Can plant tissue culture speed up phenotype hunting?

Helmut79

Helmut79

Well-Known Member
For example, if I grow out 100 plants from 100 seeds and wish for the next grow to be able to grow out 100 plants that have been taken from the best one from those 100 seeds, then I would need to take at least 100 cuttings from all those 100 seed-plants. This is in total of 10 000 cuttings to be taken, which is a bit too much work at once. Besides, when transplanted into pots, they take too much room too.

This is why it would make sense to cut down the number of cuttings by at least 10 times and do the phenohunting throughout many grows.

So for example 5 cuttings taken from all 100 plants would be 500 cuttings in total. In that way for the second grow I would have 100 plants that came from top 20 seed-plants.

If taking again 500 cuttings, then for the third grow I'd be able to have those 100 plants originate from top 4 seed-plants.

This way it would be until 4th grow when all the plants could be named the phenotype nr 1 (winner).

Bottom line is that it takes time.

But what if the plant tissue culture can help to speed up the game? To my understanding you only need a little piece of a tissue to grow a whole plant out of it - like for example a tip of the leaf.

I'm at the moment trying to grasp the idea about plant tissue culture.

Please look it up and share your thoughts. I'm going to do my research in a meanwhile.
 
Kingrow1

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
Culturing stuff in a sterile environment is easy to do but hard to get right. Do you need this extra pain in life when clones are a lot easier form of replication.

If you found that ultimate pheno then what?
 
Helmut79

Helmut79

Well-Known Member
I'm not sure how painful it is. I've got the pressurecookers and a flowhood. Pretty used to growing mushrooms. I can see the similarity in equipment requirements.. almost like mushroom growing and plant growing mixed together kind of thing.

You said clones are easier, but you meant "cuttings". Yes, taking cuttings is simple, but even more simple would be to grow for average results.

If I found that winner pheno of "The Ultimate" by "Dutch Passion", then I would hopefully get 10 grams per watt per year, which is 2 grams per watt per grow. That would be awesome, but now we are doing the filosophy again.

I'm interested to see if someone would have something interesting to say about if we can or can not take advantage of the plant tissue culture to speed up the phenohunting process and make it more efficient :)
 
Chip Green

Chip Green

Well-Known Member
I too am intrigued by this technique, and have also done sterile culture work during my freelance mycology experiments in late 90s....
I haven't as of yet even really begun to read up on these advanced methods, trying to stay in the elementary level where I belong right now....
 
Jaybodankly

Jaybodankly

Well-Known Member
Grow your hundred plants. Take some late flower clones and see if you can reveg the best under cfl's. A month into flowering and you will have a good idea of the dozen or so top plants out of a hundred. This is a riskier method. Late flower clones have a hollow or woody stem making cloning harder. Revegging often works but sometimes the plant is finished and nothing is going to bring it back.
 
Jaybodankly

Jaybodankly

Well-Known Member
I like the idea of tissue culture for keeping a library of genetics in a rack of testubes. I dont know much about it but I expect it to become a regular tool in the cannabis growers toolbox in the next 5 years. Instead of clones, stop down to the grow shop and grab a culture.
 
Dr. Who

Dr. Who

Well-Known Member
Helmut79 said:
I'm not sure how painful it is. I've got the pressurecookers and a flowhood. Pretty used to growing mushrooms. I can see the similarity in equipment requirements.. almost like mushroom growing and plant growing mixed together kind of thing.

You said clones are easier, but you meant "cuttings". Yes, taking cuttings is simple, but even more simple would be to grow for average results.

If I found that winner pheno of "The Ultimate" by "Dutch Passion", then I would hopefully get 10 grams per watt per year, which is 2 grams per watt per grow. That would be awesome, but now we are doing the filosophy again.

I'm interested to see if someone would have something interesting to say about if we can or can not take advantage of the plant tissue culture to speed up the phenohunting process and make it more efficient :)
Click to expand...
So then. Just how is a culture going to reduce pheno hunting? You still have to grow the things out to actually find out what difference's they might express.
 
Jaybodankly

Jaybodankly

Well-Known Member
Amazon sells a kit
Cannabis Tissue Culture Kit
for $255. didnt put a link but do search for it on Amazon & it will come up.

Here's a guy on youtube DIY.

Might have a new winter hobby on my hands. Becoming a cannabis tissue culture specialist.
 
Dr Magill

Dr Magill

Well-Known Member
Once you place your tissue sample (disinfected) into the culture medium it should form a mass of callus tissue - all things working right of course. This tissue should differentiate over time into what will look like several micro-plants. These can be divided and placed into additional culture tubes/jars to proliferate. In essence you will end up with hundreds of little micro plants which can be cut up and treated like small cuttings. Once they grow on you will get something more like a clone which you are probably used to. This process can be continued for ever - technically. I'm not sure to the extent this technique is used in the cannabis industry. I think it would be ideal for developing a tissue bank with all available strains cultured.
 
Kingrow1

Kingrow1

Well-Known Member
My bad, your already down with the agar and autoclave flowhood tek so tissue culture should be rasy. If i remember there is a different mix on the agar for plant tissue over fungi or bacteria and possibly other mediums.

I dont see how plant culture will speed up the process unless you conduct your whole search in it which would allow more samples to be cultured at anyone time. Ill wait to read more of the thread :-)



Helmut79 said:
I'm not sure how painful it is. I've got the pressurecookers and a flowhood. Pretty used to growing mushrooms. I can see the similarity in equipment requirements.. almost like mushroom growing and plant growing mixed together kind of thing.

You said clones are easier, but you meant "cuttings". Yes, taking cuttings is simple, but even more simple would be to grow for average results.

If I found that winner pheno of "The Ultimate" by "Dutch Passion", then I would hopefully get 10 grams per watt per year, which is 2 grams per watt per grow. That would be awesome, but now we are doing the filosophy again.

I'm interested to see if someone would have something interesting to say about if we can or can not take advantage of the plant tissue culture to speed up the phenohunting process and make it more efficient :)
Click to expand...
 
Dr Magill

Dr Magill

Well-Known Member
The growing medium can be altered to the exact specifications of the species you are cultivating when you make the medium
 
I.G.Rowdit

I.G.Rowdit

Well-Known Member
Tissue culture would be of limited use when hunting for a prized pheno by evaluating seed-grown plants. The plants you are evaluating are the result of some sort of hybridization. The 'new' genetic combinations that may include a prized pheno are in the seeds, nowhere else. A plant that is asexually propagated is just an exact genetic copy, a clone, of the original plant. Tissue culture is a way to produce an unlimited number of clones.

I can think of only one situation where tissue culture would be of some use. If you think you have found a winner but need to grow 100 plants for a test run to make sure. 100 cuttings from a single plant would probably not be possible. With tissue culture the number of clones is unlimited, so 100 or one million from one plant is all the same.
 
Odin*

Odin*

Well-Known Member
I.G.Rowdit said:
Tissue culture would be of limited use when hunting for a prized pheno by evaluating seed-grown plants. The plants you are evaluating are the result of some sort of hybridization. The 'new' genetic combinations that may include a prized pheno are in the seeds, nowhere else. A plant that is asexually propagated is just an exact genetic copy, a clone, of the original plant. Tissue culture is a way to produce an unlimited number of clones.

I can think of only one situation where tissue culture would be of some use. If you think you have found a winner but need to grow 100 plants for a test run to make sure. 100 cuttings from a single plant would probably not be possible. With tissue culture the number of clones is unlimited, so 100 or one million is all the same.
Click to expand...
OP is talking about a 100 seed pheno hunt and using tissue culture in place of cutting 5 clones from each individual seed. He is also considering the benefit of “#69 is the keeper, so I’ll run 100 of those next time”. From the initial seed pop, one could not collect 100 clones from a single plant, let alone 100 of each in an effort to guarantee enough of a single keeper to fill the room for the next run. With tissue culture, you would not need to cut 500 clones (5 of each), or 10,000 clones (100 of each, ensuring a single pheno for next run). You would only need to identify your keeper(s) from the first run, dump the samples of the “duds”.

Two problems though;

Nobody is “gambling” on a 100 bean run just to find one pheno (or two...). I only know of one person that designated two warehouse rooms to seed runs (long time grower with plenty of great strains already in the stable). Too many plants per room to identify every mild herm/banana tosser. Both rooms were completely seeded, enough to start their own bean co. and never run out. Lost nearly everything in both rooms (garbage). Anybody with the space to run a “100 bean experiment” already has strains and resources for verified genetics (if needed). Again, no need to go “all in” on the off chance of getting “Thee 1” insane standout from 100. I’ve popped “30 something” one time, “20 something” a couple times, sticking to “one pack” for the foreseeable future.

The other issue, even if you do go the culture route, you would still have to grow out 100 of each (10,000) to ensure that they are ready in time to fill the room immediately after “takedown” of the previous run. Even then, I don’t think that your 10,000 “Live Culture sprouts” are going to be as developed as 10,000 clones (w/ appropriate space/environment) would be. This would set your next run back by a considerable amount of time (if you are indeed dead set on running only your lone keeper from this experiment). Time=Money.
 
Dr Magill

Dr Magill

Well-Known Member
Odin* said:
OP is talking about a 100 seed pheno hunt and using tissue culture in place of cutting 5 clones from each individual seed. He is also considering the benefit of “#69 is the keeper, so I’ll run 100 of those next time”. From the initial seed pop, one could not collect 100 clones from a single plant, let alone 100 of each in an effort to guarantee enough of a single keeper to fill the room for the next run. With tissue culture, you would not need to cut 500 clones (5 of each), or 10,000 clones (100 of each, ensuring a single pheno for next run). You would only need to identify your keeper(s) from the first run, dump the samples of the “duds”.

Two problems though;

Nobody is “gambling” on a 100 bean run just to find one pheno (or two...). I only know of one person that designated two warehouse rooms to seed runs (long time grower with plenty of great strains already in the stable). Too many plants per room to identify every mild herm/banana tosser. Both rooms were completely seeded, enough to start their own bean co. and never run out. Lost nearly everything in both rooms (garbage). Anybody with the space to run a “100 bean experiment” already has strains and resources for verified genetics (if needed). Again, no need to go “all in” on the off chance of getting “Thee 1” insane standout from 100. I’ve popped “30 something” one time, “20 something” a couple times, sticking to “one pack” for the foreseeable future.

The other issue, even if you do go the culture route, you would still have to grow out 100 of each (10,000) to ensure that they are ready in time to fill the room immediately after “takedown” of the previous run. Even then, I don’t think that your 10,000 “Live Culture sprouts” are going to be as developed as 10,000 clones (w/ appropriate space/environment) would be. This would set your next run back by a considerable amount of time (if you are indeed dead set on running only your lone keeper from this experiment). Time=Money.
Click to expand...
You're exactly right. Tissue culture would be best applied as a way to have a phenotype in a jar.
 
Helmut79

Helmut79

Well-Known Member
Odin* said:
OP is talking about a 100 seed pheno hunt and using tissue culture in place of cutting 5 clones from each individual seed. He is also considering the benefit of “#69 is the keeper, so I’ll run 100 of those next time”. From the initial seed pop, one could not collect 100 clones from a single plant, let alone 100 of each in an effort to guarantee enough of a single keeper to fill the room for the next run. With tissue culture, you would not need to cut 500 clones (5 of each), or 10,000 clones (100 of each, ensuring a single pheno for next run). You would only need to identify your keeper(s) from the first run, dump the samples of the “duds”.

Two problems though;

Nobody is “gambling” on a 100 bean run just to find one pheno (or two...). I only know of one person that designated two warehouse rooms to seed runs (long time grower with plenty of great strains already in the stable). Too many plants per room to identify every mild herm/banana tosser. Both rooms were completely seeded, enough to start their own bean co. and never run out. Lost nearly everything in both rooms (garbage). Anybody with the space to run a “100 bean experiment” already has strains and resources for verified genetics (if needed). Again, no need to go “all in” on the off chance of getting “Thee 1” insane standout from 100. I’ve popped “30 something” one time, “20 something” a couple times, sticking to “one pack” for the foreseeable future.

The other issue, even if you do go the culture route, you would still have to grow out 100 of each (10,000) to ensure that they are ready in time to fill the room immediately after “takedown” of the previous run. Even then, I don’t think that your 10,000 “Live Culture sprouts” are going to be as developed as 10,000 clones (w/ appropriate space/environment) would be. This would set your next run back by a considerable amount of time (if you are indeed dead set on running only your lone keeper from this experiment). Time=Money.
Click to expand...
Thank you for your time and effort to explain it out.
 
S

SativaInMind

Well-Known Member
you don't need 100 clones from a single plant..
to get one hundred clones the plant would have to be grown very big which would be wasting time and space that could be allocated to flowering, additionally the space for 100 plants this big would be a lot, I think you have confused yourself, at most take 2 clones (incase one dies) most of the time you should be fine with taking just one clone and wait until you see roots before you put the donor plant into flower....
Most important step is labelling, don't be lazy make sure before you set anything down/into place its all labelled 1st..
so easy to forget then you mislabel/ don't label it and you have wasted all that time and space on pheno hunting nothing..
 
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