Personal opinions wanted on early sexing of plants..worth it or not??

[Matty101]

Planning to sex 12 young marijuanna plants on week 5..wondering if putting them through the shock is worth finding and tossing the males leaving more room and sunlight for females..please give me your personal opinion..thank you

 

[dphipps1020]

I've never sexed mine like that before, I usually just wait until they get old enough and show signs. If you want to sex them early, you can always take a clone and sex that. We usually cut off trimmings that would make good clones anyway when we set up our manifolds. Why not make one a clone, plant it after it has roots, and flower that? No point in wasting it right? Just another possible option if you have the space for it. I'm not sure about how it affects the plants if you change the lighting and switch back so I can't really offer advice there. I'm sure some of the others here have done it and can share their results. Happy growing

 

[Woodsman67]

My personal opinion. And it's free so your getting your money's worth. Week 3 to 4 preflowers are present, week 5 they are generally easy to see with aid of magnifier. I would never induce flowering to sex a plant, your losing a month of growth. 2 weeks going to flower, 2 weeks reverting to veg. A male pre flower always has a stem, like a spade on cards. Females are usually the last to put up an actual pistill but males are usually fairly well defined early. I am sure I have pulled the plug on an iffy plant that may of been female, but I have no regerts 😄

 

[vostok]

I've never sexed mine like that before, I usually just wait until they get old enough and show signs. If you want to sex them early, you can always take a clone and sex that. We usually cut off trimmings that would make good clones anyway when we set up our manifolds. Why not make one a clone, plant it after it has roots, and flower that? No point in wasting it right? Just another possible option if you have the space for it. I'm not sure about how it affects the plants if you change the lighting and switch back so I can't really offer advice there. I'm sure some of the others here have done it and can share their results. Happy growing

This is my method and the one I recommend, as it makes the grower understand about much of clones and timing,

 

[Gingerbeard]

A little something-something I read on GWE about real early sexing. If the stipules are crossing, good chance it's a female. The article said it might be a little wonky. In my limited experience, 25 or so plants, it's been 100%. Two were fem. Two were auto. All others were bagseed.

 

[Obi-Wan]

I’ve only run a full round of regular seeds once, I’m currently starting round 2. So here’s what I did and what I’m going to change for round 2.

First time around I dropped 12 seeds dropped and got 11 seedlings. I Vegged them longer than I wanted to hoping to determine sex but in my inexperience I was unable to definitively determine male from female. I had hunches which mostly held true in the end but there was a male I thought was female and a female I thought was male. I ended up taking clones of all 11 plants and keeping all 11 plants until 2 weeks into 12/12 when I could accurately determine sex. I got 6 females from the 11 plants and discarded the male clones along with their fathers.

For round 2 I’m going to Veg for 6 weeks which is my preferred veg time and train them all as if they are all female. I’ll take clones of all 12 and then flip all of my little darlings into 12/12. I’ll pull the males as they show definitive sex and discard their clones, when it’s all said and done I’ll have x number of females trained and vegged the way I want them in week 2ish of 12/12.

Having said all that, I have determined that my 2x4 tent will be my sexing/observation tent for the foreseeable future. I also have a 3x3 that will act as a “Clone Tent” where I can do all female runs to keep up my storage quotas, as well as a 2x2 mother tent to house any keeper genetics I find in my various new seed runs.

If you don’t have the space to let them veg to where you want them before sexing you should consider feminized seeds for your next run. Otherwise make space to keep female clones from this run. Running regular seeds will require more grow space until you can accurately identify males from females at the earliest signs of sexual maturity.

 

[Obi-Wan]

My experience was different. 3 of my females didn’t show crossed stipules and 3 did. It could very well be a product of genetics but if I had followed that same advice I’d be getting ready to harvest 3 Jedi OG rather than 6.

 

[Woodsman67]

I think alot of the old wives tales or growing myths about stipule shape, length or even crossing has a lot of base in fact. I'll start noting how often this occurs, interesting thanks for sharing

 

[SoOrbudgal]

Matty101 You could do it and I would train just like Obi-wan does. You are taking on a huge task if you stay diligent with the grow and have enough room for 1gal. pots as these grow going to up pot them anyway. I would do it but I have enough room and pots ready to do so. I would treat them all as females, save the lost soil from the males :bashful:

 

[Jordann]

For the light change I start plants on 12 12 till they show sex around 3 or 4 weeks and soooooon as I know they go into the veg tent. The only true way I know how to early sex. Never did any damages to them since they're so small when the reveg.

 

[Jordann]

I've used cuttings from topping and trimming and just throw them into a bottle with no light for the stem in water and change water every few days with shaken up well oxignated water and less than 10 hours light in a day and they will last about a month in water with no roots and usually start to flower after 10 or so days. I've used this in the past when I don't start my bagseed on 12 12 till they sex themselves then immediately into 18 6 and never lose much growing time that way.