Male vs Female Pot Plant [How To Determine The Difference]
If you are new to growing marijuana you need to know that you want to grow specifically female pot plants VS male pot plants. The reason you want to grow female marijuana plants is to have buds growing. The marijuana buds are where the trichomes and terpenes are and that’s where the majority of the THC is in your plant if your interest is getting stoned.
So now you know the main difference between a male and female pot plant is that the female plant has the buds that everyone smokes to get high.
Below we will look at what the differences are in the two gender plants.
The Difference between Male and Female Marijuana Plants Explained
If you started a few seeds not knowing of they were male or female plants you wouldn’t know the gender of the plant until after the vegetative stage. The vegetative stage is the stage of just plant growth previous to when it reveals either balls (pollen sac) on the male plant or stigma’s on female plants. This happens between the nodes of the plant. The nodes are between where the branches grow out from the stalk.
The Male Marijuana Plant
Let me start off just by saying that if by chance you are growing to plants and one turns out to be male and one female. The male plant will most likely end up cross pollinating the female plant which will cause the female to grow seeds in the buds. Having seeds in marijuana bud is not desired by most smokers.
The seeds actually take away some of the smoothness of the smoke. The taste can be a bit hard to inhale and the seeds will pop while you are smoking them causing your joint to blow up or the pot to be flung out of your pipe or bong. Nobody wants that to happen.
The pollen sacs on the male plant will start to grow once you introduce shorter periods of light to the plant as this imitates the time of year that your plants would start to reproduce outside. You will start to notice these tiny little balls or sacs appearing in the node region.
Those are your pollen sacs. Eventually they will open and release pollen. If you have female plants in the same grow room they will most likely be cross pollinated which means the buds of the female plants will now grow seeds in them. This lowers the quality of the bud in most pot smoker’s minds.
Do Male Plants Grow Faster Than Female?
Yes male plants will grow faster than a female pot plant. This means the male plant will most likely be ready to release its pollen by the time the female plants pistols are growing which are very sticky so the pollen will land and stick to the female and again cross pollinating the plant. Then the bud will start growing and end up with seeds in it.
The Female Marijuana Plant
As stated above the male plant will grow sacs. The female plants do not grow sacs they start to grow pistols which are like skinny little fingers then the buds start to grow.
It’s almost impossible to identify a female plant from a male plant when the plant is in the vegetative stage. It is when the plant has flowered and either the sacs or the pistols are revealing themselves.
Female pot plants will usually have more leaves than a male plant. The females stalk will not be as thick as the males either.
So if you are wondering now how do I ensure I am always growing females as most growers question. You can clone a female plant and just keep doing so with each successive plant. You could also only buy feminized marijuana seeds. They are typically expensive but worth it in my mind.
Can a Female Plant Turn Male?
Your female plant could potentially turn into a male plant or it could even turn into a hermaphrodite plant. If your plant does turn into a Hermi then you basically have a male plant as the hermaphrodites will release pollen. So there is no sense in letting that plant grow any longer.
How to Identify a Female Seed?
The good news is that it is somewhat possible to identify a female seed from a male seed. This is not 100% accurate but it is pretty darn close.
There is a spot on the seed from where it originally grew on the plant. This spot will resemble the smallest volcano you have ever seen. If your seed does not have anything on it that looks like a microscopic volcano then there is a good chance it is a male. This is an old school method of determining the sexes of pot plants.
The Safest Way to Grow a Pot Plant to Find Out it’s Sex
If you don’t want to take the risk of cross pollination then you can grow one plant at a time. This process might not work for you unless you already have pot to smoke and can wait for a plant to grow to maturity and then take the time it needs for the buds to be cured for smoking.
The other option is to keep a very close eye on the plants daily once you start them in the flowering stage and once a male plant has been identified take it out of the grow room.
What is a Hermaphrodite Pot Plant?
So now that you have a high level idea of what a female plant and a male plant will look like or what to look for in identifying them it is now time to spring this info on you. There are not only male and female marijuana plants there are also hermaphrodite plants to watch out for.
Hermi (short for hermaphrodite) plants will have both male and also female flowers, meaning they will grow bud with a ton of seeds. Most users of marijuana do not want to smoke a pipe full of seeds. It lowers the quality and is just a bit harsh to smoke.
Hermi plants can be grown right from seed as well a female plant could turn into a hermi plant if it is stressed too much. Many things can cause this to happen. If lighting is interrupted or the grow room isn’t warm enough or pets move in. Another cause is if the plant is left to long before harvesting. If your plant did turn into a hermaphrodite it wouldn’t be a total waste as there would still be enough THC for you to get stoned.
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