Hybridizers: Questions about hybrids, 1 by Zen_Man

Zen_Man wrote:
Blake,

(chuckle) Exploding plants have not been a problem for me. But I suppose there is a first time for everything.

You can't depend on the name "hybrida" appearing in a plant's name to tip you off that it is an F1 hybrid, or even of hybrid origin. You can't even depend on a catalog description saying that it is a hybrid. If the seeds are expensive (10 to 20 cents per seed) then it is probably a hybrid.

In answer to your first question, self pollinated seeds of F1 hybrids will usually grow (they are called F2 hybrids) and they will recombine the genes of the F1 parents in interesting ways. People usually say not to try to grow seeds from F1 hybrids. I eagerly do grow their seeds, because I like to see interesting things.

For your question 2a, no, the parent plant will not be affected unless it catches some sort of disease from the pollen you put on it, and that is unlikely.

For your question 2b, no. For 2c, hopefully not. But the attached picture is one of my hybrid-of-hybrid zinnias that kind of 'sploded.

For your question 3, the answer is a kind of yes. Actually, some crosses only work well one way, in that the stigma of one plant can accept pollen from the anther of the other, but not vice versa. In the case when the cross actually works both ways, there may still be some factors that would make the resulting F1 hybrids turn out differently, depending on which plant was used as the female. Mendelian genetics seemed kind of simple, but real world genetics is lots more interesting and complicated.

ZM