Hyb: Triploids
- To: Multiple recipients of list <i*@rt66.com>
- Subject: Hyb: Triploids
- From: S* M* <7*@compuserve.com>
- Date: Mon, 8 Sep 1997 17:15:45 -0600 (MDT)
Mike Lowe wrote:
> Sharon's advice to Rusty vice Sindjkha; was to go with the interesting=
> dip-to-tet cross, hope for a tet offspring, but accept the much more
likely
> reduced fertility triploid.
> Sharon has patience and tenacity on the order of a Paul Cook.
Thank you, Mike. I take that as a tremendous compliment. I really didn'=
t
mean to make the Triploid Route sound easy -- just worthwhile. For
example:
In 1981, I obtained three of Gene Hunt's ABB-type triploid seedlings. In=
the years since, I have allowed only two flowers to remain uncrossed -- a=
n
emergency operation for peritonitis took me away from the seedling patch
that year....
What do I have to show for all of those crosses? A total of five
seedlings. Three still unbloomed. One a flamboyant flower with markings=
of near-spectrum-red. One a breakthrough of buff-pink, on a strong enoug=
h
plant to merit introduction, with enough fertility to offer hope of
transfering that color to fully fertile lines. I don't consider the
hundreds of unproductive crosses to have been wasted -- just part of the
price of the program.
> The 25 triploids below are all that are found in approx. 700 recorded
> chromosome counts. =
This illustrates another important aspect of working with triploids: mos=
t
are merely stepping stones on the way to fertile tetraploids. I have
spotted a number of TB seedlings in my database, which pedigree and
breeding data suggest were probably triploids. Not introduced. Not
counted. So we'll never really know.
With triploids, the temptation is often to grab the nearest shovel and ge=
t
rid of a seedling before anyone else sees it. Don't succumb -- the magic=
rarely shows up until the next generation.
Sharon McAllister
73372.1745@compuserve.com
