My Unoriginal Ideas on Stabilizing your own Variety of Cannabis

[suzy cremecheese]

My Unoriginal Ideas on Stabilizing your own Variety of Cannabis...

while minimally compromising genetic diversity.

Small numbers are the biggest obstacle to plant breeding so we have to do the best we can without spending life in prison.

The first thing I would suggest would be to use as many plants as your nerve allows. There have been other posts on gradually working your way through each subsequent generation to keep plant numbers down so I wont get to into that here. Its a hell of a compromise and it will slow down progress a bit but at least the time is still yours.

My recomendation would be to use all healthy individuals in the P generation. Grow out as many F1 seeds as possible. Only cull the undesirables from this generation. Start with more than you plan on keeping to adulthood and cull the least vigourous so that you end up with (insert your comfortable population number here) of the most vigourous. Assuming you used mostly unrelated IBLs for your P generation the F1s should be fairly uniform. Allow these to bulk pollinate. In both generations keep and start an equal amount of seed from every female to ensure your not doing any unintended selection at this point.

Now grow out as many F2s as possible. If you plan to finish with about 100 plants for example start 200-500 or more and cull the least vigourous in the seedling stage. Grow out your F2 generation. At this stage cull the males so you can test and select from more females while keeping your plant numbers down.

Decide what your goals are. Look at the (insert your comfortable population number here) females you have and decide what you like and dont like about them. Is there a trait in one of the original parents that you dont see yet that your searching for? Then cull the undesirable females and start more seed from your F1s. Select your keepers based on a preplanned strategy. Try not to pick 6 criteria for selection. Pick one or two that you insist on having in your finshed stabilized line. You will be more successful this way. Keep starting more F2 seedlings until youve found enough keepers to almost satisfy half of your maximum population. 40 is a good minimum. More is always better.

Now start more F2 seeds and find enough males to almost satisfy half of your maximum population. You dont need to cull males ruthlessly. If they are vigourous and healthy they are good enough. This will help preserve some genetic diversity in your line and your not breeding for potent or stinky males your breeding for females that are so worthwhile everyone will want a cut of the keeper. The frequency of any undesirable traits in your population will be reduced by the culling of the females that carry them and will be less and less likely to appear in every generation and be carried by males as you proceed. Bulk pollinate all your selected F2 females with the F2 males you selected.

You can repeat this F2 step for every generation to follow. By using as many plants as possible and not selecting for too many traits at a time you will preserve enough genetic diversity so that inbreeding depression will never be an issue. Always make many more seeds than you think you will need. It goes without saying that hermies should always be one of your culling criteria.

~Focus on one or two traits
~Dont start your selection before the F2. Bulk your P generation and your F1
~Do your best to have an equal number of males and females contributing to each generation
~Always use an equal amount of seed from each mother to insure your not doing any unintended selection
~Dont worry about crossing f2 to f4 or backcrossing or anything fancy. Nature stabilized varieties long before we did and this is the way she did it. If you find you lose a trait somewhere along the way you can go back to previous generations to try and recover it (if you saved seed) but other than that advanced techniques shouldnt be neccessary.

When it comes to breeding, at least using traditional techniques, most of us dont have access to the latest technology, stablizing is pretty straight forward but it is all a crap shoot. You might be selecting for something unsuccessfully. Something that might be environmental. Always evaluate and reevaluate your selection criteria to make sure your moving in the right direction and not spinning your wheels.

Your variety should be stable for the traits you select after only a few more generations provided you chose criteria that resonds well to selection. If you didnt it will take longer.

You can continue inbreeding if you choose to or create a second IBL from unrelated parents and then work on your new F1 hybrid.

To whom it may concern,
This isnt gospel this is my idea from the experience and education I've had. So if you disagree or have something to add please by all means feel free to respectfully do so. While both are valuable I always prefer discussions to tutorials.

 

[dert]

Hi Suzy,

That is some great info there. On a related note, I have a question regarding vigor, and specifically vigor as a selected trait versus hybrid vigor.

So the point of large breeding n's is to keep as much genetic diversity in the strain and avoid inbreeding depression. Can inbreeding depression be thought of as homozygosity? Such that more homozygous traits equals less vigor in general?

The reason I ask is to compare the hypothetical situation. Let's say we take 2 very unrelated P1 starins and take them to F6 selecting for potency and only potency. If we cross these 2 heavily inbred lines, I think one would expect robust heterosis.

Now if we take the same two parent lines, and select for vigor (and only vigor) for a number of generations and repeat the cross, would you expect less heterosis than in the first case? And more or less vigor in general?

I have been curious about this for a while, so if anyone has any insight i would love to hear it!

 

[clips]

very good post suzy. i have worked a cple strains over the past years . one in particular stoneybaloney/g13nl ive taken to f-4s and have em over several different parental lines keeping males and females seprately and keeping em in order. some which ive been selecting phenos for seperate 6 lines which later on can be re combined incase certain traits are lossed . ive even done bx a f-3 to one the orig mothers which gave outstanding results with vigour compared to f-2s f-3s and f-4s . i beleive key to stabelizing is def carring a strain along seperate paths so can be recombined later for that hybrid vigour .another line which ive been working on is bwg [blackwidow x pacific cut ] pacific made thus far has been taken to f-4s and currently working the backcrossing end may take a few years to achieve my goals and orig breeders intent one day should be in stable form where majority of seeds started grow out very similiar to orig pacific's cut clone so far ide say im bout 60% there .ill keep checking this post tis a good one chat ya later clips

btw one key for beginner breeder is to make plenty seeds initially with as many parents so not to bottleneck future work ;)

 

[suzy cremecheese]

So the point of large breeding n's is to keep as much genetic diversity in the strain and avoid inbreeding depression.

Yes but it isnt limited to those two points. The most important point is the preservation of broad genetic base of the Cannabis species. Cannabis has evolved to be what it is all over the planet. The many uses of Cannabis is a product of its incredible diversity.

When 1-1 matings are passed around privately and commercially and new 1-1 lines are worked from the progeny etc etc. Seletion only removes information. It never adds any.

We hear all the time that the war on drugs is a failure. Well in many respects it is, but if it continues like this for another 100 years it may be a horrible success. When the reproduction of a species is limited in the way that Cannabis is, in terms of plant numbers, breeding, growing, the eradication and spraying of herbicides on wild and cultivated populations, and all of this on a global scale, potentially valuable alleles are lost faster than we can count them.

Many seeds of many crops, such as corn, rice, and numerous other plants are preserved and regularly duplicated to prevent the loss of genetic diversity in crops that dont have to deal with such oppression. Scientists fear the loss of valuable alleles in crops like rice... Crops that feed half the planet and can be grown freely!

Anyway this isnt what your looking for but I had to get it out. The war on drugs may be a success if it is allowed to go long enough and Cannabis wont be the only plant that will suffer for it. Imagine that. Only synthetic drugs to get high on! Doesnt that make you feel safe.

Can inbreeding depression be thought of as homozygosity? Such that more homozygous traits equals less vigor in general?

Homozygosity isnt necessarily a bad thing, but when you end up with a plant or a population that is homozygous for a deleterious or lethal allele it can be a big problem and a dead end in your inbred line. The type of inbreeding depression your talking about is common in cross pollinated crops but different crops suffer from it in different degrees. When two inbred populations, (corn for example) that might be suffering from an accumulation of homozygosity at a good portion of their loci, are crossed the result is hybrid vigor. The more a population appears to suffer from inbreeding depression the more it appears to rebound with hybrid vigor. Its all relative right?

I've heard from a number of folks that experiment with inbreeding cannabis and most of them have said that they dont believe Cannabis suffers from it, at least not to the same degree as corn. Most likely the problem is an accumulation of harmful alleles that arent being masked any longer by healthy dominant alleles.

Let's say we take 2 very unrelated P1 starins and take them to F6 selecting for potency and only potency. If we cross these 2 heavily inbred lines, I think one would expect robust heterosis.

Its a definite possibility. However one thing to keep in mind is that potency is a trait that is controlled by a number of alleles. From what I understand we can expect heterosis however I've never bred two IBLs and crossed them to try and measure it so I have to assume that the observations from others at this point is accurate.

Now if we take the same two parent lines, and select for vigor (and only vigor) for a number of generations and repeat the cross, would you expect less heterosis than in the first case? And more or less vigor in general?

Good question. Assuming Cannabis benefits from heterosis I would expect more vigor in the hybrids but yes less than in the first case. My reasoning is that the main reason we see what we think is hybrid vigor in cannabis is because of the accumulation of deleterious alleles. You will probably accumulate more when breeding for potency because we are neglecting vigor during the breeding process and possibly accumulating harmful alleles at loci that might be linked to the potency alleles we are breeding for.

I honestly dont know though. This is just speculation on my part and I'd love to see the details of an experiment that went in this direction.

I have been curious about this for a while, so if anyone has any insight i would love to hear it!

Id like to hear what others have to say about this as well.

i have worked a cple strains over the past years . one in particular stoneybaloney/g13nl ive taken to f-4s and have em over several different parental lines keeping males and females seprately and keeping em in order. some which ive been selecting phenos for seperate 6 lines which later on can be re combined incase certain traits are lossed .

Wow. Thats alot of work I'm very impressed.

ive even done bx a f-3 to one the orig mothers which gave outstanding results with vigour compared to f-2s f-3s and f-4s

Is it possible that the loss of vigor is from an accumualtion of deleterious alleles due to selection? I'm surprised that your seeing a loss of vigor in the F2s. I wouldnt mind if you didnt answer this question publicly but I have to ask what kind of genetic base you started with. Did you start with adequate plant numbers? How much selection pressure did you exert on each generation?

another line which ive been working on is bwg [blackwidow x pacific cut ] pacific made thus far has been taken to f-4s and currently working the backcrossing end may take a few years to achieve my goals and orig breeders intent one day should be in stable form where majority of seeds started grow out very similiar to orig pacific's cut clone so far ide say im bout 60% there

I'm curious why you took the line to F4 before starting your backcrosses. Were you having trouble finding the phenotypes you were looking for in the earlier generations? The other reson I imagine you would do this would be becaause you selected particular phenotype and inbred it for a generation or two and then resorted to the backcross. That sounds like alot of selection pressure and leads me to believe thats why your seeing significantly reduced vigor. However considering your goals your methods make sense. I'm not knocking them just thinking about them outloud and asking questions.

Using the backcross technique to recreate a clone can be hell on the genetic base of your line. You understand the original intention of the backcross was to fix one or two traits that werent controlled by many genes right?

i beleive key to stabelizing is def carring a strain along seperate paths so can be recombined later for that hybrid vigour

Interesting. I would think that, if cannabis does benefit from heterosis, that this might not have as a profound effect since the lines are still closely related.

one key for beginner breeder is to make plenty seeds initially with as many parents so not to bottleneck future work

Very important point. However many breeders have a bottleneck right from the start when they choose to start their projects with 1-1 matings.

Thanks for bringing so much experience to the thread. I look forward to reading more about your work.

 

[Buckwheat]

Nice thread Suzy. I wish I had the playground to do it right.

What are your thoughts if you want to stablize or duplicate a clone only strain.
How do you feel about using STS or Silver Colloidal?

 

[suzy cremecheese]

I wish I had the playground to do it right.

You and every other Cannabis horticulturist...

(EDIT TO ADD) BTW I've seen your variety show so I'm not so sure your playground isnt partially adequate for small scale bulks. I understand its difficult to choose between variety for enjoyment and breeding.

What are your thoughts if you want to stablize or duplicate a clone only strain. How do you feel about using STS or Silver Colloidal?

I think it is very difficult to dublicate a clone only. I dont think the backcross method works as well as some might think. Although Clips strategy sounds like the best one I've heard yet I havent heard that many.

As far as STS goes, I'm all for it. However from what I understand Your going to end up with all female seed anyway, theres no Y chromosome to pass on, so your going to have to get a male from somewhere eventually unless your content to just check out the limited diversity you have in that single plant.

 

[clips]

Quote:
Originally Posted by clips
i have worked a cple strains over the past years . one in particular stoneybaloney/g13nl ive taken to f-4s and have em over several different parental lines keeping males and females seprately and keeping em in order. some which ive been selecting phenos for seperate 6 lines which later on can be re combined incase certain traits are lossed .

Wow. Thats alot of work I'm very impressed.

~thanks suzy but lots of work yet to do and lots of learning to be had..im a hobbiest at best.ive watched your post and have learned alot among others .


Quote:
Originally Posted by clips
ive even done bx a f-3 to one the orig mothers which gave outstanding results with vigour compared to f-2s f-3s and f-4s

Is it possible that the loss of vigor is from an accumualtion of deleterious alleles due to selection? I'm surprised that your seeing a loss of vigor in the F2s. I wouldnt mind if you didnt answer this question publicly but I have to ask what kind of genetic base you started with. Did you start with adequate plant numbers? How much selection pressure did you exert on each generation?

~now on stb/13 its genetic make up is tangerine x c99 x kali one of stp's gems stoneybaloney .now with the spread of a hybrid mess tis hard nuff finding what ya want but one in the bunch touched me so reason for work with it def a flair of taste .a friend used a airbourne g13nl line which was bred to nl by ncga to out cross with . from these he gave me 6 seed intially[very lil to work with i know] but 5 alike and very normal and one i kept as due to its high potentcy level and flavour ,growth wise has lot to be desired lol. now vigour in f-2s wasnt too bad but the f-3s and f-4 def showed less vigour and lots of varibleness .now when i took em to f-2 i used 3 mums and one male to give me enuff to play with so . the orig breeder of stb/13 sent me a additionals of f-2s he made i used with mine to get enuff selection to work into f3s . had went through roughly 100 winding down to a handfull these or so with one male in that round to f-3 . for the f-4s i used 1 male with 6 ladies each plants seeds are kept seperate and ran seperately. with selection i basically kept all i could and picked the best of the phenos that presented themselves mainly to see how the one male bred with each . time will tell with future but far as ive gotten .


Quote:
Originally Posted by clips
another line which ive been working on is bwg [blackwidow x pacific cut ] pacific made thus far has been taken to f-4s and currently working the backcrossing end may take a few years to achieve my goals and orig breeders intent one day should be in stable form where majority of seeds started grow out very similiar to orig pacific's cut clone so far ide say im bout 60% there

I'm curious why you took the line to F4 before starting your backcrosses. Were you having trouble finding the phenotypes you were looking for in the earlier generations? The other reson I imagine you would do this would be becaause you selected particular phenotype and inbred it for a generation or two and then resorted to the backcross. That sounds like alot of selection pressure and leads me to believe thats why your seeing significantly reduced vigor. However considering your goals your methods make sense. I'm not knocking them just thinking about them outloud and asking questions.

Using the backcross technique to recreate a clone can be hell on the genetic base of your line. You understand the original intention of the backcross was to fix one or two traits that werent controlled by many genes right?

~well i wanted to keep each seperate the reason of back cross was to return to the mother plant in seed form versus the bwg x pg line which basically being bred as orig through the generations .wasnt for correction but to ibl over the generations to solid stability figger 5-6 gens should get her right .now with the bx i used a f-1 male bwg with this showed the recesiveness in the bx1 seeds and had some traits not desired . one reason am continue with the bx the next round will use a f-2 or later bred male ill be running f2 ,f-3,f-4's to find what will work best .basically restarting the process def got some good results but can do better . no better teacher then trial and error main goal in bxig was to get clone to seed form unlike the bwg line showing either side of parental influences .not the right way but works for me .


Quote:
Originally Posted by clips
i beleive key to stabelizing is def carring a strain along seperate paths so can be recombined later for that hybrid vigour

Interesting. I would think that, if cannabis does benefit from heterosis, that this might not have as a profound effect since the lines are still closely related.

~ ya might have a good issue on that one thing ill learn as i go along hehehe


Quote:
Originally Posted by clips
one key for beginner breeder is to make plenty seeds initially with as many parents so not to bottleneck future work

Very important point. However many breeders have a bottleneck right from the start when they choose to start their projects with 1-1 matings.

~ i can agree there but with todays times and fears and small cab and closets and small growrooms all any grower can do is take the time to work what they got . one thing im finiding takes me while to go through the numbers whether personally or at locals gardens and taking selected cuts from them ,one benefit they get genetics i get selection but takes time with smaller crops ran then a giant field or lab .

Thanks for bringing so much experience to the thread. I look forward to reading more about your work.

~thank you for calibrating minds may be awhile for more i move rather slow hehehe

enjoy and ill chat ya later clips

btw i have to agree with your intial post makes the most sense

 

[suzy cremecheese]

btw i have to agree with your intial post makes the most sense

I will go through your last post again when I have more time but until then "there is more than one way to skin a cat." Sorry skitty.

 

[suzy cremecheese]

thanks suzy but lots of work yet to do and lots of learning to be had..im a hobbiest at best.

Well unless were working for hortipharm or a university I think thats all we can call ourselves. Some more enthusiastic than others.

from these he gave me 6 seed intially[very lil to work with i know] but 5 alike... now when i took em to f-2 i used 3 mums and one male to give me enuff to play with... had went through roughly 100 winding down to a handfull these or so with one male in that round to f-3... for the f-4s i used 1 male with 6 ladies...

I just cut some tidbits out of this paragraph but I think this might be why your seeing the reduction in vigor. I don't have the background in Cannabis breeding to back this idea up, but based on my experience and education with other plants, I think your either over doing the culling, starting with too few seeds, or both. Especially in the male department. I'm not knocking your work I know the extent that youve taken this to is very difficult especially considering plant number maximums. Its just my observation.

with selection i basically kept all i could and picked the best of the phenos that presented themselves mainly to see how the one male bred with each

Understandable strategy. My next question was going to be why do you rely on one male at almost every turn in your program. I see after this statement but how about this... Why not use at least 2 or 3 or more males. Keep their progeny seperate and then by evaluating the female progeny, after crossing them with a variety of females, you will know if one of the males was a dog or not and can cull it, or toss the rest of the seeds from the crosses you made with him. Right now your comparing the results of only one male crossed with many females. If you had multiple males youd be able to evaluate if you were selecting the right ones.

This is why I encourage people to skip the male culling and evaluating. If your inclined to do the work keep the progeny from various males seperate and you can do great pedigree selection but this requires more plant numbers. If you bulk pollinate with all healthy males you can be sure the best males will be represented in the progeny.

not the right way but works for me .

If it works for you then its the right way.

i can agree there but with todays times and fears and small cab and closets and small growrooms all any grower can do is take the time to work what they got

Thats my point though. All small breeders should be working what theyve got. Working all of their males and making a serious effort, for the sake of the species, to maintain as much genetic diversity as possible. How many lines start with less than 10 total plants and only one male and how many lines come out of that line and do the same thing? The result is the gradual loss of genetic diversity. Especially when everyone is doing it, even some commercial breeders. The war on drugs may not be as big a failure as everyone thinks.

may be awhile for more i move rather slow

How can we do anything but move slow when we have severe limitations on plant numbers? Part of the problem is people try to move faster in spite of the limitations.

i have to agree with your intial post makes the most sense

It makes sense. It applies well to cross pollinated crops. I'm sure your work will result in some quality keepers and overall be considered a success. Its important to me that I repeat that I'm not knocking your work. It is a means to an end and unfortunatly most hobby breeders succesfully reach this end. It is unfortunate because since this "works" no one is motivated to preserve the diversity of the species. This isnt a something that one person or group can accomplish. Its something that everyone needs to be aware of.

I know when I came to the laughing moon boards years ago I was clueless. I was in awe of people like Mr. Soul, Sly, Vic and Chimera... I still am. I learned alot from them and they motivated me to get a very expensive education in this field. I wonder if I'll ever work off the debt , but it was worth it. I hope that there are some young newbs out there now that take what I'm saying seriously and persue the same path as me because they love this species and dont want to see it even partially lost to the war on drugs.

 

[clips]

great replies i think ill revist some earlier batches and use as many males as i can then adding more can only be a good thing . i test several males till i see they pass on the traits i like ,then usually settling one to continue on. i can see where traits can be lost by not useing as many as possible . thanks for the post ill chat ya later clips

 

[suzy cremecheese]

i can see where traits can be lost by not useing as many as possible

The problem though isnt just the traits. It is the alleles that we dont even notice are gone. They may not do anything meaningful right now but they may be important to the future of species... for example, to scratch the surface, resistance to some type of insect or pathogen problem. They may even be the alleles that allow us to make an even more potent plant, or a plant that may satisfy a particualr medical need.

 

[clips]

The problem though isnt just the traits. It is the alleles that we dont even notice are gone. They may not do anything meaningful right now but they may be important to the future of species... for example, to scratch the surface, resistance to some type of insect or pathogen problem. They may even be the alleles that allow us to make an even more potent plant, or a plant that may satisfy a particualr medical need.

i can agree with trying to save a landrace or a ibl ide use as many parents as possible but with strains that are poly hybrids and trying to make a stablized version of that ,if ya can understand the selection used 1-?? m/f.i do agree with ya though for the most part . chat ya later clips

 

[suzy cremecheese]

I understand the need for selection in order to accomplish goals and I'm not knowcking your methods Clips... just climbing on my soapbox again. Hope a few pick something up from it.

 

[LateShaftNBaggins]

Wow... I dont pay as much attention as I should to the breeding threads, but this is the best I've ever read. I'll be back with questions after I read it two or three more times and let it sink in.. Damn short attention span... :)

Thanks for the time spent, suzy.
LSnB

 

[clips]

ya know ctg i wished i knew bout that when i had that g13hp male would been one hell of a female lmao sunbitch was hard to kill but same time hard to root on cloning reason for his loss .i def will add that to testing in future breeding programs . chat ya later clips

 

[DMAN]

Hi Suzy,

Excellent post....stuck! :)

 

[HothouseFlowers]

This isnt gospel this is my idea from the experience and education I've had. So if you disagree or have something to add please by all means feel free to respectfully do so.

Hi Suzy,

That is excellant for sure.

Thanks for the link.

Peace, Flores

 

[Gonejah]

ctg- from experience, have you found that these reversed males (with the nice female flowers) tend to be good breeding material?

"Hope a few pick something up from it."
SC, I think there are plenty who are thankful and interested - thanks :)

 

[kephra]

Thanks for the great info. This thread helps answer a couple of questions for me, more than a couple. ;)

 

[suzy cremecheese]

~Do your best to have an equal number of males and females contributing to each generation

I just added this to the first post.

Reason being the recent reading on population genetics I've been doing and Keph's thread on bottlenecks.