Yep, my female plants showed me today the real reason for the resiny droplets all over the bud leaves. And this would also account for why the males tend to produce much less resin. The purpose would be to catch bugs and keep them from damaging the flowers and seeds. I saw a number of tiny ants caught and dead in the resin (my grow room has some scouts always prowling), and this showed the true purpose. You see, Passiflora foetida, a type of passionflower that I love to grow, produces loads of resin on these filigree structures all around the flower bud and consequently the developing fruit. There is even the possibility of a shot of narcotic in the resin, as many species of passi's sling some narco into their nectar and resins. Many are poisonous, don't try them! These resin-coated structures capture small insects, likely lowering the possibility of damage to the flower or fruit. (also, P. foetida is considered proto-carnivorous, and may take some nutes from those bugs).
Ive noticed before that the glandular trichomes of cannabis look very similar to those of drosera, a carnivorous plant. cannabis definitly doesnt feed off insects, but your idea that those trichomes are there to kill harmful bugs seems quite reasonable. if thats the only reason then you could probably find one or a few specific insects (maybe a kind of gnat or something) that does significant damage to cannabis in its natural habitat. I believe there is another thing going on, which would explain why females got more than males, having insects stick to the flowers and then trying to get off by buzzing hard may efficiently shake pollen off those insects onto the pistils all around them. cannabis pollen usually travels by wind, but insects could spread it in different directions. the type of insects that would be used wouldnt have to be classical pollinators that feed on nectar or pollen, but all kinds of flies and shit. most likely the various odors of cannabis would have developed to attract certain insects like buddleja attracts butterflies with sweet aroma and araceae smell like excrement to attract flies.
ya I heard that before, but it doesnt seem very plausible... wouldnt a flat layer of some stuff to block UV be more effecient? those pistils may slightly reduce the overall amount of UV radiation that gets to the green parts of the plant, but it doesnt reduce the maximum concentration of UV light for most cells as most cells are still being reached by unfiltered light. why grow the stuff up on those pistils where it only catches a small percantage of the light? the stickiness is definitly there either for insects or to have ripe flowers with seeds stick to passing animals or both.
some trichomes do, bulbous glandular trichomes (the good stuff) dont. they are only present on many parts of the plant, but they do not efficiently cover all of its surface, otherwise there would be no space in between them and youd have more or less a flat layer. even if they were covering every part of the plant, that still wouldnt indicate their purpose as being protection from UV light. other (pointy, hard, non-sticky) trichomes do cover all of the above ground growth and theyre clearly to protect against predation.
Funny you should say that. It does happen... I have an associate in the UK who breeds passi hybrids. Last fall he had a new one flowering that drew bees like alkies to a bar, 10 or 15 at a time. They'd stay forever, sucking nectar, then stagger around unable to fly, clearly drugged.
I've read that when the female becomes more sexually frustrated(aka receiving no pollen), she sends up more trichomes to try to catch any male pollen in the air. Simple survival tactic
Heard this lots...just never seen a trich on a pistill( the part that gets impregnated), so I have some pretty heavy doubts on this.
Of course! More bang for the buck, as it were. Be silly for nature to develop too many multiple systems to do multiple things, when you can have several in one... There probably were plants (and animals) back in the day that did things that way, but it was so energy intensive they were out-competed...