Experiment on different method of sexing cannabis

[JD1stTimer]

I'm going to do an experiment on a different way to determine sex of plants. I heard this somewhere long ago, and I can't find where it was originally posted, but what it said was that plants which have swellings around their nodes are almost always female. I have eight plants growing, and as soon as I can sex them using the flowers I will take a close-up pic of the nodes and post them here so we can all find out if this is true or not. If it works it may be a good way for everyone who has trouble identifying the preflowers to good a good guess as to the sex of a plant. I have a plant that I think is male, once I determine more assuredly the sex I will post a pic or two of it's nodes. And so on for each of eight plants I have growing. I know it's not really a large enough sample size, but I think it would tell us whether or not further research is warranted. :detective1:

[phatsesh101]

i can tell from preflowers but some strains pre flowers look male so i still take them into flower.

it would be nice to get a good ratio good experimenting but im skeptical

[JD1stTimer]

One down and seven to go. This demonstrates what I will call the "male" style of nodes. We shall see if this bears out as true.

[JD1stTimer]

This is my first known female. I can't tell any difference in these nodes, so I will call this type of node the standard node.

[JD1stTimer]

Another male showed today, with standard nodes.

[JD1stTimer]

A male and a female showed today. The male had standard nodes, the female had the swollen nodes which is what I'm looking for in this study. Here's pics. The first two are the male, the second two are the female. It's kinda not that noticable in the pics as it is in real life, but you can see kind of a "hump" right where the branch meets the main stem. When I have had plants that showed these, they continue growing until it looks like a donut around the "crotch". The parent plants that I took the node pics from are NOT showing preflowers yet, so if this turns out accurate it could be a way to sex plants early with the possible loss of a female. We shall see.

[JD1stTimer]

Another pair showed sex on Tuesday... or Monday, I forgot... but anyway, even though I don't think this warrants any further research, I will go ahead and finish out this experiment since there is only one plant left yet to show sex, so here we go. First two pics from the male, third pic is the node on the female. It is a standard node. I didn't get a picture of her flower because it was so tiny I didn't think it would be worth the effort for the pic.

You may also notice that the males are short and bushy compared to the tall skinny females. In fact in all the photos of the male nodes I am holding back the branches because I can't get a picture of the stem. That is noooo problem on the females hehe. This is strange, I have another thread in the basic growing section, and have mentioned it in my growlog also in case anyone has thoughts on this phenomenon.

[JD1stTimer]

My last plant finally flowered, and she shows this node swelling trait more than any plant I've ever seen. So out of eight plants I have seen this on two out of four females and zero out of four males. In both cases the node enlargement was noticeable a few weeks before any flowers or preflowers showed. It seems as though if this is a valid identifier of a female plant, you would lose about half of your females by sexing this way. That does give me an idea for a breeding program though... *evil laugh* If anyone develops a strain that's reliable for this characteristic you all know I thought of it first!!

If anyone finds a male that shows this node enlargement please post it as I wouldn't mind having this idea debunked. Also if you have females with this trait I think it would be cool to post it here if anyone thinks it's worth keeping a running tally. Anyways, I'm done with this experiment, at least until I start more seeds, which may be some time since I have apparently found a very good plant to clone from and I will probably end up just growing her out for the next few sessions.

[Rusty Trichome]

Nice try with the experiment. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. :thumbsup:

Could be that those with the bulge were closer to the fans, requiring stronger joint-strength at the nodes. Or it could be genetics. Or maybe those with the spare tire are just fat?..<kidding>

I'm willing to bet the 'short and bushy' males versus 'tall and skinny' females is genetically programmed, too. Seeing more and more of this lately. I wonder if some of the breeders have stopped back-crossing their strains to stabilize the traits?

[JD1stTimer]

Well, my veg box has no fans in it, they are just sitting on a shelf with a lamp hanging overhead and white plastic board wrapped around them. I mean I have folded it into a box and I have a latch made from wire that I can close it or open it up. I move them to a different spot every day, the ones I just watered go in the back and the drier ones come up to the front. I only have room for about four small plants though. Argh I'll just have to show a picture in my grow log.

As far as the breeders not stabilizing their genetics, it could be that the business is going much more commercial rather than boutique/niche or simply with the high prices of seeds they are just trying to produce bigger quantities faster to make an easy buck. And I almost can't blame them, they have it very risky in their business and if they can't pull a big profit they can't justify the risks. They should realize though, that the biggest rewards would come about through years of consistently good quality products because the seeds are so expensive, and most growers have access to lots of unbiased reviews of all the different products. Anyone who's selling basically glorified bag seed is going to always have to change their names, websites, and hope that everyone doesn't find out too quickly. Not a good business model.

[axlcinema]

Sorry mate but i had a plant with large nodes, found sacks all over the top of him today.

Refer back to my thread http://boards.cannabis.com/grow-log/171797-irish-balcony-window-grow.html for results.