What Is The Best Location Globally To Operate A Pollen Bank?

[pic book]

At present there are dozens of seed banks but not one pollen bank.  Strange, nobody offers male and female pollen, sold by the strain.

Edited June 17, 2015 by pic book

[trichcycler]

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MI is the best place of course.

[pic book]

Why Michigan?

[trichcycler]

Because I'd hate to have to mail you your offered stock, across state lines.

 

seriously though, some states boast prolific sales of breeding stock, clones, seed sales, breeding tools....a good place to study maybe.

Pollen can be stored long term and shipped overnight safely, and with the net, making any location viable , not sure of the legalities though. Thinking the  fairy dust is legal to ship, until LEO thinks it isn't.

Elevated mold counts can and will adversely affect a pollen collection in the grow room, as well as while in storage.

I think a pollen bank is a fine idea.

Edited June 17, 2015 by grassmatch

[mrd]

Pollen stored in the freezer is viable supposedly for about 6 months. Seeds can last years. Of course all bets are off if you use liquid nitrogen. I think it is a great idea but not sure if you can easily do it (as compared to seeds or clones) Good luck I would be interested. 

[trichcycler]

especially not with the LG appliance types in the kitchen. There are proper storage freezers that also keep humidity in check. I believe I can store viable pollen for as long as I can store viable seeds in this type of controlled refrigeration. Is possible, but definitely a niche business venture, yet a fine hobby one.

[mrd]

especially not with the LG appliance types in the kitchen. There are proper storage freezers that also keep humidity in check. I believe I can store viable pollen for as long as I can store viable seeds in this type of controlled refrigeration. Is possible, but definitely a niche business venture, yet a fine hobby one.

What do you base that belief upon? Everything i have read suggests non viability after 6 months. I do not know if anyone has erformed any exeriments that showed otherwise (would be great if it was proved otherwise.)

[trichcycler]

It's not a belief, but a practice. Like with seed storage moisture content is key.

Dessicant tolerant pollen like cannabis is easily prepared for long term storage by reducing the moisture content to below 10%.

The first mistake is made in timing, the second in gathering, third is fungi, fourth is in "drying" and packaging. Once these tasks are addressed

a 0 degrees F  storage is possible for years and years.  Of course a lab freezer(wish I had one!) will extend that time exponentially, and 200 to 300 below 0 will

make that storage near indefinite.

 

 Anthers should be gathered from flowers, then separated.

placing fresh pollen into a vial and refrigeration/freezing  lasts a short time like you are familiar with. The issue is degradation due to moisture/age, which must be halted with fast drying/freezing to prevent the off gassing of degrading vegetable material.

 

I check my pollen viability with a petri dish, some agar I use in culture, and a light sugar feed.  Some prepared chems are available for this too. (germtube emergence)

 

hope that helps.

 

long term pollen storage is an age old subject, no proof necessary really, google for results from 1920's even. grow room cannabis pollen storage today is likely not done in a lab, or under lab conditions, varied results are expected.

Edited June 22, 2015 by grassmatch

[pic book]

in determining the best global location, the problems to consider are plant numbers and shipping, the same as for seed banks, most of which operate legally in a european gray area, until caught and closed down.   spain prolly is the ticket, although i bet that a better approach is to find the biggest most successful, profitable, seedbank/breeder for sale, buy it or a share of it, and then ramp up pollen as an additional product offering.

Edited June 23, 2015 by pic book

[pic book]

storage is not the primary question.  it is, are we shipping viable pollen?  whether it is pollen from last month or from 15 years ago, is the pollen viable, and what % of the grains in each shipment are viable, regardless of how or where or when stored, all that matters is that the customer receives pollen that can be depended upon, both as to strain and viability.

[pic book]

to be the lowest cost supplier of viable pollen to breeders, you'd want extremely long term effective storage, so that you only have to grow out a crop of each strain every 20 or so years, and spend 19 years or so working off the the supply inventoried in the company's extremely long term storage.

[pic book]

to be the arbiter of strains, such a company should map the dna for every strain and become the default identifier of what truly is any given strain as it will be id'd by the dna.

[pic book]

for a seedbank or a pollenbank, reputation is all you have to sell...