File this under Lessons Learned
I recently did a selective pollination on an outdoor plant using the bagging method I described in an earlier post above.
Open Pollination + Selective Pollination - #27 by GrouchyOldMan
I learned a hard lesson and wanted to pass it along.
I chose to leave the big bag covering the unpollinated mass of the plant overnight. I wanted to make sure the pollen had plenty of time to do its work. The humidity due to transpiration inside the plastic bag got high enough to activate the resident spores and a nasty case of bud rot greeted me in the morning.
If I had followed the consensus advice and only left the bag on for a few hours there would have been no problem. Alas…
Stupid mistake and an ugly result. I’m owning it. Note to self: Don’t be Stupid!!!
Anyway, I was able to salvage some smoke by cutting and removing all the affected areas and I’m still waiting to see if the seeded branch gives me viable seeds.
-Grouchy