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This time I am aiming to produce seeds. I have grown Pure AK (AK-48) three times now. This will be the fourth but I probably won't let it flower very long because I want to grow something else. But I also don't want to lose these genetics, so before I call it quits (for now) on Pure AK, I want to produce my own seeds.
Never done this before. Everyone says use distilled water, I didn't. Just tap water. Generated Ionic Silver for about 60 minutes under 26mA current and 99.99% silver wire.
It's cloudy and by no means would I consume this. I think for my needs which is just to trigger production of pollen sacks, this should do the job.
Every morning and evening I will apply a healthy dose until male organs appear. And if I did this right I can apply the pollen to that other clone I took. And it will self pollinate itself.
In addition to what I think may be early stage seeds I am also noticing a sweet smell that reminds me of honeysuckle. I'm not seeing balls/nanners or male flowers. But I think maybe early stage seeds (compare week 5 and 6 photos).
This strain has a very strong smell, but I think it's getting less strong since last week.
I was about to call this a fail. But now I'm not so sure. Am I seeing signs of seed development and make traits? Is it becoming a hermie?
Still waiting on seeds on other plant and lower branches. Took the good buds. Going to seed out what remains. Expect seeds to be ready in 5-6 weeks. Will cut when seeds start to drop. Also added dark construction paper to catch falling pollen.
Anyone know if there is an industry standard to grading seeds? I have harvested femenized seeds of various sizes, shapes, colors, and condition (see my grow diary). Probably going to try and sprout some of the worst seeds just to see which are garbage or not.
Commercial seed sorting is done by dropping seed past an air jet and any light weight ones that blow away are deemed "unworthy" as indicated by their lightness. All "full" and heavy seeds pass through the air jet and fall into collection tubs and are deemed "saleable".
Seeds are usually harvested a certain amount of days from/after pollination or after manual examination and usually a combination of both.
In my own breeding experiments, winnowing on a windy day is good for getting rid of light weight and unviable seeds.
As to determining if seed quality relates to plant quality, it seems there are no connections. As long as a seed germinates and sprouts, the resulting plant that emerges can be just as high quality as one coming from a light coloured seed or dark seed.
It is confidence inspiring to plant the biggest and darkest seeds first, however, there is no guarantee of dark seed = good plant.
I usually use the lighter coloured seeds for germination tests. Doing side by side tests with light coloured seeds against darker ones from the same plant, I have generally achieved identical germination percentages, with 99% being common with fresh seeds.
White and/or greenish seeds are definitely no good, but anything from light brown to black are good.
Using pollen from hermaphroditic females will not be feminised, but regular seeds that when in flower will have genetic dominance to being hermaphrodite plants themselves. Feminised seeds are created with chemical manipulation, or can occur if pollen is collected from stamens/bananas which have appeared on female plants very late in flowering and very sparsely, perhaps 10 or so on the entire plant, that is, one or two stamen per flower and maybe only half a dozen flowers on the entire plant. Any male flowers that appear in bunches and at multiple sites, these are the text book definition of hermaphrodite.
Remember too, when it comes to using your own seeds, don't use all the best ones first, keep some better seeds for future plantings.
Hope this helps,..........
Organoman.
420Coder
