Attack of the Hermies

[Bud_Munchkin]

Hey there, hoping some of you can help me out here

I have been growing for 2-3 years now. I started with AK-47, then bubblegummer, then chrystal and now recently Blueberry and Kalimist. All went well until the blueberry..

I had to take down my grow tent for a while because I needed to use the room it was in for something else, so I decided to use the pantry instead. Problem is, I couldn't keep the temperature low enough there but with a maximum of 31 Celcius I reckoned I could get away with it (have used that room before and worked ok). 3 out of 4 plants turned into hermas and I was way too late discovering it (have only had successful grows over the years so got a little cocky and didn't check up on my plants enough), so everything got seeded up like a motherf####r and very low quality weed. I decided to keep the plants because I was so far along in the cycle that I didn't want to waste the electricity I had already put into it.

Anyways, I figured I had just been unlucky and got a bad batch of seeds, as I'm sure the nutrients and ph were properly maintained and I had had several good grows in that room when starting out. I bought some expensive kalimist seeds next and, guess what? All 4 are hermas. They only have the odd little male sac here and there, but there's no mistaking it. I have enough time to remove them all with a pair of tweezers before they burst, though if I keep the plants I'll leave one or two so as to have some kalimist seeds for later. In the blueberry grow, the male sacs also appeared more in a banana shape in the middle of the buds as well - it doesn't seem to be happening so far with these kali plants but they're difficult to spot in the middle of a bud and I'm sure to miss a couple if I decide to keep these plants.

I have now set up the tent again and started another grow there with some Kali clones and a few Skywalker Kush plants. I'm now debating whether to keep the 4 kali plants in the other room or not - Another 10 weeks of 400W would be a great expense if they get full of seed..

My question is, what is the most likely cause for the herma transformation? Is 31 Celcius warm enough to do that? I must say I did sneek in there a few times during 'night' cycle and let light in - could that be it? Other than that, I can't think what else it could be..

Also, do hermas always produce the male balloon thingees in the middle of the bud?

If I get seed from a herma, is it going to be all female or are there potentially going to be hermas in there too? I read in the Cannabis grow bible:

"The plants then self-pollinate themselves and the results are

female and hermaphrodite seeds. In a special case a female known as

an XX female will produce more female seeds than hermaphrodite

seeds. That is how female seeds are created."

So will the seeds I get from a herma for a large part also be herma? The reason I'm asking despite what it says in the book is that I read in another thread in this forum about stressing plants on purpose to make it into a herma and create female seeds, so maybe the book isn't accurate?

Thanks in advance for your thoughts on this folks!

[Bud_Munchkin]

Thanks Tokage. Right, so that's temp pretty much ruled out. I'm going to get myself one of those green lights so I don't run the risk of light contamination when I need to be in the grow room at 'night' time. I first attributed it to bad luck, but when I think about it, I had 2 different strains, one from serious seeds, the other from Dutch Passion, and the chance of this happening to both seems rather slim to me, though it is possible I guess.

Another thing I was reading about in the Cannabis grow bible is that if you put plants into 12/12 before they've had their pre-flower, which is when the little shoots start growing out at the nodes, you could be stressing your plants into becoming she-males. Anyone agree with that or have any idea if this is correct? What I have done with most of my grows, including these last 2 hermified ones, is wait until there are 5 internodes (very close together coz I use a really good pre-grow box) and then top them. I give them 5 more days of 18 hours and then I put them on 12. I'm not sure but I think they hadn'r entered pre-flower yet - could this be it?

[mopman]

Hey mate , I would and totally agree with toke and say its the light/dark interruptions causing this , I am not sure about 12/12 straight from seed causing hermies , never happened to me but would be interesting if someone else has experienced this.

Keep growing mate

[Bud_Munchkin]

Right, I'll have at it with the duck tape this evening and make extra sure there's no light coming in. And no more sneeking in to peek at the buds during night cycle either ;-)

[bozoph]

plants dont need a trigger to hermie. it can just happen to some plants.