You have a pack of expensive beans and you want to for whatever your reason , to make more seeds, now regardless of anything you are intent on breeding one of them males to one of them girls in that pack , what are your standards for that male ?
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As long as it’s 100% male I’d use it. If I had more space I’d probably be more selective but in my position any male is a good male.
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What’s a 100% male?
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Not a hermie?
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Correct - not a hermie
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Biggest things for me are branching structure, height and flower production. But there’s no reason you need to only use 1 male. 2 is a good number, especially if you’ve never tried the strain before. Attempt to find the best looking male from each pheno. Then pick the best 1 female. Your odds of getting what you want to find in the F2 will be higher.
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Let’s say your females are shit and f2 is not an option and also how do I know if my male isn’t a hermie ?
“Hermi” is a spectrum. There is no 100% and you wouldn’t want it if there was. Sexual fluidity is a tool for us chuckers and breeders alike. For the plants it is a key to their nature. Stability is good. Rigidity is not.
I am preferring males that strongly resemble my chosen females for in-breeding. This will reinforce traits I like. Homozygousity seems like a time saver. For out-crosses I want clear identifiable traits, markers that I will be able to see in the progeny. (ex. Wild Canadian Sativa, Deep Chunk)
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I agree about spectrum. I wouldn’t be too concerned about a few male flowers on a female at the end of its life.
I don’t have space to let males finish so they only live until they get a chance to drop pollen if I see herm traits I’ve no way of knowing how bad it is and so reject them.
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If your females are shit then the male won’t be any better. Judge a male by his sisters. If every female in a pack is dank the males are probably good too, and will pass on good genes.
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I like to look at my favorite female from a batch and try to choose males that are the closest to identical.
I don’t choose a male to pollinate with tho, I choose males to die. And preferably the remaining males can have their pollen mixed evenly and applied by hand.
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If I may expand on your post a little @lefthandseeds…
I’d like to point out that pollen from multiple males gives better genetic diversity to the offspring than using a single male. The same may be said for using multiple females for breeding projects.
Using a one on one breeding method severely “bottlenecks” the genetic flow and rare/semi-rare alleles can be lost in this process, impacting genetic structure within the offspring as a whole.
Of course, possessing pollen from one source is better than nothing at all, however, if the breeder could source pollen from more than one male, this would benefit the offspring and the overall strain diversity tremendously.
I’ve kept clones of certain male plants going for years to try and achieve distinct breeding goals with favorable results. It’s definitely a process!
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Love your statement. A diverse population is a healthy and more resilient one. Just ask nature 
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Okay cool I had to ask , wanted to know what standards are is all , like do you stress test that male or are you just pollen chuck for the sake of breeding, Op a great time taking thing if you have the room to run a few thousand offspring to find a plant I think that’s intriguing and a great reason for many folks to breed anything for history sake without consideration for parental makeup .
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Your question of standards for picking a male is highly subjective ,to say the least. Every breeder looks for certain traits when choosing a male to work with. Male plants offer mostly “visual” growth and development traits, such as structure/branching, leaf density, pollen sac density and/or size.
I’ve read studies that show data that these traits don’t exactly translate favorably to female flower or density traits, meanng it has little to do with them.
However, dominant visual male traits like structure and growth DO blend well.
For some it’s all about structure, which is an important factor when planning a cross. A good structure let’s you know it’s a strong plant that can handle some weight, among other things.
The other important factor being growth. How the male plant grows, fast/slow, odd branching, leaf density, etc. are also important factors to consider when planning a cross.
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It is intentionally a very open question , all sorts of folks trading and giving seeds from a breeding they did with a grand population of a 10 pack of seeds , so with professional breeders using mass numbers to select from I have to wonder what people are using as a criteria from a tiny gene pool and are they just breeding anything for the sake of making seeds
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Well there’s all kinds of criteria you could consider. I have been thinking about some best practices for small scale breeding. It can be done, and it can be done well; however, you will need to “go slower” than someone who can grow a lot of plants at once.
That’s a full stop for me. If I wouldn’t grow the exact female I’m taking seeds from again, then I wouldn’t go any further. There may be some exceptions… rare genetics, long term “improvement” projects with landraces. But in general, I wouldn’t waste my time with seeds from a female, unless I was looking forward to growing her again.
Some great points already by @vernal, @DiggySoze and @DesertGrown. I’m also of the mindset that I infer not too much from the males, other than structure. And therefore, I prefer to limit “male selection”. This is beneficial for slowing down the genetic convergence, doing 2:1, 3:1 etc instead of 1:1, which may lose desirable traits too quickly. An alternative is “male testing”, but that requires running female progeny from each male, and then going back and running your maximum numbers for that 1:1 selection.
There is also backcross breeding, which is accessible to the home grower. Keep no males and simply hunt for mothers until you find something exceptional. You can combine this with inbreeding to reinforce traits in the mother. Or if you do not have intentions to stabilize for outcrossing, you can just keep backcrossing until you are satisfied that the progeny beat an acceptable level of consistency and similarity to the mother. Or if you are not concerned with having males in you line you can self and inbreed selfed genetics or backcross selfed genetics to the mother.
It really depends on what you are trying to accomplish. If you just want a bunch of good F1 seeds, then buy a couple IBLs and pollen chuck between them until you find something you like. Or hunt two good, inbred mothers and reverse one into another. Simple and effective.
If you want to build something with lasting value, you can try spending some time working on your own IBL.
If you want to make money, buy good clones and pollen chuck.
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Thanks for all answers.
I can’t buy good clones where I am but I did breed an OGKB v2 x Cookie Boi male to GMO as friends send gifts.
the breeding need to done by people whom can grow out 1000 of seeds to find the best male and female too bread from unless you want to make your own strain for personal use then go for it good luck. peace