Re: HYB: F1 and uniformity

In a message dated 1/23/2003 2:06:06 PM Mountain Standard Time, 
gibbman6@mchsi.com writes:


> It's cold, snowing, unusual, and I have a general question: How can F1 seeds
> be sold that are uniform? You look in any catalog, and the seed is promoted 
> as
> F1 hybrid of uptysquatch. What gives? Aren't F1 HYBRIDS, by nature, fiarly
> random in their characteristics?
> 
> Truly perplexed, but assured of comfort by the group,

The answer, once again, is "it depends".

Plants that are self-fertile can be inbred for generations until the seed 
"comes true" -- meaning that the strain is for all practical purposes 
homozygous.

If two such strains are crossed, the F1 seedlings will be uniform but highly 
heterozygous and the F2 can be expected to express ancestral traits in 
roughly Mendelian ratios.  

As you've observed, though, this is not the way of nature or typical of the 
world of iris.  

Sharon McAllister

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