NWG’s first products to market are dioecious varieties in the ABOUND family. NWG has also released the first hemp hybrid in the form of the AMPLIFY™ trait. Hemp is ancestrally dioecious, meaning male and female flowers are found on separate plants. NWG has created a genetically skewed ratio of male: female from its ancestral 50:50, up to 100% female, in effect doubling hemp grain and flower production.
A dioecious plant is one where the male and female reproductive systems occur on separate plants. While both plants produce flowers, one plant has male reproductive parts, and the other has female parts. This is unlike a monoecious plant, which has both male and female flowers on the same plant.
Feminized seed is just as it sounds, a seed lot that produces predominantly female plants through chemical induction. A higher proportion of female plants is desirable since females are the source of almost all the economically significant products, whether seed or flower. Feminized seed is created by inducing female plants to become hermaphrodites by applying chemicals like silver thiosulfate (Lubell and Brand, 2018). Hermaphrodite plants have female flowers, which accept pollen to create seeds, and male flowers, which release pollen. The theory is that chemically induced pollen produced on a female plant contains the female sex chromosome (X chromosome) rather than the male (Y chromosome). Thus, the progeny seed created by pollination with a hermaphrodite will inherit an X chromosome from the pollen and an X chromosome from the ovum of the female flower. The resulting seeds will be primarily females, but there is not yet a method that consistently produces 100% females. This has implications for production using feminized seed (see the Agronomy section of our website). The most significant handicap of feminized seed is chemical feminization – it makes no further seed to multiply. Therefore, it must be reproduced season by season; it's not scalable. Chemical induction of feminized seed is most appropriate for horticultural, craft-style production of flower products.
The term autoflower is a term defining genotypes insensitive to photoperiod (e.g., day length). Photoperiod-insensitive genetics do not require shortening day lengths to initiate flowering. It is common for “autoflower” advertisements to specify the number of days to flowering and maturity, some in as few as 60 days. However, this is a bit oversimplified as plants use several environmental cues to initiate flowering, including temperature, water availability, and the metabolic state of the plant. These factors can be controlled in indoor production so a crop's lifecycle can be precisely estimated, but this is obviously not the case under outdoor conditions. The term autoflower should generally refer to genotypes that can flower under increasing day lengths, a characteristic that NWG varieties and hybrids possess.
AOSCA seed certification provides growers with third-party verification that a seed is a genetically pure variety professionally produced to give the highest quality seed possible and will perform as labeled. States have a Seed Growers or Crop Improvement Association that collaborates with the state department of agriculture or the agriculture university to test and validate stable compliance below 0.3% and seed is inspected and certified according to AOSCA standards. These are two separate processes. Just because a seed demonstrates compliance does NOT mean it is also certified seed, or vice versa. Be sure to look for both the 3rd party validation and Certified Seed Tags. Currently, New West Genetics offers ABOUND®, a family of dioecious grain varieties certified and validated as having compliant levels by multiple state Departments of Agriculture. See variety descriptions here.
Certified seed has been grown according to AOSCA Standards to maintain genetic purity. A seed certifying agency works closely with seed growers to help them follow AOSCA Standards throughout the production process. AOSCA Standards apply to hemp and a wide range of field crops, turf grasses, fruits, vegetables, woody plants, forbs and vegetatively propagated species available for sale. Seed lots that complete the seed certification process qualify for the official “Blue” Certified seed tag, assuring the seed customer that the seed meets genetic and varietal purity standards. Seed Certification is not a one-and-done process. Every seed lot is individually produced according to AOSCA Standards and inspected to earn a Certified seed tag or label. Before planting each season, the seed grower applies to their local seed certifying agency to indicate they will plant and reproduce the pure seed of a recognized variety. The agency inspects the field during the growing season to confirm that the plants are uniform and true to type for that variety, and the seed grower uses good management practices to ensure purity is maintained from planting to seed conditioning and packaging.
Yes! We currently sell dual-purpose grain and fiber-forward varieties in the NWG ABOUND® family and Hybrids with the AMPLIFY trait. Our genetics are specialty-bred for mechanical production and are best suited for large-scale production. Best for producers with farm equipment for row cropping: order here