Hello my friends!
Have you ever heard of the term "Hermaphrodite"?(Learn how to pronounce it here)
I recently discovered this big tounge twister of a word while doing some research on cannabis cultivation, and I was surprised to find that a single plant can be sprouted as both male and female!
In the cannabis Industry, the female is the most sought after of the two sexes due to it being the plant producing the sticky buds, while the male plant is mainly used for propogation. A single male plant is enough to pollination all the female plants within its area, and is considered a disaster to a crop.
So why dont we want to allow our male plants to pollinate the female plants? Well, when the female plant is left to grow without the intoduction of male pollin, it can produce the flowers(buds) without any seeds! This increases the quantity and quality of the flowers produced.
So what exactly is a Hermaphrodite?
It turns out hermaphroditism is a common thing for certain creatures on earth, acting as a "self fertilization" in some species, while providing others with the ability to be either a female or male during reproduction.
In biology, a hermaphrodite is an organism that has complete or partial reproductive organs and produces gametes normally associated with both male and female sexes.
Source: Wikipedia
So it is not really to suprising to find out that cannabis plants can also grow as hermaphrodites. Although its not that common to grow one with the seeds you can buy from seed banks lately, it is a natural process and some cannabis species will have a higher rate of hermies grown.
Hermaphrodite plants can also occur when a plant experiences alot of stress during seedling stage, or because of the high hermaphrodite rate in the genes of plants in a specific enviromental area.
Can a hermaphrodite plant be useful?
Since the plant contains both male and female genes, it will be possible for it to pollinate any female plants that are close enough to it. Pro growers tend to remove these plants as soon as the show any signs of being a hermie.
Leaving the plant to grow will result in it flowering like a female, but also creating the pollin and seeds of the male.
This has certainly been an intersting topic to find and explore and I hope some of you learned something new today, as I did :)
Want to learn more about cannabis? Head over to Leafly.com!
We shall, by and by, want a world of hemp more for our own consumption.
—John Adams