by Nebula Haze
A cannabis grower asked me this question and I wanted to put a tutorial about in GrowWeedEasy.com in case anyone else happens to type the question into Google.
Sometimes a cannabis plant grows small flowers where the buds should be. The petals are typically white, yellow, or green, but may have tinges of purple or pink.
When you see small pale flowers on your cannabis plant, it means the plant grew pollen sacs that have opened up and released pollen. This happens either when your marijuana plant is a male plant, or if it is a hermaphrodite plant (lovingly called a hermie in the cannabis growing world).
By the time the flower has visibly opened, it has already spilled its pollen.
Sometimes a LOT of pollen.
Sometimes they’re sneaky and hide at the base of buds.
Before the pollen spills, the plant will grow pollen sacs. Now that you know what a pollen sac looks like, you can spot them before they open up.
You don’t want pollen anywhere near growing cannabis buds because it will cause them to grow seeds. That’s not the end of the world, but it’s annoying to have seeds falling out of your buds everywhere, bud yields tend to be smaller (all that energy went into seed production) and if buds are super seedy they often feel less potent and have weaker effects. The sooner you get the source of the pollen away from your other plants, the better.
Keep pollen away from buds, especially buds with a lot of white hairs (pistils). Young buds like this get the seediest from pollen exposure. The wispy hairs catch the pollen and a seed forms at the base.
If pollen gets on buds, you will get a seed wherever the pollen touched a hair.
A few seeds don’t matter, but if the buds get heavily pollinated they will grow a lot of seeds. Buds with a ton of seeds are usually less potent.
I hope that helps a fellow cannabis grower. Share this knowledge if you know a grower in need.
- Learn more about hermies (when there are buds and pollen sacs growing on the same plant)
- Learn more about male vs female cannabis plants
Happy growing!
Nebula Haze
P.S. If you liked this article, sign up for my weekly newsletter and you’ll get cannabis grow articles delivered to your inbox every Sunday.
