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Post by mnjrutherford on Aug 15, 2011 6:38:40 GMT -5
hmmmm..............................
I wish we had minds like this in congress.....
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Post by ottawagardener on Aug 15, 2011 9:33:24 GMT -5
I'm on the same page Joseph
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Post by blueadzuki on Aug 15, 2011 11:27:13 GMT -5
With peas and beans, I also save seeds from every plant that grows well enough to produce seeds figuring that some plants will produce 200 seeds, and some plants will produce 3 seeds, and that the better producing plants will eventually dominate the population. I guess in theory that I don't need to remove mal-adapted plants because they pretty much remove themselves, either by not maturing seeds before frost, or by dying mid-season. Depends on the maladaption. There are after all two kinds; those that make the plant a suboptimal choice for itslef (i.e. those that affect growth) and those that make it a suboptimal plant from your point of view. If a bean plant was very vigorous and produces tons of beans, but the bean it produced tasted so unutterably foul you couldn't eat it (or if the genes you added are primitive enough, actually made the beans poisonous), I doubt you'd keep it in your genepool long, regardless of how vigorous it. From the plants point of view, having poor tasting or poisonous seed is not really a handicap. In fact, it's an asset since it means a larger portion of it's seed will likey survive to grow (or in the case of really poisonous seed, that quite a few of them will have a lot of extra fertilizer. From our's not so much. Ditto shattering genes; great for the plant (cast thier seed far and wide, lousy for us. Two give an example; two cowpea plants survived long enough to produce beans in my garden. One has white pods one purple. Next year when I'm planting I'm planning to skew in favor of the white one, even though the purple one produced 3-9x more actual beans (9 pods to the whites 1-3 (depending on whether you count the one the animals bit off early and the one that's still developing) the reason is that the white one has much thicker, meatier pods; and I'd like the option of being able to take some as snap beans next year, besides ones as dried seed. the purple one is too slender for that (about the thickness of a thin pencil) and dries down too quick once it reaches size (when it reaches it's 6inch or so mature length, it's maybe 3-4 days before it purples and then only a day or two before it's started to go parchmenty) Of course most of the room is going to the leftovers from the orginal bag, as I hope to find one that has "the best of both worlds" (whites size, purples vigor.) |
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Aug 15, 2011 14:03:55 GMT -5
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Aug 15, 2011 14:16:29 GMT -5
Oops.... you reminded me of another screening I did on my peas this summer when I was collecting seeds. I opened each pod and examined the peas for bug damage. Those that were highly susceptible to the dreaded pea weevil were tossed. So perhaps I am working on making my pea crop more poisonous.
I think that I am also working on making my corn crop more poisonous: At least to the soil organisms that interfere with it's ability to germinate in cool soil... That might affect taste.
Sometimes I've had a C. melo fruit show up that is extremely bitter. They don't get propagated by seed, but they might contribute some pollen to the patch. If i could identify them earlier in the growing season I would definitely chop them out.
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Aug 15, 2011 21:52:06 GMT -5
A friend in Southern Utah grew two crops of corn from seed I produced last summer: Astronomy Domine, and a cross of [Astronomy Domine X homozygous se sweet corn]. Today he sent a picture of the cross:  He says "Thanks for the seed. This is some of the best looking corn we have ever grown here. The a.d. Is just starting to produce ears and is two feet taller. The taste [of the cross] was varied, some really tender and sweet and some more chewy. J.... had three ears!" |
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Aug 27, 2011 21:32:32 GMT -5
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Aug 27, 2011 22:23:22 GMT -5
when I started Astronomy Domine at the end of the first year I only ended up with about 20 cobs from a population of about 1,000 due to animals, but from that population (and additional genetics) I built up something that has now traveled the world and is being selected far and wide for diverse climates. This week I have been selecting Astronomy Domine sweet corn for better adaptation to my garden... I am roughly selecting for the following traits: - Lots of color at the early milk stage.
- Matures 2-3 weeks after my early season corn.
- Productivity (multiple cobs or large cobs).
- Taller plants.
A cob can be selected either for growing really well, or for having lots of color. They don't have to have both traits. I am using different flags for the two traits. Some plants might be flagged twice with different color flags: Once for color and once for great growth. I am deselecting plants that matured very early because I already have a good reliable early sweet corn. (And also because there are so few of them in my-version-of AD that they didn't get pollinated fully.) Late maturing plants will end up eliminating themselves because of my short growing season. I might also actively deselect late maturity as well. One seed produced six great cobs on tall easily harvested plants. I'm very pleased with it. I tasted around 100 cobs of Astronomy Domine last week and every one of them was acceptable as a sweet corn. However, I have found a corn that I like better than AD,  , the F1 hybrid that I made last year between AD and sugary enhanced sweet corn. It has the early season vigor, great growth, and multicolored kernels of AD with more sweetness. My long term intent is to maintain an AD population, and an open pollinated se+ population, and to make a F1 hybrid between them as my main season market crop. Unfortunately, I didn't make any fresh hybrid seed this year, though I still have plenty for use in the next few years. This year I'm expecting to produce an open pollinated landrace of sugary enhanced sweet corn that is nearly homozygous for the sugary enhanced allele. I intend for it to be the pollen donor for my hybrid sweet corn. |
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Post by DarJones on Aug 28, 2011 1:29:05 GMT -5
Joseph,
One of my all time favorite corns was Platinum Lady which was a hybrid of a standard su white corn with a su/se sugar enhanced selection. The advantage was better germination while getting a 25% boost of sugar from the se gene in 1/4 of the kernels. Unfortunately, it was discontinued about 10 years ago because of development work that gave similar performance from full se hybrids.
"Platinum Lady - Breeder and vendor: Crookham Company. Characteristics: F1 hybrid, early season, high eating quality, white kernel and white silk, 14 row count, leaves and glumes have ornamental anthocyanin pigmentation. Resistance: tolerance to stewarts wilt. Similar: Tokay Sugar. Adaptation: wide. 1977."
If I may suggest an alternative, consider developing two strains of sugar enhanced corn with one earlier and one later maturity than AD. Then you can selectively cross either se variety with AD and produce corn with a range of maturity from early season to late season and with 25% increased sugar. The advantage would be having a longer season to market. It might also be an advantage since you would have a much higher opportunity to gain heterosis.
DarJones
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Post by lavandulagirl on Aug 28, 2011 9:22:29 GMT -5
   Some of my Astronomy Domine harvest this week. The pic of 4 cobs together are from one stalk.  |
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Aug 28, 2011 9:52:48 GMT -5
Very nice!
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Post by bunkie on Aug 28, 2011 10:17:11 GMT -5
great looking corn there lav and joseph!
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Aug 28, 2011 10:20:11 GMT -5
If I may suggest an alternative, consider developing two strains of sugar enhanced corn with one earlier and one later maturity than AD. Then you can selectively cross either se variety with AD and produce corn with a range of maturity from early season to late season and with 25% increased sugar. The advantage would be having a longer season to market. It might also be an advantage since you would have a much higher opportunity to gain heterosis. DarJones Can you be more specific... Would you suggest making the two crosses separately, and then combining the seed 50:50 before planting? I'm thinking that would provide better cob pollination in the F2 than the willy nilly method I used last year of pollinating with 65, 75, and 85 days-to-maturity se+ all jumbled together. Should I plant the pollen donors at 10 day intervals (or GDD equivalent) hoping to get crosses with the earliest and the latest members of the AD population? It seems like it would be easy enough to do. I already have a segregated F2 sweet corn with the equivalent of 60 days to maturity. I'd just have to select the se+ seed out of it. And I have some segregated [Indian Corn X se+] with longer DTM. I'd want to grow it out one more year to make sure it would make an OK pollen donor, but as a temporary thing it wouldn't hurt my feelings to use a commercial se+ sweet corn like Silver King as a pollen donor. I don't much care for the taste of Silver King in my garden... Anyone have suggestions for a more tasty se+ sweet corn that I could use as a pollen donor? Something with about 80-85 DTM. |
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Post by catherinenm on Aug 28, 2011 13:39:47 GMT -5
Fusionpower said:
"One of my all time favorite corns was Platinum Lady which was a hybrid of a standard su white corn with a su/se sugar enhanced selection. The advantage was better germination while getting a 25% boost of sugar from the se gene in 1/4 of the kernels. Unfortunately, it was discontinued about 10 years ago because of development work that gave similar performance from full se hybrids."
I never grew PL, but I did grow True Platinum, Alan Kapuler's de-hybridized version. Loved it! And it reached eating stage easily in my short season (don't know if it could ripen seed for saving, though, that was before I was interested in my own seed). I got too busy to garden when my twins were born, and since they got interested in gardening we haven't grown corn. Thanks for reminding me.
Seeds of Change still carries True Platinum.
Catherine
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Post by DarJones on Aug 28, 2011 16:43:45 GMT -5
Joseph, I'll use this as an example since it is a ready way to show the process. You can apply the principle to any selection you have that can be gotten to a pure sugar enhanced strain.
1. Cross and select a variety to maintain as a long season se+ pollen donor line. You could use the Cherokee Squaw X Silver King I sent you since it will segregate for se+ at a rate of 1 seed in 4 that exhibit su phenotype. This will become your long season se+ variety.
2. Cross and select a variety to maintain as a short season se+ pollen donor line. This could be from your existing se+ X AD line. The important rule is to ensure that it is either shorter season or same season as AD.
3. Every other year, grow plants and save seed of the selected AD strain you want to maintain. These should be grown in an isolated area where you can ensure high purity while also selecting for best performance. No special care is required re pollination since you are practicing mass selection in this block and it is grown in isolation. This will be your long term breeding line of AD. Any cull ears should be harvested and sold as regular production corn.
4. Each year, plant 3 rows of AD and 1 row of one of the two selected se+ varieties repeating as many groups of 4 rows as needed always putting a row of se+ on the outside of the block. The only special care needed is that you would plant the early season se+ variety 10 days after the AD and the next year plant the long season se+ variety 10 days before the AD. Grow these in reasonable isolation. Pull tassels out of all of the AD plants before they can release pollen. This ensures pollen is available from the se+ variety. Save seed from the se+ variety and keep it as the long term breeding line. Save seed from the AD plants and use it as production seed to grow corn to sell.
5. Each year, plant as much of the AD crossed seed as you want for production corn. I would suggest planting the short season type in blocks beside the long season selection. This will give pollination for earlier and later season plants while keeping harvest hassle to a minimum.
By practicing a 2 year rotation, you maintain all three breeding lines with pure stock and with minimum effort on your part. By exercising reasonable mass selection within the breeding groups, you can improve performance year after year with minimal inbreeding and maximum retention of genetic diversity. You gain an advantage that some of your seed is adapted for a shorter season and some is set for longer season. You would be able to harvest over a 30 day or longer season by planting the production seed of the AD crosses.
One more note, and I hate to make a plug for Burpee, but their Breeder's Choice corn is outstanding as a pure se+ variety. They have it in a white line too sold as Silver Choice. I've had excellent results using it in a single cross to an OP sweet corn.
DarJones
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, the F1 hybrid that I made last year between AD and sugary enhanced sweet corn. It has the early season vigor, great growth, and multicolored kernels of AD with more sweetness. My long term intent is to maintain an AD population, and an open pollinated se+ population, and to make a F1 hybrid between them as my main season market crop.
