Ethics & Seeds

thenotsoesoteric said:

If people give someone a clone and ask them not to breed it or give it to anyone, imo, they're a greedy asshole!

I had an asshole friend like this before and they suck as people in my experience. Dude would sit and smoke every bowl I packed no problem, but then he would pack up a bowl and instead of matching me, dude would smoke it to the head. He and his click were the types of assholes the would sit on a cut like it was some prized gem. I never asked the stingy toad for shit, but my other friend did and the a-hole's answer was, and I quote: "If you want the strain you can buy the seeds like I did, I don't give no one shit." Sociopaths, man.

That is the epitome of scumbagness in my opinion. Why would you want to hoard a strain that people enjoy or medicine that people could benefit from? Greed. So yes, I would tell somebody that I wouldn't give "their" clone out, and then as soon as I got it I would go out and give it to every last person that wanted it. Otherwise, I would never, and I don't care how good a strain is, I would never accept a clone that had any stipulations on it. There is no lineage that is so superior to another that I would ever fill discouraged about not having that particular clone.

I understand people wanting to get credit for a lineage, bragging rights or a sense of accomplishment, but beyond that I think patenting any plant or animal is scumbag stuff and we as humans are pieces of crap for treating living organisms as profit makers. God complex at it's fullest.

Fuck monsanto and sam the skunk man's mutli-million dollar plans to fuck off marijuana's genetics in a way that benefits seed makers. You want a patent, invent the next coca cola or the next new iphone or legalize marijuana so corporations can fuck weed off too.

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SOOOOOOO many people like that here in Colorado, they have average to above average genetics and horde it like it's the last weed plant on earth. The only reason I see hording a cut is if you spend a shitload of time breeding it for yourself and don't want to give out your work for others to make money off cause that happens a lot out here too.

Im not sure why I have not opened this thread until now? I read the first page, but to be honest, dont feel like reading through 100 posts. I may go back and read it all in the future.

I apologize if I am beating a dead horse and my perspective has already been argued, again I didnt read through the entire thread. I did get the gist of the conversation from the OP.

As we all know, each strain has multiple phenotypes. I dont care how worked the strain is, there are different characteristics that can display from plant to plant. There may be 3 common phenos of a strain, but somewhere hidden amongst 1000s of seeds is a diamond.

If a breeder purchases a strain, and spends his money, time, labor & love running the genetics for some time, and finds a plant containing characteristics that they are looking for and then decides to use that plant for a breeding project, I think that is his right to do so. He bought the seeds. He searched through them. He put in work.

That is my stance on using another breeders genetics to create a hybrid or a cross.

Now, if the breeder wasnt putting in much work, just grabbed random pheno A and crosses it to the same strain pheno B and then tried to just sell it as their own <cough-cough> Natures sweet nothing <cough-cough> I am against this under MOST circumstances (there are exceptions, ie - an old lost strain, very rare strains, etc...)

If the breeder runs lets say 100+ of a strain. Happens to find an extremely rare pheno, runs another 100 and finds a male of this rare pheno, then continues crossing it and stablizing this pheno then I have no issues if the breeder markets the strain as their own.

No matter what the situation is, anyone of the options I listed, i feel that the original breeder should absolutely be given props for their work. The description should contain the original breeders name some where.

amgprb said:

Im not sure why I have not opened this thread until now? I read the first page, but to be honest, dont feel like reading through 100 posts. I may go back and read it all in the future.

I apologize if I am beating a dead horse and my perspective has already been argued, again I didnt read through the entire thread. I did get the gist of the conversation from the OP.

As we all know, each strain has multiple phenotypes. I dont care how worked the strain is, there are different characteristics that can display from plant to plant. There may be 3 common phenos of a strain, but somewhere hidden amongst 1000s of seeds is a diamond.

If a breeder purchases a strain, and spends his money, time, labor & love running the genetics for some time, and finds a plant containing characteristics that they are looking for and then decides to use that plant for a breeding project, I think that is his right to do so. He bought the seeds. He searched through them. He put in work.

That is my stance on using another breeders genetics to create a hybrid or a cross.

Now, if the breeder wasnt putting in much work, just grabbed random pheno A and crosses it to the same strain pheno B and then tried to just sell it as their own <cough-cough> Natures sweet nothing <cough-cough> I am against this under MOST circumstances (there are exceptions, ie - an old lost strain, very rare strains, etc...)

If the breeder runs lets say 100+ of a strain. Happens to find an extremely rare pheno, runs another 100 and finds a male of this rare pheno, then continues crossing it and stablizing this pheno then I have no issues if the breeder markets the strain as their own.

No matter what the situation is, anyone of the options I listed, i feel that the original breeder should absolutely be given props for their work. The description should contain the original breeders name some where.

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Yup we both pretty much agree on the standards. Put work into it and give credit where credit is due and by all means open up shop. Do some pollen chucking on random first run shit and get the fuck out.

Yodaweed said:

SOOOOOOO many people like that here in Colorado, they have average to above average genetics and horde it like it's the last weed plant on earth. The only reason I see hording a cut is if you spend a shitload of time breeding it for yourself and don't want to give out your work for others to make money off cause that happens a lot out here too.

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There are good reasons to keep your diamond to yourself, if you are growing to supply a collective then you have the only one and no one else can take your spot. If you pass around your diamond and enough people get hyped up on it the payment will be lowered or you won't even be added to the shelf because someone else already brought their 5 lbs of your strain.

Doesn't make sense to me if you are growing the only blue dream cut in town and you pass it around to 3 friends who pass it around to 50 people who pass it around to 100 etc etc...

I don't advocate hoarding genetics but to all those who call those guys assholes they really need to put in the work themselves and then see how they feel about giving away a potential paycheck.

King Arthur said:

There are good reasons to keep your diamond to yourself, if you are growing to supply a collective then you have the only one and no one else can take your spot. If you pass around your diamond and enough people get hyped up on it the payment will be lowered or you won't even be added to the shelf because someone else already brought their 5 lbs of your strain.

Doesn't make sense to me if you are growing the only blue dream cut in town and you pass it around to 3 friends who pass it around to 50 people who pass it around to 100 etc etc...

I don't advocate hoarding genetics but to all those who call those guys assholes they really need to put in the work themselves and then see how they feel about giving away a potential paycheck.

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I agree with you, but high CBD strains are the excception for me. That's truly medicine. Not many people using high cbd strains just to catch a buzz. Those should be shared, and should be free IMO.

Everything else, whatever. If someone wants to share, great. If they don't, no hard feelings. I understand the work that goes in to growing out a bunch of seeds to find that gem. .

st0wandgrow said:

I agree with you, but high CBD strains are the excception for me. That's truly medicine. Not many people using high cbd strains just to catch a buzz. Those should be shared, and should be free IMO.

Everything else, whatever. If someone wants to share, great. If they don't, no hard feelings. I understand the work that goes in to growing out a bunch of seeds to find that gem. .

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Charlottes Web people are total scam artists, those are the worst kind of people in the world. Preying on sick individuals is bullshit, once I get a CBD strain you can bet your ass I will be handing it out to each and every person that will cover the cost of transport.

King Arthur said:

Charlottes Web people are total scam artists, those are the worst kind of people in the world. Preying on sick individuals is bullshit, once I get a CBD strain you can bet your ass I will be handing it out to each and every person that will cover the cost of transport.

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Indeed. The Stanley's may have started out with what they believed were good intentions.
So much myth and rumour around that mess. Stolen genetics, bait n switch, borderline criminal profiteering, false and unproven claims, refusal to acknowledge the negative outcomes, 'dumping' patients who have concerns.

What happened with the Stanley's and CW is a prime example of the underbelly of the commercialization of medical marijuana and the risks inherent within large scale corporatization.

Hypothetical question here.


Let's say I do a 250 seed run all from the same strain to find a couple or few elite keeper moms. Then I do another 200 seed run from a different strain from a different breeder in hopes to find a super stud male or 2. I chuck some pollen, label everything and grow out a couple or few hundred progeny to test them, maybe share with some friends to test as well. No reports of intersex and lots of fire reported.





Is it ethically wrong to sell the f1 hybrid? Is this "building off another breeders work" or is putting in the work of those selections putting in enough work to call it your own work? or does it have to be worked into a "stable line".

Curious to hear opinions.

I ask the breeders if they would mind me handing out a cross with their work in it. Just bout every one said yes, just label it properly.......Josey whales gg#4 x bodhi's snow lotus chucked by racer boy for instance.

D_Urbmon said:

Is it ethically wrong to sell the f1 hybrid?

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Depends amongst others on the goals and on how much work you put into it. Phenohunting 'keepers' in the seeds you buy doesn't equal good breeding stock. What you describe is essentially pollenchucking and pollenchucking beans from a breeder's work and selling it is unethical yes. Although, if you actually make an effort to cross multiple plants in to multiple lines and test those lines till you find the best combination...

D_Urbmon said:

I in hopes to find a super stud male or 2

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That finding a stud means something different in practice than simply selecting the best looking male (although for some self-proclaimed breeders it's all they got...). It's what some forums think ethical breeding is about... finding your own stud...

D_Urbmon said:

or does it have to be worked into a "stable line".

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Not just for ethical but also for practical and quality reasons. Either stabilize the parent lines in an attempt to create a reproducible real F1 hybrid, or cross pollinate first and stabilize the cross by breeding in after breeding out. The only way to create a uniform F1 hybrid (F1 should be very uniform contrary to popular misconception) is to use stable parents. Just putting the best looking studs with the best keeper females does not lead to a new strain but a cross, a cross from someone else gear.

It's like writing an article. Is it not ethical to copy and paste an article together based on two different articles, but it's perfectly fine to write a new article based on the information in those articles, especially combined with some research and fact checking possibly write a better version. It's what you do with the sources that makes the difference.

amgprb said:

If the breeder runs lets say 100+ of a strain. Happens to find an extremely rare pheno, runs another 100 and finds a male of this rare pheno, then continues crossing it and stablizing this pheno then I have no issues if the breeder markets the strain as their own.

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That's in fact how several large breeders have started (GHS and shantibaba from mr nice amongst others), well, add a zero to that plant count.

And that is what it's about, you use traits, genes, from others strains. Doesn't matter where and how you got them, it's what you do with it that matters. It's ethical to use anyone's strains as a source for genes, as breeding stock, not as commercial pollen-chuck stock.

Just to add...

It all changes when you get the original breeder's blessing for using a strain for breeding. Which doesn't always have to be explicit. Cannalope Haze from DNA Genetics (which I use) is sold with a description of it being suitable for breeding. Mr Nice seedbank maintains and breeds and sells strains also to keep that older healthy gene pool available for breeders (they mentioned it somewhere, it's partly what they are about). ACE seeds started selling 'breeder packs' since recently. There are more examples, and those basically come with an implicit blessing to use them for breeding projects. And once you've done the work that a breeding project entails...

Does that mean getting a breeder pack from ACE and CH from DNA and crossing the best phenos of those into F1, and selling those, is no longer unethical?

Towards the original breeders perhaps, but imo it still depends a lot on how you do it and what you work with. Simply crossing the best plants from two strains does not result in the best F1 or cross breed unless you're very lucky. But then it still requires some skill to even determine how lucky you were, or comparisons to the same cross but with different parents. Essentially, the least you can do is find the best matching pair, which aren't necessarily the plants with the most frosty and fattest buds. Or self the best females and run their offspring to see which female is most homozygous/stable. Even if you do that with just one of the lines for the eventual hybrid the resulting F1 will be a lot more stable.

And that's what the stud is about... mapping genotypes for multiple lines and plants is time consuming, so many stick to getting to know a male inside out, how it's trait inherit. For example, the taste of a good stud should generally be recessive and not completely dominant, else every cross based on is going to taste like it too. Genes to contribute positively to flower time, yield, structure, frost, etc, should generally inherit easily, be dominant. That also depends a lot on what you cross it with and your goals. In some cases (haze for haze hybrids, blueberry for blueberry hybrids) the opposite may be desired.

Cannalope Haze is according to icmag and thcfarmer a C99 knockoff. 8 week flowering short plants. Get a breeder pack from ACE (panama for example) and cross it with CH. Sell it. Ethical? In business ethics and breeding ethics? Maybe it is in such a specific case. Personally I think it still all comes down to whether you tried to create a quality product or just wanted to fill your pockets.

It also doesn't stop at that first pollen chuck if you manage to sell it, and then others get the same idea, possibly uses the same cross. Where does it end? At some point you'll be releasing new crosses just for the sake selling more beans. Not to contribute to the cannabis industry. At some point you'll be recreating crosses that already exist. Crossing with every new hyped elite cut. It becomes a mess exponentially.

Crossing two best phenos/keepers doesn't automatically lead to a strain. The result, unless stabilized first, is creating variety, the opposite of breeding a stable strain. Variety from which one could breed something new and stable, or find keepers to clone (and turn into elite cuts). If the pollen chucks would be labelled as what they are, pheno hunt packs or whatever, would the question of whether it's ethical still apply?

Sativied said:

It's like writing an article. Is it not ethical to copy and paste an article together based on two different articles, but it's perfectly fine to write a new article based on the information in those articles, especially combined with some research and fact checking possibly write a better version. It's what you do with the sources that makes the difference.

That's in fact how several large breeders have started (GHS and shantibaba from mr nice amongst others), well, add a zero to that plant count.

And that is what it's about, you use traits, genes, from others strains. Doesn't matter where and how you got them, it's what you do with it that matters. It's ethical to use anyone's strains as a source for genes, as breeding stock, not as commercial pollen-chuck stock.

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That was the point I was trying to make on one of these threads about giving credit where it is due. Cheers man, you're always putting out some solid reasoning. Too bad Americans aren't known for our reasoning abilities. Peace man.

D_Urbmon said:

Hypothetical question here.


Let's say I do a 250 seed run all from the same strain to find a couple or few elite keeper moms. Then I do another 200 seed run from a different strain from a different breeder in hopes to find a super stud male or 2. I chuck some pollen, label everything and grow out a couple or few hundred progeny to test them, maybe share with some friends to test as well. No reports of intersex and lots of fire reported.





Is it ethically wrong to sell the f1 hybrid? Is this "building off another breeders work" or is putting in the work of those selections putting in enough work to call it your own work? or does it have to be worked into a "stable line".

Curious to hear opinions.

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I say make the seeds,grow them out your self....do not send them to anyone,to test in they room,unless you are willing to do so...

Other than that......try and use a "f2" male & female,from who ever you choose to work with,that is the first best step.

D_Urbmon said:

Hypothetical question here.


Let's say I do a 250 seed run all from the same strain to find a couple or few elite keeper moms. Then I do another 200 seed run from a different strain from a different breeder in hopes to find a super stud male or 2. I chuck some pollen, label everything and grow out a couple or few hundred progeny to test them, maybe share with some friends to test as well. No reports of intersex and lots of fire reported.





Is it ethically wrong to sell the f1 hybrid? Is this "building off another breeders work" or is putting in the work of those selections putting in enough work to call it your own work? or does it have to be worked into a "stable line".

Curious to hear opinions.

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If you're planning on finding some elite Sweet Skunk moms let me know. I am on the hunt as well.

Cheers guys great answers.

OGEvilgenius said:

If you're planning on finding some elite Sweet Skunk moms let me know. I am on the hunt as well.

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Bahahaha you know it. Large seed run in the future.

Observe & Report said:

This debate was settled decades ago. You can't trademark a plant variety. Anyone is free to sell seeds/cuttings under the name "blueberry" or "gorilla glue" or whatever. In addition the market has spoken: they don't care who developed a strain. If they did, JD Short wouldn't be having a bitch fest about it. Consumers definitely don't care and most growers don't either. Count the number of "Who has the best XXX" vs "Who has the original XXX" threads in Seed & Strain reviews.

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....debate far from over...lol, it wages on in many places other than just the depths of the troll caves around here....and lol @ calling a debate settled because you and a couple of your friends on rollitup agreed it was... just lol

Anyone is free to sell cuttings under whatever name they want, sure, until that name is trademarked. And one could even say that anyone could sell cuts by whatever name they choose also. But this too will change soon enough. Isn't there some lawsuit pending right now over some company claiming to be selling high cbc shit that wasn't. My point being that the lawsuits have begun flinging all over the place. And the grounds to patent this plant will be laid, they are being laid.....wake up and smell the coffee.

The market may not care who developed which strain, because they demand that strain no matter who developed it. But if the person who developed it patents that strain...they're gonna care then. But more appropriately applied to this scenario, perhaps the original breeders are the only place one can acquire such dank strains as XXX vs XXX, and perhaps it is for that reason that people actually do care who made them because they wish to track down the real ones....maybe, just maybe....hhhmmmm

true colors

althor said:

true colors

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...yes? Do you wish to imply something althor? If so...don't be scared.

Yodaweed said:

SOOOOOOO many people like that here in Colorado, they have average to above average genetics and horde it like it's the last weed plant on earth. The only reason I see hording a cut is if you spend a shitload of time breeding it for yourself and don't want to give out your work for others to make money off cause that happens a lot out here too.

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I don't give my cuts out to people who can't grow. Last time I gave some out to an unskilled grower (who pretended to be the shit) I had to deal with him bitching and moaning about how I gave him crap genetics when I gave him some of my best strains. The people who ended up buying his crap said the only strain that came out worth smoking was my Northern Lights cut, which is basically indestructible but puts out b/b+ herb at best. So no, now I will give my cuts (that I selected from seed or from seeds I created) only to people once I know they can actually grow. Since not a lot of people have my strains, I don't really want people doing a shit job with my genetics.

King Arthur said:

So there is constant talk on the forums about fake, watered down, or just plain stolen genetics. I set up this poll to get a feeling of how the majority feel about this. While I believe that taking ones genetics an using them without giving credit is wrong ... I feel like it is any other product. Take a car for example, 4 wheels a body an engine and all the things that make it move. If someone said nah man you can't use the 4 wheel body for yours because it is my creation I would tell them to go fuck themselves as the 4 wheel car is a proven efficient way to travel.

If female seeds comes out with c99 from the brothers grim at half price but used their genetics to make it, why do you feel it is wrong to purchase from them? Must we wait until brothers grimm goes out of business? Should we wait until the next drop even though we don't know when it will happen?

I find nothing but silliness in the triviality of this situation. If it is good weed and is close enough to the description of what I am buying then by all means I will buy again. Even if swerve is a shithole had his beans served me well I would have kept growing them.

Don't use this thread as a flame ground or I will ask for it to be locked.

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When you allude to female seeds making copies of brothers grim gear for half the price and allude that they are in fact using the same genetics then I would be under the impression that brothers grim must be in association with female seeds. Otherwise why would brothers grim give up their parent seed making stock to someone who would just undercut them on the prices so......

....what I believe you are in fact referring to is female seeds using brothers grim genetics to make f2 knock offs of c99. And the problem with this, other than the blatant greed, is that you're actually putting a company with superior genetic stock out of business in place of another company that will then only have sub-par watered down genetics to offer. And if you just use a little forethought to see where this ends up it's really only in one of three places that I can think of off the top of my head.
1). Hoarding
2). Patenting
& 3). The most watered down kool aid you can imagine.

...maybe four...
4). Stealing

...and most breeders I know don't give out their parent, or as you stated, 'original' genetics because of option #2 on the poll. As a matter a fact, any serious breeder doesn't make their 'original' genetics available to the public. So this option is more appropriately stated, "buy from someone making knock-off f2's with the breeders genetics."
See #4). above.