Weird Cannabis Mutations: Ducksfoot, Albino Weed and the 'Underwater' Plant Myth

The best-known cannabis mutations include ducksfoot (webbed leaves), albino and variegated plants, whorled phyllotaxis (three or more leaves per node), polyploid "giants," creeping plants whose branches take root, buds sprouting from leaves, and "twin" seedlings from a single seed. Mutations are everywhere in the plant world, and cannabis has its fair share of strange cases.

The key to every mutation is hidden where it started: in the plant's genetic code. The DNA of any living thing holds deep secrets that can be tricky to understand and study, which is why researchers keep digging into them.

From twin plants to albino ones and even plants with animal-like shapes, we put together a list of some of the weirdest cannabis genetics out there. We kicked it off with the internet's favorite oddity, the "underwater" weed plant, which deserves a big asterisk.

The "underwater cannabis plant": where was it supposedly found?

The story goes that in 2015, fishermen in Chile pulled up a pretty wild find: a cannabis plant growing underwater in the Pacific Ocean. According to the tale, tests confirmed it was genuine cannabis.

As it's told, a group of fishermen was going about their usual work when they hauled up their net and found the exotic specimen. A "Chilean Aquaculture Institute" supposedly analyzed it, declared it Cannabis sativa and named it "the fishermen's friend" in honor of the crew who found it. Heads up: we couldn't find any scientific record backing this up, and cannabis is a land plant that can't survive submerged in seawater.

The story claims specialists put it down to hot springs, a mutant gene and the location, and that the plant even had flowers with very low but detectable THC. Treat it as viral lore, not botany.

Creeping cannabis: the plant with tentacle branches

Among the many types of cannabis plants out there, this genetic mutation produces plants whose branches spread across the ground like tentacles, always looking for something to anchor to. It's known as the "creeping phenotype."

Pretty strange, right? If the branches spread over moist soil, they can take root, and once they've built their own root system, they grow upward as if they were independent plants. This odd mutation shows up only in sativas, with super-thin leaves and very slender stems.

Whorled phyllotaxis: chasing bigger buds

This mutant gene is called "whorled phyllotaxis," and it produces plants with three or more leaves per node instead of the usual two. The result is busy, leafy phenotypes, and all that extra foliage makes them promising candidates for big yields.

Unfortunately, growers report that this mutation tends to throw a very high proportion of males. The leafy overgrowth seems to come from a mutation in one or more of the genes that control plant growth.

Plants that grow buds out of their leaves

One of the cannabis mutations whose origin is still unknown makes plants develop buds at the base of many of their leaves. Growers who've seen it noticed leaves and pistils forming right where the leaves join the branches.

Keep in mind the flowers aren't very big. And unlike the buds we know, which grow from the nodes, this new generation of "mutant buds" can also grow where the leaflets (the individual "fingers" of the leaf) meet.

Polyploid mutations: the giants of cannabis

Polyploidy is a genetic quirk that creates plants with hyper-vigorous sections. It's an anomaly that happens when plants carry more sets of chromosomes than the two typical of their species.

These plants are usually much bigger. But that's not necessarily a huge advantage: according to growers, they can't pass their gigantism on to their offspring, whether crossed with normal plants or with another "mutant."

The strange case of "twin" plants

When two plants sprout from the same seed, you're dealing with a polyembryonic seed, meaning one seed carrying two individuals. It happens when one embryo develops from a fertilized ovule while another forms from the mother plant's own female tissue. So one plant will be "normal" and the other will be a clone of the mother.

The stems of these seedlings are usually very delicate, so if you try to separate them before the seed has broken down, you'll probably kill both. But once they reach a decent height (20 to 25 cm, or 8 to 10 in), you can separate them without trouble, since they're two independent plants.

Albino cannabis

If we're talking cannabis plants with baffling genetics, this one's in a league of its own: white buds on plants that mix colorless patterns with green parts. It's called "variegation," a mutation caused by faulty expression of the genes that regulate chlorophyll, which produces albino traits.

The key is the cause of the albinism. If it comes from a double albino gene, the whole plant will be white; if it's down to faulty expression of the chlorophyll genes, the plant will have snow-white patches or patterns, and that's the one with better odds of surviving.

Ducksfoot cannabis

This is the ducksfoot mutation, named because its webbed leaves look like a duck's foot. It's a genetic variation of the classic cannabis genome that almost always shows up in sativas.

Our advice is not to keep it if you find it, since crossing it with "normal" strains passes the webbed trait on to part of the offspring (a three-to-one ratio is often cited).

 

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