Trouble choosing strains

Clint Torres

Clint Torres

New Member
As a newb when I got seeds I just chose what "looked good". Lately I have been told about "stable", "established" or "consistent" strains and that they are ideal for newbs like me. I have heard that stuff like Skunk #1 or white widow is like that.

Also, what is F1 and S1? I've tried to understand and have looked at "weed family trees" but I don't get it.

If you were to order these type of seed from Attitude Seeds what are some good strains like this.

Any help will REALLY help.
kiss-ass
 
Clint Torres said:
As a newb when I got seeds I just chose what "looked good". Lately I have been told about "stable", "established" or "consistent" strains and that they are ideal for newbs like me. I have heard that stuff like Skunk #1 or white widow is like that.

Also, what is F1 and S1? I've tried to understand and have looked at "weed family trees" but I don't get it.

If you were to order these type of seed from Attitude Seeds what are some good strains like this.

Any help will REALLY help.
kiss-ass
Click to expand...

an f1 is if you take two plants, and cross them together, the resulting seeds will be an f1.. if you took those seeds and breed them back to the parents again, you'd have an f2..
an s1 is when someone takes what is usually a clone only strain, and hits it with some cs or another similar chemical to create feminized seeds.. these seeds are called s1's..

and when people talk about making sure you buy seeds that are stable, it's pretty well known around the forums who's gear isn't so stable, and which breeder's gear seems to be more stable..
for one, greenhouse seems to have a bad rep for putting out very unstable seeds.. what this basically means is that you can crack a pack of ten seeds, and get ten very different looking plants.. if they were more stable, they would all be very similar and not have many differences between them..
the differences in the plants are called geno and pheno types..

some other co's that i've heard don't have the most stable genes are like barney's farm.. they tend to be very hit and miss.. you can end up with fire or poo poo.. there's others as well, i don't want to bad mouth too many at one time, lol, but if you ask around, you'll learn..

some of the more stable breeders that i've run across are like hmm...
dna / reserva preveda
dr greenthumbs
cali connection
bog
mr nice
connoisuer
gage green
subcool / tga
serious seeds
the list goes on and on really.. :)
 
As far as a good strain to grow for a beginner

I think that northernlights is very easy to grow imo , they can take some abuse lol

Lst , supercropping , ect , you can bend and train em to grow anyway and it dont even faze em
 
nirvana seeds has some great genetics at amazing prices. once i'm done with my bag seeds im ordering from them and tga subcool.
 
racerboy71 said:
an f1 is if you take two plants, and cross them together, the resulting seeds will be an f1.. if you took those seeds and breed them back to the parents again, you'd have an f2..
an s1 is when someone takes what is usually a clone only strain, and hits it with some cs or another similar chemical to create feminized seeds.. these seeds are called s1's..

and when people talk about making sure you buy seeds that are stable, it's pretty well known around the forums who's gear isn't so stable, and which breeder's gear seems to be more stable..
for one, greenhouse seems to have a bad rep for putting out very unstable seeds.. what this basically means is that you can crack a pack of ten seeds, and get ten very different looking plants.. if they were more stable, they would all be very similar and not have many differences between them..
the differences in the plants are called geno and pheno types..

some other co's that i've heard don't have the most stable genes are like barney's farm.. they tend to be very hit and miss.. you can end up with fire or poo poo.. there's others as well, i don't want to bad mouth too many at one time, lol, but if you ask around, you'll learn..

some of the more stable breeders that i've run across are like hmm...
dna / reserva preveda
dr greenthumbs
cali connection
bog
mr nice
connoisuer
gage green
subcool / tga
serious seeds
the list goes on and on really.. :)
Click to expand...

what about companies like Dinafem, emerald trianngle, world of seeds, sweet seeds, kannabia?

I got a free Kandy Kush from reserva privada once and its node sites on the main stalk were like golfballs.
 
racerboy71 said:
an f1 is if you take two plants, and cross them together, the resulting seeds will be an f1.. if you took those seeds and breed them back to the parents again, you'd have an f2..
an s1 is when someone takes what is usually a clone only strain, and hits it with some cs or another similar chemical to create feminized seeds.. these seeds are called s1's..

and when people talk about making sure you buy seeds that are stable, it's pretty well known around the forums who's gear isn't so stable, and which breeder's gear seems to be more stable..
for one, greenhouse seems to have a bad rep for putting out very unstable seeds.. what this basically means is that you can crack a pack of ten seeds, and get ten very different looking plants.. if they were more stable, they would all be very similar and not have many differences between them..
the differences in the plants are called geno and pheno types..

some other co's that i've heard don't have the most stable genes are like barney's farm.. they tend to be very hit and miss.. you can end up with fire or poo poo.. there's others as well, i don't want to bad mouth too many at one time, lol, but if you ask around, you'll learn..

some of the more stable breeders that i've run across are like hmm...
dna / reserva preveda
dr greenthumbs
cali connection
bog
mr nice
connoisuer
gage green
subcool / tga
serious seeds
the list goes on and on really.. :)
Click to expand...

so are f1 and s1 strains more stable and good for newbs?
 
Clint Torres said:
what about companies like Dinafem, emerald trianngle, world of seeds, sweet seeds, kannabia?

I got a free Kandy Kush from reserva privada once and its node sites on the main stalk were like golfballs.
Click to expand...

dinafem i hear a lot of good stuff about, but they're still relatively new and the words still out on them for me.. emerald triangle are another newer company, but again i hear that they have some nice stuff so far.. wos, i'm not very familiar at all with this co, as i think they're another newer co, kannabia, again, another newer co, and i haven't heard much one way or the other on their stuff..
they all could have fire, or they all could have poo poo, lol... i like to try and stick with some of the more tried and true breeders for the most part.. co's like mr nice have been at this for decades, and their gear shows their dedication and skill as breeders, bog is another breeder that i have a lot of respect for.. he mostly seems to fly under the radar compared to co's like greenhouse, but i'd rather grow his gear over anything from ghsc honestly..
subcool sure seems to have his fans, although i'll admit i'm not one of them... not that i don't like his gear, it's just something about him personally that gets under my skin, lol..
sensi seeds are another very old company... they're one of the original banks to have come out of holland years and years ago, and they have some very solid strains like a few skunks, and i'm growing their g13 x hashplant called mr nice atm... it's only early in flower again, so i don't have much more info on her then that..
 
oppps, i left out sannie and krew, with people like e$kobar working with him, the whole lot puts out some true fire imo... they sell their seeds for a very reasonable price, and have some of the best customer service of any bank / breeder that i've encountered thus far..
check out their chocolate rain, which was one of my top five smokes, and probably my number one so far.. super dank smoke, and a smell that take three bags to try and cover, lol... i was blown away with this strain honestly..
their herijuana is another famous indica dom plant that will knock your socks off.. very very heavy couch lock stone...
killing fields and ko kush are two more that i hear a lot of good stuffs about..
they also have a chocolate mix ... the same father i think it is that was used to make the chocolate rain was hit with a few mothers, most of whom i believe to have come from soma himself.. lots of fire to be had in that pack as well..
 
racerboy71 said:
an f1 is if you take two plants, and cross them together, the resulting seeds will be an f1.. if you took those seeds and breed them back to the parents again, you'd have an f2..
an s1 is when someone takes what is usually a clone only strain, and hits it with some cs or another similar chemical to create feminized seeds.. these seeds are called s1's..

and when people talk about making sure you buy seeds that are stable, it's pretty well known around the forums who's gear isn't so stable, and which breeder's gear seems to be more stable..
for one, greenhouse seems to have a bad rep for putting out very unstable seeds.. what this basically means is that you can crack a pack of ten seeds, and get ten very different looking plants.. if they were more stable, they would all be very similar and not have many differences between them..
the differences in the plants are called geno and pheno types..

some other co's that i've heard don't have the most stable genes are like barney's farm.. they tend to be very hit and miss.. you can end up with fire or poo poo.. there's others as well, i don't want to bad mouth too many at one time, lol, but if you ask around, you'll learn..

some of the more stable breeders that i've run across are like hmm...
dna / reserva preveda
dr greenthumbs
cali connection
bog
mr nice
connoisuer
gage green
subcool / tga
serious seeds
the list goes on and on really.. :)
Click to expand...

I agree about Barney's Farm.....my Vanilla Kush was ALL crap from there...literally unsmokable plants.....if it was not for the way that Barney's Blue Cheese turned out, I would never think about going back! Blue Cheese has been one of the most stable strains I have personally grown.....almost every plant has been almost identical from seed.
 
pure bred afghan by DNA genetics is some real nice indica, Also the L.A confidential is outrageous. they dont sell feminized seeds of the ghanny but its worth it to pop a few, they are super cheap and are the original hash plant so the genes are solid.
 
hazorazo said:
I agree about Barney's Farm.....my Vanilla Kush was ALL crap from there...literally unsmokable plants.....if it was not for the way that Barney's Blue Cheese turned out, I would never think about going back! Blue Cheese has been one of the most stable strains I have personally grown.....almost every plant has been almost identical from seed.
Click to expand...

yah, i hear a lot of mixed reviews on barneys as well haz... some people say what they grow from them is way bomb, and others say it's mediocre at best, and i also hear a lot of hermie issues with their fem gear..
i know they won a cup and all, but i'm not a big believer that the best strain win's the cup anymore.. years ago i used to think ... oh snap, this or that won the cc, it must be super dank, but anymore, well pretty much after greenhouse won two years on the trot, i've wised up to the fact that the cup is pretty much like anything else in the world anymore, and it seems that the company with the deepest pockets usually ends up winning..
not always mind you, i'm just trying to say that i don't think winning the cc is the prestigious thing it once was... sure, it still sales seeds, no doubt about that, but other then that, idk..
 
NL is a good choice for a first grow, it so easy to grow good yielding , good all rounder
check out Mr nice ortega , or nordle which is even better :)
 
QUOTE=racerboy71;6579332]well, yah, they would be more stable for the most part, all depending on which breeder you go with though like i said before...[/QUOTE]
Racerboy you and I are usually on the same page but I would have to politely disagree that f1 and s1 are good stable breeding stock especially when starting out in the game. I say this because in today's $$$$$ of commercial breeding and the rush so many breeders put into their products I wouldn't trust the breeding of the parent plants. If you are breeding for an f1 hybrid from two different strains and these strains are in themselves only f1s,2s or 3s you are looking at a lot of variety down the line. I would agree totally that two IBL or say f5 and up would generally be preferred and cut your time down in finding the desired offspring.
I do totally agree with Sannie and crew and have been playing with their genetics for almost 5 years now and am very pleased with many of their strains. Breeding and crossing from him and his record keeping of his crosses makes crossing with many of their strains very easy and with great results.
Just my opinion and understanding of how I have been approaching things over the years.
 
Lets be clear here.

F1 is a genetic term referring to first generation offspring between two parents. For example, lets say you cross plant A with plant B. All the hundreds (or thousands) of resulting seeds you get from this cross would represent "F1" plants.

Cross two F1s, and you have an F2. Cross two F2s, and you have an F3, etc.

Now, whether or not a particular strain is "stable" is **NOT** the same thing as F1, F2, etc. A more precise term used for this in conventional breeding is "true-breeding"

That means if you cross two parents of the same strain, the offspring will all be exactly the same as the parents. In this case, the strain is "true". Genetically speaking, it means that all of the plants genes (or all of the important ones) are homozygous at each locus, or nearly so.

So for the truly established strains, like Northern Lights, Skunk #1, etc, not only should all the seeds in a pack give you similar plants, but crossing them with one another should yield offspring that are also similar. Cross two F1s, and the F2s should be similar. Cross an F2 back with a parent, and again, you end up with something similar. No matter how you do the crosses (F1xF3, F2xparent, F4xF8, etc), if you're working with actual true-breeding stains, you should end up with offspring similar to the original plants. That's what people mean by "stable".

The problem arises when you cross DIFFERENT plants. Lets say you crossed Northern Lights x Skunk #1. The offspring (F1) of this cross are all likely to be similar, or at least considerably similar since they'll each have roughly identical half-genetics from each parent. IE they're HYBRIDS. But when you cross the F1s to get an F2 and now these F2 plants are likely to be considerably different one from the other: some taller, some shorter, some bushier, etc. They'll have random combinations of traits from each of the original parents. They're not "true breeding" because the genetics have not been stabilized.

And this is one of the "dirty" little secrets of commercial cannabis breeding.. .many of the so-called "strains" for sale aren't really "strains" at all, but F1, F2, or later hybrids created from other true-breeding (and in some cases NOT true-breeding) strains. And that's why they're not stable. If they're F2 hybrid plants, you would expect that multiple seeds in a pack would grow up to be plants with different traits.

How do you stabilize? Basically you cross a plant again and again with the same parent until the genes all become the same (homozygous) at each locus, and the variation goes away.

There are several problems with this approach though. The first and most important is that it takes many generations of crosses (at least 5 and 10 is better) before you end up with something reliably stable. That's potentially going to take 1-2 *YEARS* of crossing with careful selection if you're working indoors, and many years if you're working outdoors. So you can see why breeders might not like to do this. . .its hard work!

The next major problem is that some traits require mixed genetic combinations to be expressed. In other words, certain traits REQUIRE hybrid genes, and in cases like that, the plants simply CANNOT be stabilized. Cross plants like this, and not only will you get many different traits in the offspring, you may end up with NONE of them that are close to what you started with!

The real-world solution to this issue is that when you find that "super-plant" that you love, if its a hybrid, then the only reliable way to get more plants exactly like it would be to clone it. That's why some of the elite strains are "clone only". . .they're hybrids that cannot be stabilized via crosses (or in some cases, unique hybrids where a similar male plant cannot be found). .

Hope that helped a little.
 
How much stable-vs-nonstable matters is going to depend on what exactly you are trying to accomplish.

If all you're doing is running a few plants from seeds and harvesting, then really it doesn't matter if they're true breeding or not.

In other words, if you're not trying to create seeds or breed them, as long as the plants you're growing end up with the traits you're looking for, then it doesn't really matter if *their* offspring will all be different.

Where "unstable" matters if, if say you buy a pack of 10 seeds, and say only 9 of them germinate, and then 4 of those are males, well, now you've only got 5 good plants to take to the end of flowering. If those 5 plants are all different, maybe only 1 or 2 of them will be excellent and have all the traits that were advertised for the strain. So you've paid full price for only a small number of good plants *AND* you had to go through 3+ months of work to figure out which are good ones.

That can be highly frustrating. It shouldn't happen, but there are breeders who are putting out so-called "strains" that are really non-stable early generation hybrids. Which isn't to say that some of those seeds won't be excellent or as-advertised, but its pot-luck.

At that point, if you're a serious grower, maybe you can identify the 1-2 excellent plants, and propagate them indefinitely through cloning. If they are really good, then that could be a good outcome.

But if you're sort of a newbie or just occasional recreational grower, you've gone through a lot of trouble for what might not have been a great outcome.

As mentioned, one way around this is just to select stock from a reputable breeder whose been around a long time, and pick strains that have been established for a long time.

Its a mistake to think that older strains from 10 or even 20 years ago (eg Northern Lights, Skunk #1, etc) aren't as good as the newer ones. The opposite is usually true. . .these older strains would not sell and get grown today if they weren't tried and true and excellent in their own right. Something like the original Skunk #1 or Northern lights #5 will still be as potent as many or most of the more recent strains, and may offer other advantages of easy growth, etc.
 
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