When to send males into flower?

Started a run of 4 red eyed genetics blueberry iced cream and with my luck they all turned out male. So I figured now would be a good chance to collect some pollen and try my hand at breeding while my next round is germinating. I scrapped 2 and have the 2 stronger plants going to see which one I want to use as the dad. They are just now showing preflowers and am wondering if i should send it straight to flower or are there any benefits to waiting until its bigger?
 
Are u sure they are males

I've rarely seen full on male pre flowers

Pics
I can take some pics later and post them to the thread. Im 90% sure because I'm noticing the little stem starting to protrude from under the bulbs. Can probably give it a few more days but I'm almost certain.
 

CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
It doesent matter much, as long as its old enough to flower. Just before it opens its first flowers you can move it elsewhere and even if you use some low powered light(like 10w led at least), you can harvest enough pollen to spread on one branch and make hundreds of seeds from that alone.

If you move the male under really low light only pointed to some flowers, its growth will stunt at first, but it will put out pollen from those flowers that do get light. If you dont want to risk pollinating your whole plants and end up with thousands of seeds and not much to smoke, AND if you dont have a proper space where the male can freely flower and not spread its pollen around and ofc unless you need tons of pollen, then its better to do it this way imo.

I have done it a few times and even managed to get some useable pollen under a kitchen sink fluorescent tube light. 150w led gave plenty of pollen and 9w led gave enough, but significantly less than 150w. However the fact that the male under 9w led was a freakshow and not a regular strain, might had contributed to why it produced so little pollen.
 
It doesent matter much, as long as its old enough to flower. Just before it opens its first flowers you can move it elsewhere and even if you use some low powered light(like 10w led at least), you can harvest enough pollen to spread on one branch and make hundreds of seeds from that alone.

If you move the male under really low light only pointed to some flowers, its growth will stunt at first, but it will put out pollen from those flowers that do get light. If you dont want to risk pollinating your whole plants and end up with thousands of seeds and not much to smoke, AND if you dont have a proper space where the male can freely flower and not spread its pollen around and ofc unless you need tons of pollen, then its better to do it this way imo.

I have done it a few times and even managed to get some useable pollen under a kitchen sink fluorescent tube light. 150w led gave plenty of pollen and 9w led gave enough, but significantly less than 150w. However the fact that the male under 9w led was a freakshow and not a regular strain, might had contributed to why it produced so little pollen.
Thanks! That was a lot of good info
 

CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
By the way here is an example of what i did the last time:

IMG_3711.jpeg

IMG_3813.jpeg

Other option would be to make something where the pollen can fall from aluminium foil and have it hanging from the plant.

The first pic is when i took it out of the closet and shortly after got a 150w led i could use for it. If you keep it under too low light, flowering will slow down and if only some part gets good enough light(spot light) only that spot will develop properly, so you dont need to get tons of pollen all over the plant. You can also cut off stems that are not worth harvesting, but dont be too rough on it or it might need time to recover. Which especially under low light is not good.

Here is a freakshow i put under 9w led after it showed first flowers and it was enough light to harvest enough, the photo was taken after i had already been able to put a little in two plants and also take a bit on store. As you can see most of everything else than the main cola has dried off and did not make pollen properly. This is because the led was only lighting the top and rest was uner normal room lights. It did make less pollen than with 150w and while 9w china led seems barely good enough, i would recommend a bit higher power, but 150w is already an overkill for sure if you just want to make a little pollen.

IMG_4221.jpeg

It doesent matter if the male stays small like this. If it makes viable pollen, its viable and it doesent make difference if its grown big and under big lights or flowered like this. Its genes are what matters
 

T macc

Well-Known Member
By the way here is an example of what i did the last time:

View attachment 4641174

View attachment 4641178

Other option would be to make something where the pollen can fall from aluminium foil and have it hanging from the plant.

The first pic is when i took it out of the closet and shortly after got a 150w led i could use for it. If you keep it under too low light, flowering will slow down and if only some part gets good enough light(spot light) only that spot will develop properly, so you dont need to get tons of pollen all over the plant. You can also cut off stems that are not worth harvesting, but dont be too rough on it or it might need time to recover. Which especially under low light is not good.

Here is a freakshow i put under 9w led after it showed first flowers and it was enough light to harvest enough, the photo was taken after i had already been able to put a little in two plants and also take a bit on store. As you can see most of everything else than the main cola has dried off and did not make pollen properly. This is because the led was only lighting the top and rest was uner normal room lights. It did make less pollen than with 150w and while 9w china led seems barely good enough, i would recommend a bit higher power, but 150w is already an overkill for sure if you just want to make a little pollen.

View attachment 4641179

It doesent matter if the male stays small like this. If it makes viable pollen, its viable and it doesent make difference if its grown big and under big lights or flowered like this. Its genes are what matters
Have you smoke that freakshow? I want to get a pack to make something unidentifiable later
 

CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
Have you smoke that freakshow? I want to get a pack to make something unidentifiable later
Nah the female buds are not ready yet.

Do note that they veg reaaaally slowly. Especially in the beginning. It took like 2 months for them to veg to same size as usually plants are at like week 3 or 4. However the females multiplied their size very fast after putting under 12/12. One plant started to flower really fast, one bit slower and one still looks almost after a month like it still is not flowering properly.. They dont look like they will yield much, especially the fastest one, but it also has very good bud structure and looks like its going to get hard nugs, the bit slower one looks like it will make more bud, but also tons of more leaf and the slowest one, well i dont even know if it will make proper buds and neither is it showing the frostiness of the other two, but maybe it will get there one day, hopefully.

So its not very stable producer. I would say that its more of a special funny plant than a good producer. But maybe with proper vegging and outside they seem to grow like monsters. I mean the plants went from like 25cm to over a metre, even tho they were topped very fast after 12/12. Something vegged a lot bigger and put outside would surely make tons more, but i bet some high yielder normal strain would produce much more.

I know that the high is sativa, but there doesent seem to be much if any smoke reports around. It does have a very unique terpene profile for sure.
 
By the way here is an example of what i did the last time:

View attachment 4641174

View attachment 4641178

Other option would be to make something where the pollen can fall from aluminium foil and have it hanging from the plant.

The first pic is when i took it out of the closet and shortly after got a 150w led i could use for it. If you keep it under too low light, flowering will slow down and if only some part gets good enough light(spot light) only that spot will develop properly, so you dont need to get tons of pollen all over the plant. You can also cut off stems that are not worth harvesting, but dont be too rough on it or it might need time to recover. Which especially under low light is not good.

Here is a freakshow i put under 9w led after it showed first flowers and it was enough light to harvest enough, the photo was taken after i had already been able to put a little in two plants and also take a bit on store. As you can see most of everything else than the main cola has dried off and did not make pollen properly. This is because the led was only lighting the top and rest was uner normal room lights. It did make less pollen than with 150w and while 9w china led seems barely good enough, i would recommend a bit higher power, but 150w is already an overkill for sure if you just want to make a little pollen.

View attachment 4641179

It doesent matter if the male stays small like this. If it makes viable pollen, its viable and it doesent make difference if its grown big and under big lights or flowered like this. Its genes are what matters
Should a T5 work fine or not enough red light?
 

CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
Should a T5 work fine or not enough red light?
Yea im sure if you got enough watts. Its not like t5 lacks red, its just that there is more blue in comparison to reds than in HPS or most LEDs for example. The extra blues doesent make things worse.

However changing the lights to completely different can stress the plant a bit and maybe slow it down for a moment(which also happens if you move it from tons of light to low light with just barely enough light to one branch as a spot light), but it wont kill the plant. Ideally you dont want to change lights all of a sudden to completely different. You can also induce it slowly to new light source by giving it the new light few hours a day, but that sort of tricks should not be needed if you just want to make a little pollen at home. You would do things differently if you were after huge amounts of pollen anyways.
 
Yea im sure if you got enough watts. Its not like t5 lacks red, its just that there is more blue in comparison to reds than in HPS or most LEDs for example. The extra blues doesent make things worse.

However changing the lights to completely different can stress the plant a bit and maybe slow it down for a moment(which also happens if you move it from tons of light to low light with just barely enough light to one branch as a spot light), but it wont kill the plant. Ideally you dont want to change lights all of a sudden to completely different. You can also induce it slowly to new light source by giving it the new light few hours a day, but that sort of tricks should not be needed if you just want to make a little pollen at home. You would do things differently if you were after huge amounts of pollen anyways.
He's still going strong and now his balls are starting to drop. About how long from this point until the first pollen sacks beging to open?
 

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CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
He's still going strong and now his balls are starting to drop. About how long from this point until the first pollen sacks beging to open?
The ones hanging most are close to opening. They always take that hanging form first and then open. If you have it with females now and dont want to seed all, take it away from the females asap
 
The ones hanging most are close to opening. They always take that hanging form first and then open. If you have it with females now and dont want to seed all, take it away from the females asap
Thanks for all the help man, I've mostly just got seedlings right now and one young clone so I don't think I'll have to worry about pollination, just made sure to keep the fans off of it
 

CannaOnerStar

Well-Known Member
Thanks for all the help man, I've mostly just got seedlings right now and one young clone so I don't think I'll have to worry about pollination, just made sure to keep the fans off of it
No problem :)

Yea you dont have to worry about pollinating future females. You should however spray the tent properly with water after you get rid of the male. Moisture kills pollen very easily. I dont think the stray pollen would survive long and could pregnate females later easily, but just to make sure, i recommend spraying the tent with water. You dont need to wet it completely, but just see that some moisture sprayed from spray bottle gets everywhere.
 
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