Hybrid F1 vs F2 Seed from Seed Sellers?

14 years ago

I have noticed that from some hybrid seeds I have purchased that there is more variability in the plants resulting from the seeds than I would be expecting if they were actually F1. I am wondering if some of the seeds being sold are actually F2 seeds rather than F1? It is easier to obtain seeds from tomatoes grown from F1 seed than to produce the seeds by making the crosses each time you want the seed to sell. Am I wrong? Are some of the seeds being sold by companies F2 or all of them F1?

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Comments (13)

anney
14 years ago
Which companies? Their hybrid seed reliability depends on their seed source.
lubadub
Original Author
14 years ago
Totally Tomatoes.
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Depending on what it is, you may end up with something very similar to the F1. I'm no expert in this by any means, but I've saved a few seeds here and there from produce and from F1 plants. It doesn't hurt to grow them out and see what you get. I tried growing out F2 pepper seeds a few years ago and I kept getting 3 different types of peppers. Of the 3, the ones I really liked were seedless, so unless I took cuttings, I could never keep growing those. I've saved seed from white marigolds and they would never germinate. I've read that tomatoes grown from Campari F2 seeds are just like or very close to the F1. It is fun to try...I usually have some kind of experimental planting each season, but on a very small scale..
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If you remember your highschool biology, this is where punnett squares come in. You've got dominant traits (uppercase letters) and recessive traits (lowercase letters). Lets pretend Red pepper pod color is dominent, and yellow pods are recessive. So you have two purebred peppers next to each other, a red one (RR) and a yellow one (yy), and they accidentally cross. .....y.....y R..Ry..Ry R..Ry..Ry All of the seeds from that crossbreeding will be red, because the dominant red gene (R) is in all of the crosses, and it overrides the yellow. Now, that is your F1 generation. Say you save the seeds from that F1, and plant them. Say there is no cross pollination, only self pollination (which is most likely), you get this: .....R.....y R..RR..Ry y..Ry..yy So you end up with a 25% chance that the F2 is going to be pure Red, a 50% chance that the offspring is going to be a hybrid that is red, and a 25% chance that it will be yellow. If you were to take one of those Ry hybrid reds and backbreed it with a pure RR red, you'd get this: .....R.....y R..RR..Ry R..RR..Ry So your F3 would be 100% red, with a 50/50 chance of carrying the recessive yellow gene. Now, peppers have a lot more going on than just a single thing like this, but it gives you the idea. Heirloom peppers are generally stable breeds, aka ones that have been bred out for at least 8-16 generations to ensure there are no weird recessive genes lurking around. Hybrids may look normal for several generations and then spit something weird back out again. And then you get into the stuff with two dominant genes that end up creating actual hybrid appearances (like if in the above example Red and Yellow were both dominant, the RY offspring might come out Orange, for example, while still having offspring that come out Red or Yellow). Scrupulous seed dealers will only sell seeds that have passed at least the 8th stable generation mark (as in, 8 generations of seed grown out with no surprises), sellers like Pepper Joe on the other hand will happily sell unstable hybrids if they can get the sale. Its one of the reasons you need to look up the reputation for a seller, and never trust seed off of ebay. Because even if the ebay seller picks the seeds straight out of the pod and puts it into an envelope for you, they still might have been an open pollination cross that will mess it up for you. But please, don't let that scare you away from anything thats OP, as its very unlikely that an OP pepper actually hybridizes, majority of the time a pepper self pollinates. Which, as long as its a stable line, will get you more of what you want. Even then, I occasionally like to intentionally plant F1s from an unstable line (like the snacking sweet peppers you get from the grocery store) just to see what I get. Peppers sold for food don't need to be stable, and it can be interesting to see what grows (especially when it gives you a glimpse into what they're hybridizing to make the peppers they sell you). Sometimes the mystery of what grows is the most fun part!
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Oh, boy, there are better experts than I but being on Pacific Time and up late, I'll take a crack at it. An F1 is a "first filial" outcrossed generation of 2 inbred breeding lines. Without going into details why it is so, their characteristics will tend to be that they are relatively vigorous and productive, and rather uniform (because they were bred from 2 highly inbred lines). Their vigor is referred to as "hybrid vigor" or "heterosis"; it is a side-effect of having a lot of a lot of different alleles ("heterozygosity"). It is painstaking to produce them, especially in the case of tomatoes, and this work is mostly done in China. Even so, they are significantly more expensive than other seeds, as I noticed while shopping for tomato seeds online a few minutes ago. F2s are the next generation. They are NOT controlled crosses, unlike the F1s, but are simply allowed to self-pollinate (as tomatoes tend to do). Compared to F1s, they will tend to be less uniform, and will tend to have a lot of double-alleles ("homozygous"), which defeats the purpose of the F1 hybridization and sabotages the "hybrid vigor". This is part of the reason that breeders raise F1's: they can protect their seeds because the cross has to be remade and remade and remade from the parent lines, which they do not distribute. F2s are cheaper. So, in summary: F1s more vigorous, productive, expensive F2s less vigorous, less productive, less expensive.
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The tradelists at this URL are mine: http://plants-and-food.160845.n8.nabble.com/Pen-td44.html
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mulio
14 years ago
If the packet said "hybrid" or F1 there is a problem. Hybrids sold should be uniform. If it is not uniform it is not a hybrid.
anney
14 years ago
lubadub

Maybe someone else has experience with TT. I don't buy from them because their tomato seeds cost about a dollar more than other companies, and their shipping costs more as well.

I don't think they fall into the "disreputable company" category yet. I suspect they may sometimes offer seeds that are not stable because they didn't wait a year or so for testing.

But others may want to comment who have direct experience with them.
trudi_d
14 years ago
When I first read this post the thought which came to my nimd was that age or freshness of the seed would be the biggest determining factor of germination.

T
HoosierCheroKee
14 years ago
I have noticed that from some hybrid seeds I have purchased that there is more variability in the plants resulting from the seeds than I would be expecting if they were actually F1. [lubadub]
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Which hybrids and regarding what kind of variability?
trudi_d
14 years ago
I agree with HC, need more info. I purchase some of my bulk stock from TT, I think their prices and stock are very good, I consider them very reliable. There are a LOT of catalogues with far higher prices--my experiences have been nothing but positive and I would never hesitate to recommend them. they're AOK.

So please, give us some more info about this seed and what happened that you have questions about if it's F1 or F2. Which variety/ies are you talking about?

Definitely need a more info to understand exactly what happened.
digdirt2
14 years ago
Agree - you need to give specifics on the "variability in the plants" you are seeing. Some variability is normal and simply due to growing conditions and seed age (as mentioned) and has nothing to do with being a hybrid or F1. Some is also due to the occasional stray seed that ends up in a seed packet. Some is also common with grower inexperience.

But I think it would be a real stretch of credibility to claim TT is knowingly selling F2 seeds labeled as F1's.

Dave
woodcutter2008
14 years ago
I always wonder about the label "hybrid." It used to be synonymous with "F1," but I'm not so sure anymore. If someone creates a "new" F1 tomato "C" by crossing "A" and "B" and then continues to refine it in subsequent generations until it has the same observable characteristics as the original F1, isn't this still a "hybrid" variety?

Is there anything stopping the breeder/developer from calling it a "hybrid?" (Yes, we may call this de-hybridization, but another description might be "a stabilized hybrid.") If you look through catalogs you will find from the same seller "F1" and "hybrid" listings. Do they mean the same thing? The answer likely depends on who you ask. But even if "stabilized," there should be minimal variation. Personally, I've never seen much variation between adult tomato plants of the same variety, true F1 or OP (unless caused by external conditions).
-WC2K8
HoosierCheroKee
14 years ago
While breeders and vendors used to refer to post-F1, open pollinated products as "hybrid," way back in the yonder days of seed vending (ie: Turner's Hybrid), I think the common practice nowadays is to refer to only F1s as "hybrid."
lubadub
Original Author
14 years ago
I was not claiming that TT is selling bad seed etc. I just was asking if when you purchase hybrid seed if the sellers are always selling F1 or might some be selling F2. F2 seed is easier to produce and is not a lot different from F1 but does have more variability. The variability I saw was that some plants were much smaller than others. I never grew them to adulthood. The seed I was referring to was Big Zac.
HoosierCheroKee
14 years ago
Interesting. And I have seen some variability in other seed sold as F1 but only in rare instances like one potato leaf seedling in a population of thousands of Early Girl hybrid transplants. I've only seen that twice and two years apart. In those cases, I guessed that some of the open pollinated fruit of one of the parent lines was inadvertingly harvested by inattentive field workers and the parent line seed was mixed in with the millions of correct F1 seeds. Your case may be due to different circumstances. Dunno.
anney
14 years ago
Rats! I just re-read the name of the company the OP typed, and THAT isn't the one I think has some troubles. Many apologies to Totally Tomatoes and those who couldn't comprehend why I might criticize the company.

I can no longer rely on my memory with these senior moments popping up unexpectedly...

Hybrid F1 vs F2 Seed from Seed Sellers?

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anney

lubadub
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Hybrid F1 vs F2 Seed from Seed Sellers?

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lubadubOriginal Author

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