Creating a hybrid question

Thunderbrain

New Member
Let's say I want to cross a Blueberry with a Jack Herer. Does it make a difference whether I pollinate a female JH from a male BB, or a female BB from a male JH? Can I expect the same results either way, or does a hybrid have more of a tendency to take on the traits of either the mother or the father?

I got some DJ Short Blueberry recently and I'd like to cross it with Sensei Jack Herer. With regular seeds of both I'll probably have both males and females, and I was wondering if the pollination order mattered.;)
 
Kind of but it's kind of complicated. Say you wanted to incorporate a recessive gene trait from the BB into the JH, say purple buds. You would have to grow out a female plant of the BB that shows those genes, and then mate males of the JH against it. So that would be your F1 BB x JH and none of them would show the recessive trait, but if you then crossed the males and females of this cross the next generation would be F2 and the recessive trait would show in 1/4 of them. So you would take the F2 crosses and self-cross them again to make the F3 generation which will be about half purple, the F4 generation would be 3/4 and finally by the F5 the recessive gene will be dominant and present in all of them. But you cannot do this without knowing either parent had the recessive pair, and so in this case since it's flower color, you need the female to be the strain with the recessive gene.

The simplest way would be to open pollenate and growing the seeds from flower that had the characteristics you liked. Then you grow them out, self cross and so on and so forth until the characteristics you like have become stabilized and show in the majority of the plants grown.
 
What stated above is very well done and is simplifying it dramatically. It is way more complicated then that but that is the basic idea very well put.

Specifically the short answer is mixing those 2 could be all over the map including bad stuff...or great stuff!

the long answer...

Crossing two plants for kicks is no big deal. Crossing two plants for a purpose requires a bunch of knowledge. There are very thick very expensive books that explain this stuff.

Before talking about the stuff above you should understand some basic stuff. If you cross 2 things that are relatively similar then you can fairly quickly get something out of it you want. If you go crossing things that are very different then you can get wild stuff depending on the heritage.

There is very clear science on how to achieve improved stable results breeding for traits. It is not special for cannabis, it is how genes work even with people. And a strain cannot be entered into the cannabis cup until it is stable. Stability is the key. An unstable strain is worthless.

Now An F1 as described above is when you cross 2 things for the first time. An F1 is very stable but could be anything (and only from those parents...which could be cloned and breed for a very long time). It is likely very much a middle of the road of the 2 parents but could take on many bad traits of both. Finding a sweet F1 or easier a great F2 as described above are great places to start a breeding program. Then you back breed that into the main line to stabilize the trait you are after. You can stabilize a trait in 6 generations against one parent. To go back into both I think it is more like 10 or so generations to make it stable. If you do not do the correct back breeding (the proper order of linage breeding) the line becomes less stable and you can get anything and do not have a strain.

Crossing 2 F1's makes F2's... see here this is from a website about the guy who figured out the genetics of plants.

genetics1.JPG


So you see the next generation is a wild set of offspring that can be anything. It can take on many great and bad traits from each.

Now that is just messing around with stable lines as the beginning point. Specifically a good breeder starts from a land race strain which is a line that is so old that is genetically evolved to live in a region and is very genetically strong. Northern Lights is a land race that is the root of most anything out there.

F1's are prized as they grow with exceptional vigor and can be very good. Not all are good. When a good F1 is found seed banks will sell them for a good price because they are not good for breeding but amazing to grow. Many designer "strains" are really F1's and they say so on the website and are not a strain.

If you take 2 F1's from different back grounds you are mixing together 4 parents none of which have a strong genetic presence in this mix and the outcome is all over the map.


J.H. is a hybrid of 2 hybrids. So people went out and stabilized many various strains together to make this one. It has a very deep linage. The last few are crossings are a Haze Hybrid and another hybrid of Norther Lights#5 crossed with a special Shiva Skunk #1. This Skunk is another stabilized hybrid made from Northern Lights. So this is crossing a Haze Sativa against a Hybrid that was stabilized and back bread into NL and stabilized again.


Blueberry (not blueberry kush) is an old old Indica strain that has been used all over in many good ways but in no way really is in line with the JH mix. It is the result of taking a cross of two sativas and line breeding them into an indica and stabilizing it against the indica.


The combo of those 2 lines, both of which went in very different directions, may be great...there is a higher likelihood of getting "meh" and a chance of getting a flop.

:goodluck:
 
Thanks, both of you, for all the great information!

I'm not breeding for any particular traits, I just figured I'd try it and see what happens. Each strain by itself is supposed to be fantastic. That would be funny if I crossed them and got dirt weed LOL!

In any case, both of those original strains should be stable, so at least I can count on the results if I breed them with each other, right?
 
So it is highly unlikely it will create ditch weed. It will likely be somewhere in the middle and not worse than either and may be better than one or both. For fun it is worth a shot.

The issue is that combo is pretty varied. so stabilizing that is a mess and may not be a easy place to start from. one wrong move and the Frankenstein monster may go whack and be all over the place.

If you are talking 1 generation no problem, go for it. But don't think this is creating a strain. It is merely an unstable F1 that may be awesome and never reproducible unless you are using very good stable strong strains. Then the F1 might be reachable from very similar but different parents.

For example mixing 2 land race strains that are 100% guaranteed to be a certain thing...you can mix any 2 parents get get basically the same F1.

When you start taking hybrids and making more depth it it you have to know what you are doing otherwise it can get completely unstable and you get anything.


That is what the Jack H. is. They took good stuff, well established, and mixed them up but it was all very similar stuff. It is kind of a piece of art to begin with all on its own.
 
I just bred a Purple Nepalese with another PN that I got as freebies, and according to the source (highgradeseeds.com) it's a land race sativa. It sure looks like one, spindly and skinny, thin leaves, and it's not ready for harvest after 9 weeks (they say it takes 11). I also got a Malawi Gold which turned out to be male, so I pollinated a branch of the PN with that, too, just because I could.

HGS doesn't say where their seeds come from, though, so they could be anything. Anyone have any experience with them? In any case, I took a small larfy bud from the PN yesterday that wasn't going anywhere, and despite the white pistils and few trichomes, it had me walking around the house talking to myself.
:jawdropper:

Whatever it is, I can't wait till it matures, and I'm glad I made seeds.

Even though the plant itself is still not ready for harvest, the buds I pollinated are beginning to pop their seed pods, and I've been picking a few off the plant to check them. The seeds are all brown and healthy looking, but the plant isn't mature yet. Will it hurt the seeds to go another few weeks on the plant, even though they look good now?

I really appreciate all your advice!
 
I just got high and and wanted to add.

Think of it like this.

No 2 things are the same. One of those 2 strains is "better". The combo will land between so it will be better then one and worse than the other.

One strain is getting a bit of a downgrade and one is getting a bit of an upgrade.

Now to get a basically improved strain you have to grow many many different F2's to find traits (usually a single one is targeted) then back breed them to get stability of said trait and hope in the end you have the same potency or better with said trait and not too many downsides.

Do this over and over until it is good again.

Inherently an F1 is going to be somewhere in the middle and if you are lucky it is everything the better one is and plus some great stuff about the weaker one.

That is some serious lottery type luck. There are a lot of genes that can be mucked up.

But like you said starting with those two and a decent F1 should arise...just I recommend stopping there. The only way you move forward is you get some Northern lights and you back breed some wild F2 to that.
 
Well put, crossing to F1s which are both polyhybrids will give you 3-5 phenos of which only 2 or 3 will be worth anything. If you have conditions to keep mothers you keep your ace, clone it and preserve it that way if you cannot stabilize the strain, which is a lot of work and takes years.
 
The only way you move forward is you get some Northern lights and you back breed some wild F2 to that.

Well, I bought some Northern Lights #5 from Marc Emery back in 2003 and I've been smoking it's offspring from clones ever since. I even have a bunch of 13-year-old seeds that I'm going to try to sprout so I can get some fresh ones.

Does that count. or does it have to be the original NL?
 
no Jack H is based on #5. That is golden pony boy.


Do a few hours of research on the proper way to back breed the lineage and you actually could do something.

:goodluck:
 
Now when selecting what you want... know that you are driving towards NL. So for example: try taking something from the Indica Blueberry side and driving that into the NL lineage.

When you get to the F2 stage you could find a good looking blueberry plant and grow it out a few times to confirm its potency and vigor and immune system is good and the stalks grow strong. Then when you found the girl you want that is driven back into the NL#5. Or you could try driving it first into JH and then driving that int NL#5 and it would be a deep heritage.

So it may take a few grows at the F2 stage, including a few clone grows, to get the right girl to drive back into the line.

So that gives you a few grows before you have to really figure out how to back breed.
 
I really appreciate all the advice, but I'm not trying to create a stable hybrid. I'm growing for personal use only, and once I get a good female I'll just keep cloning her, with seeds as a backup, like conradino says, in case something happens to the clone momma. I've been growing that NL5 from clones for a long time, so I have the experience to keep a line going once I like it.

I learned a lot from your replies and I think I know what to expect now. :thumb:

As to the seeds on my purple nepalese, even though the plant itself is still not ready for harvest, the buds I pollinated are beginning to pop their seed pods, and I've been picking a few off the plant to check them. The seeds are all brown and healthy looking, but the plant isn't mature yet. Will it hurt the seeds to go another few weeks on the plant, even though they look good now?
 
Great info. :thumb:

To explain the meaning of the letters used (I stole this from elsewhere - where it was was also stolen from elsewhere)

F0 or P: The parents selected to start a breeding program. Often referred to as P1 and P2, but this is incorrect.

F1: the first cross between two unrelated parents. The F stands for filial, and refers to the fact that all F1 progeny of the same cross are full brothers and sisters to one another.

S1: The first selfed generation. Selfing an S1 produces an S2, etc. Anecdotal evidence indicates that continued selfing to the S3 and S4 produces plants so weak that they must be handled very carefully.

R1's (aka Reversed F1's): When feminized pollen is used to pollinate a different female than the pollen donor. R1's will tend to act like a tradional male x female cross, only all female, while S1's appear to have some different properties that are not yet fully understood. Early reports indicatee that S1's are more consistent than R1's on average, but there are many exceptions, and more research is needed.

BC1 or Bx1: The first backcross generation, ie when an F1 or R1 progeny is crossed back to an F0 parent. Backcrossing can increase the influence of either parent, but continued backcrossing is too much inbreeding, according to both DJ Short and Rezdog, and should be used rarely if at all. One or two backcrosses followed by full-sib mating has beena successful strategy for many breeders, including the creator of Northern Lights.

These terms can be combined for shortand pedigrees. A second backross, followed by three generations of sib-mating, may be represented as a BC2-F3 generation.



A question- for whoever. I look at all the seed banks out there and there are dozens if not hundreds of 'new strains', new ones coming out all the time. A whole smorgasbord of critical tutti-frutti diesel poison purple mega mass/ whatever. It seems unlikely that all these strains gave been carefully bred for years and years somewhere and are just coming out now. How much breeding do you think goes into most of this stuff before it can be put on the market? Without the breeder having to flee the country after, that is?
 
Yeah this is all basic genetics. There is a ton of science. This is not magic, but there is a lot of expensive college courses to get through to be an expert in this.

Now Genetic science is something we are still learning about but we do understand the basics of how they mix, how they degrade and how they can be combined to be improved. All the numbers and letters as stated above mean something. If you understand the code someone can write out for you how to breed to success a stable line in the steps using that code. I have seen them like 15 years ago. I smoked a lot since then. I am sure it is on the net somewhere. And those are general guides that will get you stability.

But again it all comes back to the Parents. Starting with Pure breeds is much easier to get what you want. Starting with a couple of muts from the pound may not yield a prize winning poodle.
 
Most of those say F1.

Give a good read. The place I order from...all the stuff that is cheap is F1. The Land races are spendy. They give great deals on Auto Femed F1's becasue they are genetic garbage for breeding. great for a single grow but you wouldn't do anything with it but waste time breeding.

In fact probably 1/3 to half of what they have on there is F1. the other half is some stable hybrids and then some expensive Landrace but only like 3 they will sell.

Now there are a lot of pot heads. I could explain ways to speed up the process and you can get it down to just 2-3 years to nail a stable strain. But that is given you have a plan and know exactly what you are driving for and a decent amount of space...like 4 veg zones of 20 plants.

But give a good read on these things. You will find they are not stable strains and they admit it up front and they are less expensive and are usually the bomb. An F1 inherently grows faster bigger and yields more. If they find a good F1 it is the BOMB.

Most food grown industrially is F1. All corn out there is F1 copied seed. These companies have it nailed to a science and are growing things supper fast.

I looked up I think on Crop kings once a solid land race I wanted to use and it was like $105 for a 5 pack. You can get top of the line 10 packs of F1's for $30.

If you know a bit about genetics the prices start to make some sense.
 
You hooked me on a good topic on a good day. I like talking about this. I used to breed back in the 90's. My roommate was a horticulturalist Degree'd from the same university where I got my engineering degree. We scientifically worked together on lots of stuff.

I made many mistakes so I know some stuff now.
 
AND!!!

I talk about this on here about once every 2 weeks. Usually it is someone with no idea what they have and they want to mix that with something that is a messed up F1 and its like whoa Nelly.

This guy here...2/3rds of one parent is NL#5 and he has NL#5.

This guy is not a waste to talk to.
 
I read somewhere sees banks intentionally release S2 hybrids of strains they made so that people cannot simply self pollenate and recreate the strain?

I have been checking out ACE seeds strains because they have some amazingly unique looking genetics. I looked up some of the more common breeding methods and realized logistically I wouldn't be able to do it. Way too many clones and veg areas to keep.

I was going to go at it much like the OP where he is keeping one mother. I just wanted to open pollenate a whole tent full of different genetics, grow the seed out and take clones, then find which one made the best smoke and keep cloning off of it.

I think they even sell breeders packs. In any case you can tell by the way their seeds are priced... Regulars are twice as much as feminized, because they know people are going to be crossing the regulars.
 
Good genetics...Not necessarily good quality for a single grow...but real strong stable genetics is spendy. Good F1's are the BOMB and you will enjoy them but you get craziness when breeding them. You get what you pay for. In general there is a reason some stuff is more spendy. If you can go independent from the purchase they will charge more.


Now all that said...the first step to breeding good stuff is finding a great F1.

SO!!!!


Lets say you like Mexican Sativa. You go find a seed bank that will sell a land race Mexican Sativa and an F1 that is a cross of stuff including the same Mexican line. Then they have done a lot of hard work for you and weeded out the first stage.

Take that F1 and the parent land race and you can get a jump start.

:thumb:
 
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