What Does a Female Pot Plant Look Like?

Believe it or not, marijuana plants have distinct genders, like most plants, animals, and other life forms. They can be either female or male, and in some rare cases, you will find them as hermaphrodites. These hermaphrodite plants have male and female traits, which the plant cannabis also has.

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What does a female pot plant look like? Female pot plants have a calyx, the slightly pointed option. If the pre-flower with green color grows a white hair or pistil, it is more likely that it is female. Female plants typically take longer to express themselves than male cannabis plants.

This article will help you determine how to grow cannabis plants and differentiate female cannabis plants from their male counterparts.

You will also find this guide useful when it comes to properly taking care of pot plants.

The Definition of Cannabis

Cannabis refers to three plants with psychoactive properties. It is also known as Cannabis indica, Cannabis ruderalis, or Cannabis sativa.

Once the flowers of these plants are harvested and dried, you are left with one of the world’s most common drugs.

Some people call it weed while others call it pot. For most people, it is known as marijuana.

Weed is not legal in some areas around the world, though it is legal in most areas of the U.S. As of today, people are using the term “cannabis” as a general word for this plant.

Cannabis is usually consumed because of its relaxing and calming effect on people.

In some states of the U.S., it is even prescribed by health professionals to help with a wide range of medical conditions like chronic pain, glaucoma, and poor appetite.

While cannabis is derived from a plant, making it natural, it still has strong effects, both positive and negative.

Figuring Out the Gender of the Plant

Usually, the gender of the plant does not matter. However, for some growers and breeders of marijuana, knowing whether the plant is male or female is essential.

The reason is that the type of weed is crucial to the quality and value of the end product.

For instance, seedless buds are worth more than lower-quality cannabis. Only the female marijuana crop has the capability of producing potent buds.

From a breeder perspective, selling male marijuana plants is useless, as these plants do not provide much of a high.

When it comes to planting seeds, regular seeds typically have a 50/50 chance in terms of producing a female or male plant.

Also, most seed banks and companies have some genetically altered feminized seeds.

This means fewer risks of pollination if a male phenotype lacking resinous buds gets mixed in.

If a male plant sneaks into your cannabis garden, it will most likely contaminate healthy females and fertilize them.

Once a female plant is pollinated, it will start producing seeds rather than focusing on growing its robust flower.

By eliminating the issue early on, you can ensure that the result is a healthy female plant.

How to Determine the Gender of Cannabis

After the first six weeks, you will be able to notice little pre-flowers near the growth tips.

They will show some signs of a slightly pointed shape at the ends or be more rounded. With some of the strains, it is more challenging to see a difference at first glance.

Female plants will have a calyx, which is the slightly pointed option. A male plant will have the aforementioned mini pollen sacs, which are round or slightly oval.

Some plants do not show these signs early on. You just need to wait a couple more days.

Then, if the pre-flower with green color grows a white hair, also known as pistil, it is more likely that the plant is female.

Pistils never appear as green, so look for something light-colored and fuzzy. Female plants typically take longer to express themselves as compared to male plants.

Consequently, you need to be patient with your crops and regularly check them to manage any males in the bunch accordingly.

Methods of Identifying the Sex of Your Cannabis

There are several ways to determine the gender of your cannabis. Perhaps you need to know it sooner, or perhaps you prefer to use different methods.

Here are some ways to identify the gender of your cannabis plants.

Look at the Growth Patterns

Every plant, regardless of its sex, will start to flourish in its vegetative growth. As these plants age, you will notice a difference in their sizes.

Some marijuana growers have noticed that certain signs in the early stages can help determine the plant’s gender.

Females usually have more complex branching when they start progressing from the seeding stage to the vegetative stage.

This method might not be foolproof, and you should not use it as a basis for throwing out the plants.

You should not throw out plants during their early stages because this can give you an idea of which plants to pay attention to.

However, this method works only with outdoor-grown plants, as indoor plants don’t usually show these tendencies under artificial light.

Identify Where the Plants Sprouted

A method exists that allows you to determine where the plants sprouted during their early stages.

Some marijuana growers discovered the gender of the plants after germination. According to their hypothesis, if the sprout comes out of the top or bottom of the seed, it is generally female.

Side sprouts, on the other hand, usually turn out to be male. While this hasn’t been scientifically proven, some growers have used this method and reported a 90% success rate.

Even with this kind of anecdotal evidence, you should not consider this as an absolute fact.

Let the plants grow more and try to notice any distinct female or male attributes. Do not just throw away the plant seeds simply because they sprouted the other way.

Keep track of your predictions so you can make an informed decision later.

A Guide to Female Cannabis

When you decide to grow a cannabis plant, you need to grow a female one.

These are responsible for making buds, which is the part of the plant that contains the most THC.

THC is generally the part responsible for the “high” that most people associate with cannabis.

Keep in mind that having one male plant and a tiny amount of pollen can fill their flowers with seeds.

If you have male and female cannabis plants in the same growing area, the buds grown there will produce only seeds, and you won’t have much end product.

It is pretty easy to tell if you have female plants because their flowers don’t fully close, and they are quite open.

They also produce little hairs, which are known as pistils. Look out for these pistils, as male plants do not have them at all.

The Meaning Behind a Female Cannabis Plant

A female cannabis plant means you will have better nugs. If you intend to grown marijuana, the goal is to produce a usable, smokable, or sellable product.

To get this, all you need to do is cultivate a female cannabis plant.

The reproduction of feminized seeds has become such a big thing, and instead of leaving it to luck, you should know that the seeds you want to plant will produce female marijuana plants.

Regular seeds can give you only a 50/50 chance of getting either gender.

For instance, if you plant 20 seeds, more or less, you might get five male plants. In this example, you are wasting potentially half of your time and resources on cultivating male plants.

Feminized seeds do not really offer a 100% success rate, either.

If you are growing cannabis outdoors, there is a chance that male pollen could float around the female plants and ruin the growth of your crops.

These male plants have little green balls that can continue to grow and fill with pollen. They will eventually burst and leak pollen everywhere.

You must separate the male from the female before this happens, as the spread can fertilize your female crops.

If that happens, the buds will stop developing.

Ensuring Female Plants

Female cannabis plants tend to start showing hairs even before the flowering stage, or the changes in grow light schedules.

However, that doesn’t mean they are safe. A single male can still fertilize them. Many growers dream of having an all-female garden.

This way, they do not have to remove half of their plants when they try to reveal their gender. This is where feminized seeds come into play.

Feminized seeds will improve the chances of growing female plants. These feminized marijuana seeds produce only female plants.

However, that is not the only thing that makes cannabis plant female. Under some conditions, female seeds can become hermaphrodite plants and fertilize themselves.

How Feminized Seeds Are Created

Growing cannabis is all about trichomes, resinous flowers, and rich cannabinoid profiles.

These splendid characteristics can be found only in female cannabis plants. Having gardens full of robust, unpollinated sinsemilla females means jars that are full of mind- and body-friendly nuggets.

Here are some of the methods that breeders use to create female seeds:

Early Methods

Early feminized marijuana seeds were usually made with two marijuana plants.

One of the plants shows some hermaphrodite tendencies when it is stressed.

The intersexual-prone marijuana plant is then stressed by the light cycle interruption or pruning method.

This stress will eventually encourage the plant to produce male marijuana flowers.

Then the pollen from the hermaphrodite plant is applied to the true female, i.e., a plant that did not easily display intersexuality characteristics when stressed.

However, this method’s drawback is that the female marijuana pollen donors already had quite a strong tendency to turn intersexual.

This tendency is most likely to be inherited by the resulting feminized seeds.

Current Methods

On the initial development of feminized marijuana seeds, hermaphrodites were a reasonable concern.

However, these days, hermaphrodites that form from feminized seeds alone are very race. Many breeders today use a technique called rhodelization.

It uses different forms of silver to force female plants to produce male flowers. This new and more extensive technique produces stable and consistent seeds.

Today, many female plants with a minor tendency to turn intersexual can be used instead of the hermaphrodite plants needed in the past.

The best thing about this is that none of the genes are modified, so the seeds produced will be female.

These female plants will remain female even when placed in harsh, irregular, or even stressful conditions.

Their offspring won’t tend to turn intersexual; if anything, the parent marijuana plant is physically modified by silver.

Growing Requirements for Cannabis Plants

Lighting

Light is one of the most essential requirements in every stage of the cannabis plant life cycle.

However, during the flowering stage, the key is to maintain a photoperiod of 12 hours of light and 12 hours of darkness.

Also, do not interrupt the dark periods by opening, even if it is for just a second in your growing environment.

Light contamination can cause the plant to slow the budding process. The plant might even revegetate or start producing hermaphrodite flowers.

Temperature

The temperature needed for cannabis plants during the flowering stage is around 18C to 26C. Temperatures below this range can negatively affect the end product.

They can even kill the plant if it is exposed to freezing temperatures for an extended period. Temperatures under 17C can slow the growth of the plant.

On the other hand, high temperatures can cause problems such as stunted growth, burnt leaves, too heavy evaporation of water, and excessive dryness.

Humidity

Humidity is a vital aspect of growing cannabis plants. Taking care of the relative humidity in your environment is very important.

Relative humidity measures how much humidity is present in the surrounding air, expressed as a percentage.

The humidity level should be between 40 and 50% in this stage, as higher humidity can cause problems like mold and fungi.

Nutrients

The main nutrients that the cannabis plant requires to develop appropriately are nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium.

When the plant begins to bloom, the concentrations of phosphorus and potassium must be increased progressively, while the nitrogen level must be lowered.

This is why specific fertilizers are needed for vegetative growth and flowering.

Other secondary nutrients will be necessary for the development of the plants. These include magnesium, calcium, and sulfur.

The plants also need some micronutrients but in a very low concentration.

These are zinc, manganese, iron, boron, chlorine, cobalt, copper, molybdenum, and silicon.

Be sure to add these nutrients via foliar, liquid, or solid fertilizers. Even when you are growing organic, planting it in a plain soil is usually not enough for the plant to produce big buds.

Several fertilizer brands offer fertilizer kits specially formulated for each stage, combined with their necessary nutrients.

Start with a dose recommended by the manufacturer and then gradually increase the amount until the desired results are achieved.

Watering

Watering your plant regularly using clean, safe water is vital. Use chlorine-free or filtered water for optimal results.

It is also important to avoid overwatering and to watch for proper drainage. A good test is to stick your finger a few centimeters or an inch into the soil to see if it is dry.

Then you will know whether or not it is time to water the plant.

Conclusion

Overall, you do not need to go to heroic lengths to save your cannabis plants.

Whether it is because you have male or female plants, sometimes the best choice is to cut your losses, remove the male plants, and focus on the remaining female ones.

If you dedicate a lot of time to just a few plants, you can rest assured that those plants will end up being of the highest possible quality.

Cannabis plant reproduction might be a little hard to understand. In particular, plants can self-pollinate under a variety of circumstances.

As a grower, you must stay vigilant and know how to recognize the gender of your plants before they start to reproduce.