds. I particularly dont like auto because of their ruderalis(sp) traits. I want to be able to keep a plant around for a while.


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## ozzydiodude (Aug 23, 2012)

No matter how a Feminized seed was made(every method relies on getting the plant to make the hormones for male flower production) if you try to use it in breeding you are going to have hermies somewhere down the road. The Genetic switch has been flipped and it will take working with the cross to get to a point when it is a stable line again.


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## orangesunshine (Aug 23, 2012)

i mis-read--- shocker  ---LMAO---sorry to throw #### in the discussion---but jmo and for the same reasons i would not use feminized beans in my 1st pollen chucking venture either---:rofl:


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## The Silver Bullet Special (Aug 23, 2012)

Yeah those are my worries I think I'll just stick to playing with my regular seeds and holding on to a clone when I decide to start my fem seeds, thanks guys!


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