Cannas: For the Canna Tyros - How to Grow Canna From Seeds, 1 by bwilliams

bwilliams wrote:

X it all depends on what you consider a winner. I have found many in just a few crosses that will work for my own personal displays but probably not for mass market. I think the key is what plants your working with. If your using species it can take many many crosses to get a nice hybrid. On the other hand if your working with known hybrids or hybrids that are on the path to what your wanting to create I tend to get more unique looking plants. As with most things the less attractive the plant is the more seeds it produces and the more attractive the less likely you are to get seeds.
I thought I should add a note that I have gotten seeds off of some of the impossible forms such as Bengal tiger, Stuttgart , Black Knight and others. So they are very difficult to get seed from but usually about 1 out of every 100 attempts you get something it seems.
Your also right on your plants producing very different looking seedlings. I have had some with dark leaves produce green leaf seedlings and vise versa. It seems thought that the less genetics involved in the plant the more stable the seedlings will be. Hybrids will have seedlings that will resemble plants from it's breeding line while species will produce almost exact duplicates. This is not always the case but it is the usual.

The key to getting nice hybrids is producing good crosses being very selective and mass growing. The larger your numbers are the higher your chances for a winner the better the breed lines are your chances go up more, after that it depends on luck or genetic manipulation. I will see how the genetic manipulations goes very soon.