How to Tell If You Have a Female Pot Plant

For those who are growing cannabis at home, determining the sex of your plants is important for maximizing your yield. Female cannabis plants are the ones that produce the buds that we all love, while the males are only good for breeding. Here are some tips on how to tell if you have a female pot plant:

Look for Pre-flowers

The first indication of your plant’s sex will be pre-flowers that will appear during the vegetative stage when your plant is at least four weeks old. The pre-flowers will be found at branch internodes and will look like tiny versions of the mature flowers. The pre-flowers on female plants will have a prominent pistil, which looks like white hairs emerging out of the calyx.

Examine the Node Structure

At the same time that pre-flowers appear, the leaves and branches of the plant will also start to grow. Female cannabis plants tend to have an alternating node pattern of two leaves per node, while male plants will have a more random arrangement of leaves.

Check the Growth Rate

Female cannabis plants tend to grow a bit slower than their male counterparts, as they put more energy into creating buds instead of just growing taller. This means that if your plants are all growing at different rates, the ones that are growing the slowest are more likely to be female.

Look for Single Blade Leaves

Another indication that your plant is female is the presence of single blade leaves. While most cannabis leaves have multiple blades, female plants will produce some leaves that have just one blade.

Wait for More Pre-flowering Clues

As your cannabis plants continue to grow, they will produce more pre-flowers, which will eventually turn into mature flowers. Female plants will continue to have pistils and will produce long, white hairs that will eventually turn brown and curl in on themselves. Male plants will start to grow sacs instead of pistils, which are located on the nodes where the leaves meet the main stem of the plant.

In Conclusion

Determining the sex of your cannabis plants is important for maximizing your yield and producing the best buds. By looking for pre-flowers, examining node structure, checking growth rate, looking for single blade leaves, and waiting for more pre-flowering clues, you can identify female cannabis plants with more accuracy.