Should I Pollinate My Female Marijuana Plants?

To pollinate, or not to pollinate. That is the question, isn’t it? Well, it could be the question for marijuana growers who are torn between breeding marijuana plants or harvesting smokable weed. But before we get to the actual answer to that burning question, let us first explore the anatomy of the marijuana flower. And then we will get into the pollination process itself.

Anatomy of the marijuana flower

First let us talk about the cola. The cola is the main flowering site of the marijuana plant. In other words, it is where marijuana buds bloom. And the main cola for a single marijuana plant is the topmost bud. One cola is composed of several buds. Before the female marijuana plant reaches the complete flowering stage, the cola comprises of several sub-units that are getting ready to bloom new buds. A bud is composed of several single female flowers. Another name for a female flower is the pistil. And on the pistil you could find stigmas which are the main sites for pollination.

The pollination process

When you have male and female marijuana plants together in one growing room or grouped together in an outdoor growing area, chances are pollination will definitely occur. Male marijuana plants carry the pollen. And when these pollens are carried over to the female plants’ female flowers, it will latch on to the stigma and pollination then happens. When this happens, seeds are produced which can be planted for the next growing cycle.

To pollinate or not to pollinate

Now that you have learned all about the anatomy of the female marijuana flower and the process of pollination, the question still stands: should you pollinate the female marijuana plants or not? The answer to this burning question is simple: it all depends on what you want to do. See, pollination of female marijuana plants is for those people who want to grow marijuana plants for breeding purposes. This means that if you want to produce seeds to sell or just to plant for the next growing cycle, you should decide to pollinate your female plants.

However, if the goal of your marijuana g rowing endeavors is to produce good quality and smokable weed, you should avoid pollination at all costs. Therefore, when you have determined the sex of your young plants that you’ve grown from seeds, whether they are male or female, you should immediately separate the male ones from the female ones. This will make sure that you avoided pollination to ensure a good harvest of buds in the end.

But if you want to avoid buying and looking for good quality seeds again and again at the beginning of each growing cycle, you could try doing a little of each. Once you’ve identified the males from the females, you could get rid of most of the males and transfer a few of them together with a few other female marijuana plants in a different room. You will then have a group of purely female plants to harvest weed from and another group that would produce good quality seeds for the next growing season. Doing this however will make you double up of resources and growing gear. So everything is entirely up to you, really.