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nOVA sCOTIA

What is it with selfed seeds?It's not that long ago a selfed seed would be roasted and eaten rather than grown.

2/26/2011 10:55:50 PM

Bemidji Minnesota

This might be better answered in the genetics forum.

It’s also not that long ago that growers were not have soil samples taken...

Selfed seeds are just another new tool in breeding. Generally the more recent idea is that selfed seeds have a good chance of maintaining the genetic characteristics of the pumpkin.

Where the more generations a line has been selfed the more consistent the outcome becomes.

Growers looking for specific traits like shape and color seem to be big advocates of it.

2/27/2011 12:02:28 AM

Bemidji Minnesota

Just one more thought to add to that, when you look at a lot of the top growing seeds these days and look up the ancestry you will find many of them have the same ancestors showing up over and over again in their line.

So even a lot of the modern "crosses" might as well be line bred. So an 1161 x 1385 cross sounds like it is a perfect hybrid vigor cross, but when you look them up they both have the exact same 4 ancestors they both can be traced back to.

2/27/2011 12:06:12 AM

Muddy Waters

Ive been told selfing can be real good or real bad,so its worth a shot.They most all go back to the 935 Llyod & farther.

2/27/2011 7:43:34 AM

[email protected]

What it is with the selfed seeds is that the 1725 Harp proved that selfed seeds are just fine. Now peoples ideas of what can and/or could be done with selfed seeds is expanding.

Hybrid vigor does not exist in todays lines, it just doesn't, it's simply a case of selection. If you catch lightning in a bottle, selfing the seeds makes it a whole lot easier to select the strongest genes. The next step will be getting past the stigma of twice selfed seeds. Until someone grows a beast off a twice selfed seed or grows a beast that is twice selfed, they will be planted very sparingly.

I've read many times on this board about growers need to start selecting for shape, disease ristance, etc. It's already being done, it may be inadverent in some cases, but it's being done, at least, to some extent. Disease resistance is something that will be addressed more in the future as our understanding of what is going on with soil biology improves. A pumpkin doesn't get to 1400+ lbs by being a weakling.

The shapes are better than they used to be too. At least it seems to me that we see less "blobs" today than we did 5-10 years. Notice how most of the 1725 Harp progeny are shaped a lot like the 1725? Growers don't usually grow seeds where one of the parents was a DMG. Once again it seems to me there are less splits and less Dill rings than there were just a few years ago.

2/27/2011 9:43:07 AM

Muddy Waters

Dmg is not always bad sometimes they pollinated to early & a solid fruit got old & rotted.

2/27/2011 9:46:47 AM

Brooklyn Corner, Nova Scotia

Meathead and Kevin make a good point. In the long gourd world selfing has successfully passed on desireable traits:

125.75 Urena- WR 126.5 Jutras x self
WR 134.25 J/B- 125.75 Urena x self
WR 135 Jacobus- 134.25 J/B x self

2/27/2011 10:30:49 AM