Treatment of seeds w ethylene gas = more females??

[NaturalALiasClifford]

Hey Guys

Check this out. I saw this info while surfing the web a while ago. I copied and pasted to my MS Word. Sorry i dont have the source for you guys..what do you think of these methods????


Treatment of seeds with ethylene gas will increase the resulting number of female plants by about 50%. Ethylene is produced by certain plants (i.e., bananas, cucumbers and melons), and these can be used to treat hempseed in a simple manner. About two weeks before you plan to sprout the seeds, place them in a paper bag, and put that in a plastic bag with the peels of a ripening banana or cucumber. Replace the peels after a couple of days, and change the bags to prevent mould.


When hempseed is treated with the female hormone oestrogen [estrogen??], the percentage of females that are produced will increase by about 10%. Dissolve a birth control pill in water and soak the seeds overnight in the solution. After the initial soaking, continue to treat the seeds by sprouting them on a paper towel soaked in the solution.


I dunno what to think of all this. Any of your input would be appreciated :jointsmile:

[NaturalALiasClifford]

Found it at this info site
Snow-white.nl - PERCENTAGE OF FEMALES - Weed Cannabis Grass Pot Marihuana Marijuana Hemp Seed Seeds (http://www.snow-white.nl/engeland/h40PERCENTAGEOFFEMALES.htm)

[stinkyattic]

Ethylene perhaps but I think the estrogen one is a crock.
Or just find a good mother and grow from clones! :D

[NaturalALiasClifford]

the Ethylene procedure is what i was leaning towards as the safer set-up to follow. thanks for your input:thumbsup:

[AussieBushMan]

ethylene gas is one of the 5 main known plant hormones. I believe it is used in ripening of flowers and fruits. Not sure what kind of role it plays in determination of sex during early stages.

As for estrogen.. Thats a human hormone. Not a plant hormone. Any increase in female to male ratio after treatment with estrogen is most likely a coincidence.

The ethylene gas theory does have some merrit how ever as ethylene is a known plant hormone.

For your information too.. I do believe when it was discovered it was thought that heat was rippening fruits. Farmers used to harvest fruit when they were green and place them in sheds with (I think kerosine) heaters. The fruits used to ripen nicely, and uniformly. Later there was a change in technology. Kerosine was not used and a different heating source was used. However this failed. It turns out that kerosine being burnt produces ethylene gas. I'v often wondered if you could decrease the flower time of a marijuana crop by introducing ethylene gas into your grow area. You could also probly get the lower buds to ripen up at the same time as the top buds. Have not to this date tried this experiment but might do so in the future.

[stinkyattic]

Ethylene is meant to promote ripening in a wide variety of plants but it just seems a bit unnatural to me... ethylene-ripened tomatoes SUCK... sure they are red, but they just aren't quite right. Yeah sure a lot of that is that they were bred for resistance to shipping damage... but... yuck.

[Zandor]

I agree with stinky on this one guys, I have seen no scientific proof beyond anecdotal posts on forums saying to use birth control pills or using piss from a pregnant horse or from a pregnant woman.

There is no Science behind this that I am aware of, if you have a scientific report that I would read and study. But until then I would take caution. Sex is not determined in the seed DNA but rather in the RNA so that means that the true sex of the plant is not determined until between the third and forth week of true veg. That is why environment is so important at that time of the cycle of life of this plant.