Making Feminized seeds...

[Treetops]

Excellent post....miss your posts, hope all is well...

Thanks,
Treetops

[bluesteve]

Wow, there seems to be a lot of confusion out there about making feminized seed. The first thing that you guys need to know is that you should NEVER pollinate the female that made the male flowers with her own pollen. If you do, you're almost guaranteed to get Hermans, as a result. Always take the pollen, generated by a female throwing a male flower, to a different female and pollenate her with it. This will almost eliminate all chance of getting Hermans, though it's still a remote possibility.

And secondly, I'm actually shocked at the post quoting one of the world's best breeders, Soma, wherein he states that he doesn't like to use Gibberellic Acid to generate the male flowers because it's not organic. Nothing could be farther from the truth! Gib is a naturally occurring plant growth hormone that is present in, virtually, all plants. It is often obtained from a fungus, or from distilling seaweed. It can also be produced in the lab, but even when it's made this way, it's the exact same chemical, and no different from what is already in your cannabis plant!

If you use it as a foliar spray at around 20 PPM to 40 PPM during veg, you will see dramatic increases in growth rates, as it causes the plants cells to elongate. Many strictly organic back yard gardeners use it on their tomatoes and squash! It also tends to hold plants back from flowering, so it should be discontinued once you get close to flower time, unless you're growing in a climate where a harvest in late Oct, or Nov, is acceptable. Indoors, just discontinue 2 to 3 weeks prior to cutting the light cycle to trigger flowering. If you drink wine, you're drinking a product produced from grapes grown (world wide) using Gibberellic acid to increase yield! Bet you didn't know that, did you?

I'm a commercial walnut grower, and as such, have access to more, and more accurate, information that some of you do, that's why I know about the Gib, as we call it. All commercial growers in CA deal with a supplier of fertilizers, pesticides and other ag amendments, and we're assigned a Pest Control Advisor (PCA) who has been university trained, so I have him as a resource when I need accurate information, or something that is, otherwise, not easy to get.

And it also shows me just how bad you guys are being ripped off for your ferts & ammendments, most of which are 3 to 4 times more expensive than they are when I buy them thru my PCA. I'm currently sitting on a gallon of Gibberellic Acid at 4%, or 40,000 PPM. This solution is stable forever until it's mixed with H2O. With this solution, you can add 1 ml to 1 liter of H2O and get a 1 PPM solution. Add 150 ml to a liter of H2O, & you have a 150 PPM solution for creating feminized seed. I've seen this stuff on eBay for over $10.00 @ gram (of dry powder that has to be mixed with H2O)! If any of you are interested, I'll sell liters of this 4% (40,000 PPM) solution to anyone who wants some for $40.00 @. That's enough to last you for many years, unless you're growing several hundred plants @ year! Just ask to 'befriend me' thru this site, and it can be arranged. Happy growing........BlueSteve

[bluesteve]

Since I see that there is a lot of misinformation regarding just exactly what Giberrellic Acid is, and what it does, and as no one seems interested enough to do a search and post the facts, I've done so for you. Here is the real truth about it:

Issue 11
July/August 1993
Story Title: Gibberellins - Plant Growth Hormones
Author: Leo Wright

The power of gibberellins to accelerate growth, and to induce or promote flowering, continues to fascinate both amateur botanists and commercial flower growers. One gibberellin is Gibberellic Acid, a natural hormone that can be readily extracted from common plants.

Auxins, cytokinins and gibberellins are the principle growth-promoting hormones found in plants. All three control, stimulate, inhibit, or alter a plant's development to one degree or another, depending upon the external environment. Auxins tend to promote rooting, leaf and fruit retention and directional growth; and cytokinins promote active cell mitosis, ion transport and general plant vigour. Gibberellins are noted as the most powerful of the growth promotors because they increase internode spacing, induce and promote flowering in many plants, and modify the flower sex expression in some plants.

Investigations in Japan in the 1920's of the pathogenic rice fungus Gibberella fujikuroi, which caused rice plants to grow abnormally tall, led to the eventual isolation from the fungus of several types of gibberellins, or growth-promoting hormones, including Gibberellic Acid (GA-3).

Gibberellins are well known to promote uniform growth through cell enlargement. They cause plants to grow tall and elongated, with light green leaves, and also stimulate seed germination and other growth phenomena such as early flower formation.

Flower Induction and Promotion
In many plants flower formation is governed by internal factors; in other plants it is controlled by precise environmental conditions. Some plants initiate flowering after having undergone exposure to a period of cold. In nature, these cold-requiring plants usually flower in spring or early summer, after having been exposed to the cold temperatures of winter.

In other plants, flower formation depends upon day length or photoperiod. Basically, there are two principal photoperiodic plants - "long-day" plants which flower when the day length exceeds a certain minimal value which may vary from one plant to another, and "short-day" plants which exhibit the opposite behaviour, flowering in relatively short days when the photoperiod remains below a certain maximal duration.

Under these conditions, long-day plants flower in summer when the days are longer, and short-day plants flower in autumn and winter when the day length drops below the critical maximum.

Then there are plants that are described as "dual-day length" plants, where they stay vegetative if grown on continuous long day or continuous short day, but flower if exposed either first to long then short days ("long-short-day" plants), or vice versa ("short-long-day" plants). Most cold-requiring plants also have dual environmental requirement, flowering if the low-temperature treatment is followed by a long-day regime.

The phenomenon of cold requirement with regard to flower formation is called "vernalization", and that of day length control as "photoperiodism". The conditions conducive and nonconducive to flower formation in a given plant type have been termed "inductive" and "noninductive", and exposure of cold-requiring and photoperiodic plants to inductive temperatures and photoperiods are called "thermo-induction" and "photo-induction" respectively. In cold-requiring and photoperiodic plants alike, the need for induction may be absolute, whereby the plant will fail to form flowers altogether unless given inductive treatment; or it may be facultative whereby flowering will ultimately occur without induction, although with greater or lesser delay.

The use of gibberellins for cold-requiring and long-day plants can induce or promote flowering to one degree or another. Typical gibberellin responses include larger blooms, stem elongation, flower stalk elongation, and in some cases earlier flowering, which are all desirable elements to commercial flower growers.

Typical Applications
When gibberellic acid is sprayed on gardenia or geranium flowers, there is a 25% -50% increase in flower size. The treatment is used at the rate of 5 mg/L (5ppm) at the time of first colour appearance.

The flowering of cyclamens can be accelerated by 4-5 weeks with a single spray of gibberellic acid, at the rate of 50 mg/L (50ppm), 60-75 days prior to the projected flowerdate (Widmer et al. 1974). Higher concentrations will result in adversely tall and weak flower stems. More recently, Lyons and Widmer (1983) suggest applying 15 gms/L (15ppm) of gibberellic acid to the crown of the plant below the leaves, 150 days after seed is sown.

Gibberellins are popular with commercial growers to replace the cold treatment or long night treatment of plants such as azaleas to induce or force flowering. Standard cultivation techniques require flower-bud induction with about six weeks of long-night treatment. Once flower buds are established, a temperature of 7°C (45°F) or lower is required for six weeks to ensure flower bud development. After this, flowers are forced into bloom in 4-6 weeks. However, a weekly spray treatment of gibberellic acid for five weeks, at a concentration of 1000 gms/L (1000ppm), will result in earlier flowering and larger blossoms. The five consecutive weekly sprays should commence when flower buds are well developed after the short-day treatment.

Hydrangeas, another cold-requiring plant, also respond favourably to gibberellic acid. Using the same five-weekly treatment, the concentration should be reduced to 5-50gms/L (5-50ppm) to ensure earlier flowering and larger blooms.

Gibberellic acid can also be used to delay flowering and to stimulate rapid growth in plants such as geraniums and fuchsia. The treatment requires weekly sprays at the rate of 250gms/L (250ppm) for four weeks.

According to Carlson (1982), gibberellic acid can also be used to produce tree-type geraniums and fuchsia when applied at the rate of 250gms/L (250ppm) two weeks after potting, then once weekly for five weeks.

It should be noted here that the precise function of applied gibberellins to flower formation is not entirely clear since all plants react differently to treatments, and in many cases gibberellins do not promote flower formation.

Sex Expression
Flower sex expression can be modified in some plants by treating seedlings with several growth-regulating substances. With the exception of gibberellin, these substances tend to reduce the number or suppress the development of staminate flowers, and increase the number or accelerate the development of pistillate flowers. In contrast, in the case of cucumbers, gibberellins increase the number of staminate flowers on monoecious cucumbers (plants that have the stamens and the pistils in separate flowers on the same plant), and result in the formation of staminate flowers on gynoecious (female) cucumbers which would otherwise only produce pistillate flowers.

The ultimate effect of a chemical on sex expression would be a complete reversal of flower sex. To validate a flower sex reversal one would have to replace the intial staminate stage with pistillate flowers, or the pistillate stage with staminate flowers in monoecious plants. It has been found that gibberellins will increase the number of staminate flowers in monoecious cucumbers, resulting in the formation of staminate flowers on gynoecious cucumbers which would otherwise only produce pistillate flowers.

Extracting Gibberellic Acid
Although several types of gibberellin are found in plants as natural hormones, Gibberellic Acid (GA-3) is the best known. While it is a natural product of the Asian fungus that destroys rice, growth-promoting substances that are either identical with, or closely related to, gibberellic acid can also be found in common plants such as cucumber, rock melon (cantaloupe), corn, peas and beans, and it can be readily extracted in crude form by amateur botanist.

Edward Pinto, a student at St Peter's Preparatory School in Jersey City, developed a simple and inexpensive procedure for extracting gibberellic acid from common plants, which was reported in American Scientific ( August 1967). As sources of materials, he used the seeds of fresh cantaloupe (rockmelon), fresh wild cucumber, and the dry seeds of corn, peas and three species of bean - pencil rod, lupine and pinto. The cantaloupe and cucumber seeds were dried at room temperature and chopped into particles about 3mm in diameter. The procedure used 200 grams of finely chopped seeds which were soaked for seven days in a solution of acetone (10 parts by volume), isopropyl alcohol (5 parts), ethyl alcohol (2 parts), and distilled water (5 parts), to give a total volume of 110 millilitres. The solution was then poured off and the seed particles rinsed with 40 millilitres of a solution consisting of equal parts of acetone and isopropyl alcohol. The rinsing solution was then added to the first solution, and heated to a temperature of 45°C (113°F)

WARNING: it should be noted that the solution is highly flammable and must not be exposed to an open flame. The heating procedure was continued until the residue evaporated to the consistency of thin tar and was almost dry. The residue was then taken and mixed with 100 millilitres of distilled water and ethyl acetate.

According to Pinto, a key factor to extracting gibberellic acid is to raise the pH of the water to about pH8 (slightly alkaline) - at this pH the gibberellins are soluble in water. The pH was achieved by adding potassium hydroxide, or concentrated pH lower to the solution. The mixture was then shaken for two minutes, and the water drawn off and mixed with another 100 millilitres of ethyl acetate. This procedure was carried out a total of three times.

Now the water was made acidic (pH3) by the addition of hydrochloric acid - at this pH the gibberellins are soluble in ethyl acetate. The solution of acidic water was added to 100 millilitres of ethyl acetate. The water was drawn off and the procedure repeated twice more, after which the ethyl acetate solution was dried to a paste. The tarlike mass was then mixed with about 8 grams of lanolin. The lanolin paste is the final product, and it is applied to plants as a thin coat to the upper surface of each mature leaf, taking care not to damage the plant.

Conclusion
The role of plant hormones is complicated biologically and biochemically, and even today their roles are not fully understood. What works for one plant does not necessarily follow for another. In most cases it is which will signal a homonal response. When applied externally, hormones will influence the organisation of the internal chemistry of the plant cell, and the interaction among cells, but the degree of interaction will still depend upon the plant specie, the stage of plant development and the external environment.

[SmokeMyPiece]

Went diggin for this one huh?

Good stuff man, Deff wanna try this :thumbsup: Dont wanna keep a lot of strains goin at once with clones.

[bluesteve]

If anyone out there needs Gib, I can supply it in liquid form at either 50, or 100 PPM. For 50 PPM, I ask $15.00 @ Qt., and at 100 PPM it's only $25.00 @ Qt., suspended in reverse osmosis filtered water & checked for ph, ready to spray right out of the bottle, & that much can go a very long ways. It will last thru several growing seasons, even if you're trying to go commercial with feminized seed production, as all it takes is one good properly treated female, producing male flowers, to pollinate a huge number of plants, producing thousands of seeds, eh. Contact me at s12345@sbcglobal if you're interested. I've seen it selling for $29.95 for 1/2 gram on the Internet. I offer a much better deal, and if you want a larger quantity, I can make it even cheaper. I can do this because I'm a commercial walnut grower and have access to commercially packaged ferts & ammendments that only commercial farmers can get. And in spite of many postings to the contrary, gibberillic acid is NOT synthetic. It is a naturally occurring plant growth hormone, occurring in nearly all plants to some degree. This Gibb is approved for use on ORGANIC crops. It is used on all the seedless grapes grown, that many of you love & consume regularly. I simply reduce the concentration by adding reverse osmosis filtered water to the product to reduce its strength. If you're still not sure just what gibberillic acid is, then read this from the manufacturer, who makes the product I sell, after adjusting it to the strength needed for feminized cannabis seed production. It can also be used to increase the growth rate of Cannabis at a reduced strength & applied earlier in the season:

Some commonly asked questions on the use of Gibb on table grapes:
1. Whatâ??s the ingredient?
The ingredient is gibberellic acid, a naturally occurring plant growth regulator found in most plant species. Gibberellic acid is produced by the process of fermentation, where a pure strain of the fungus Gibberella fujikorai is grown in an aseptic medium. The unsurpassed quality of this Gibb stems from the highly sophisticated process and unique quality control procedures that the manufacturer uses to make gibberellic acid.

2. How does Gibb work in seedless table grapes?
The active ingredient is gibberellic acid, a natural plant growth regulator found in most plants. Gibberellic acid regulates several different processes in plants. Perhaps the most well known effect of gibberellic acid is to promote the growth and development of plant organs, flowers, fruits, leaves and stems. Seedless table grapes are deficient in gibberellic acid, as the main source of it are the seeds. In seedless grapes, Gibb is applied before bloom to â??stretchâ?� the cluster. The end result of the gibberellic acid regimen is a large, loose cluster, with large and uniformly sized berries that mature evenly. All seedless grapes grown for fresh market are grown with gibberellic acid applications. Currently, many varieties of seeded table grapes are also treated with gibberellic acid, as berry size is also
improved in these varieties.
3. What are the ideal conditions to apply Gibb to grapes (or cannabis-Steve)?
a) Temperature: For Gibb to be absorbed and work in the tissue, the plant metabolism must be active. Thus, very low and very high temperatures must be avoided. Best results are obtained at temperatures between above 60˚F and below 90˚F. In dry hot regions, Gibb is usually applied at night.
b) Slow drying of the spray material allows for higher penetration of ProGibb into the plant tissue. Avoid low relative humidity (less than 40%) and windy conditions. Early mornings and late evenings are usually desirable spraying times, as long as the temperature is adequate.

4. How does Gibb affect the quality of table grapes?
Gibb improves the quality of table grapes by producing a large, loose cluster of well-developed berries. Flavor and aroma develop normally in Gibb treated grapes, providing that adequate cultural practices in the vineyard are followed. It is also important to harvest the grapes at the optimum maturity to attain maximum eating quality by the time the fruit reaches the market. Because a looser cluster is less prone to be attacked by fungal diseases, Gibb-treated grapes may in some cases require less fungicide sprays.

5. Does Gibb use in grapes fit IPM and IFP practices? Does Gibb qualify for organic farming?
The active ingredient in ProGibb (gibberellic acid) is labeled as naturally occurring by the regulatory agencies, and is exempt from tolerance establishments for all crops. Based on the inert ingredients, some of the ProGibb formulations qualify for IPM, IFP and organic farming practices.
7. Do adjuvants enhance Gibb efficacy?
Gibb is formulated to be used without the use of any additives. In many years of research we have found that adjuvants (spreader-stickers, surfactants, etc.) only help in some specific situations. When spraying conditions are ideal, and with good quality water, it is hard to notice the effect of adjuvants. In adverse spraying conditions (windy, dry, high temperatures) it is possible that a nonionic surfactant may help improve coverage and increase absorption. Also, a pH corrector is only necessary if the pH of the water is 8.5 or higher. Caution should be exercised since some surfactants and other additives may cause russet or phytotoxic reactions (burnt leaves-Steve).