I want to start playing with pheno hunting, to make my own seeds, I’ve been reading a lot about the subject, but a question arose, what is the real advantage of the male? Isn’t it worth it for me to look for two females whose pheno characteristics attract me, reverse one of them and breed them together?
sorry about my english is not my first language
The advantage of using a male for the pollen is if you want to have males in the progeny. The progeny can then reproduce and perpetuate the gene pool without requiring chemicals applied to reverse females.
If you don’t want males in the progeny, then do it this way. When using true males to make seeds, it’s not immediately apparent what characteristics the pollen donor might contribute to the cross. When reversing a clone from a female that you previously flowered, you already know how good the flowers are on that female and have an idea of what characteristics she is likely to contribute to the cross.
im also interested in making seeds and from what ive read:
Having males will insure genetic variation and the chance of a great recessive phenotype. It also allows for future genetic lines and recombination of genes. IMHO male plants are as important to the genetic lineage of that strain as is the female.
Reversing is for someone that has already done the work and found the phenotype they want and don’t want to further explore that lineage.
Agreed. Perhaps even more important.
There are good reasons to reverse too but I don’t do it that way and prefer reg seeds anyway.
thanks for the answer brother, was very helpful
thank you very much for the answer brother, was very helpful
Can you give me the good reasons? because I always see people saying that regular ones are better because of the gene pool, but I think that I prefer to reverse a plant whose flower has already shown me results and have feminized seeds
Perhaps someone with more reversal experience could answer this better. I think someone already mentioned about producing fem seeds which may or may not be desirable depending on your goals.
If you do want to ‘reverse’ a plant and have it produce pollen, bare in mind that not all plants respond the same way to this.
Some will produce pollen, some won’t. Some will produce pollen that isn’t viable. It’s not just as straightforward as spraying a female and then you’re done, so something to bare in mind.
It’s also important to note that an S1 plant will not be an identical copy of its mother. It will be very similar, but will show up some variance in its traits. They can even show some recessive traits too.
Deciding wether or not you want to use a male to make seeds, or if you want to reverse a female, depends on your goals.
Do you currently have a female you like and want to preserve/ explore?
If you’re starting from seeds,
How many seeds do you currently have of this cultivar?
What are the lineages of the parents involved in the seeds?
There’s a lot to consider, but knowing your goals, and what youre starting with will help narrow down the options.
Thank you very much brother, your answer was very useful
I think your end goal would decide the breeding path you should take. If you want to simply narrow down traits and end up with seeds that reliably produce satisfactory plants, breeding with only females will be faster and easier. These seeds would be great for production. Great for selecting keeper clones and growing flower.
If you want to breed something that has longevity to be bred in the future by others, I would use males. With feminized seed lines you have to bring in an unrelated male to get males back in the line. This creates a lot more work to keep the original traits how they were.
Ideally the best thing to do would be both types of breeding at the same time. Keep a male/female line that you can pull females from to also make a feminized version. Then you have the option to reliably grow females on demand, but the gene pool has retained the male side if it is ever needed.
Howdy @sedanapo, each of these methods and techniques are tools a breeder can use within a breeding scheme to influence variability and phenotypic expressions of a population. If you prefer to reverse a plant and utilize that technique of breeding there is nothing wrong with that. It’s important to enjoy yourself gardening and to explore and learn at your own pace and through your own unique lense as an individual. This choice doesn’t define you. You can employ and utilize any, all, or none of the other breeding tools and methods as you see fit.
Considering there is seed stock and genetics of all types available to the consumer market with differing origins and fitness, there is plenty to choose from for whatever ones personal tastes and goals relating to breeding may be. As long as you’re having fun, you’re doing it right!
You can also reverse males into females to more objectively quantify their observable traits in addition to progeny testing them in a classical way. Reversals don’t have to just be female to male, it can be the other way around too. It’s what you make of it. I think the most significant factors are your unique breeding goals and the variability within the seed populations being worked with and how realistic the two are when viewed together. Much love
As has been said already they are both just tools in your arsenal depending on what you want to do, and there is no reason why you can’t do both, sometimes I’ve created crosses with fems, and then later down the line introduced a male and back crossed.
I know people say that males pass on particular characteristics but imho it’s a bit more complicated than this, the plastids i.e. chloroplasts,and mitochondria dna are ONLY passed on via the mother. You might expect terps and cannabinoids for example to be maternally passed on traits because terp biosynthesis is primarily carried out in the plastids via the MEP pathways so the dna within the chloroplast and mitochondria are entirely maternal, but plants have another biosynthesis pathway called the MVP pathway where inheritance is less clear, to me at least. These traits are not Mendalian in their pattern of inheritance.
I sometimes like to cross fems both ways and then inbreed via fems a couple of generations and then introduce a male and back cross a few generations to the female. I have nearly always found the female to be more dominant in crosses.
thank you so much for the answer brother! it was very enlightening
thank you so much for the answer brother! it was very enlightening and helpfull
thank you so much for your knowledge brother, it was very enlightening