Oddball Breeding

[Shadeflower]

thx louis,
I'll check it out.

Interestingly I think it is a sneaky tactic to sell 3n plants so nobody can breed your plants.

We have heard of the travesty of not preserving the species more so creating sterile crosses on purpose just seems just as counter-productive to future breeders than a breeder taking all his knowledge to the grave so nobody can copy him.

I don't think any breeder really started off understanding the genetics that well. It is not a requirement. What was done was differnt crosses were tried, some worked out favorably, others turned out duds. And so the experimenting continued.

When the Toshie Aokie was created for example I am sure a little experience and knowledge will have gone into it but mostly just coincidence and luck what the breeders had on hand at the time.

Imagine half the breeders stock that had been collected to make the toshie had been 3N plants (lets say nature was as sneaky as people are to stop others making more nature) then the toshie might never have been created!

[Fairorchids]

As long as it is known that the plant is triploid, there is nothing 'sneaky' about producing and selling such plants. The buyer gets a superior product (flower), without having to pay an arm and a leg.

Champion horse and dog breeders charge outrageous stud fees for their superior product.
And, if you want to buy one of their young animals, you must sign a contract, which typically prohibits breeding with that animal (or stipulates that the first offspring belongs to the stud farm).

Why shouldn't orchid breeders do the same, when they have superior genetic material to work with?

[Louis_W]

Ya after I watched that lecture I had a lot of respect for Roy and all the work he has done.

[TZ-Someplace]

To add to what Louis W wrote. There are some 3N plants that are fertile and have become important breeders. C. Maris Song is one of them that Roy T. mentions in that video. There are others with oddball genetics that may occasionally set seed with the right mate and result in some fantastic offspring. Horizon Flight plus a special L. anceps resulted in Picotee Passion

https://archive.dvos.org/Library/Art...rdyce%2016.pdf

Louisiana Orchid Connection had/has some uncommon/unusual primary hybrids for sale. Little things.

[thefish1337]

Originally Posted by Louis_W

How is your pod doing? I appreciate your intent to breed for qualities besides flower quality. I love flowers but orchids have more than one dimension of interest to me as well.

2016 - Roy Tokunaga (Tetraploid Breeding) 6th Annual Cattleya Symposium - YouTube

This is a video from Roy Tokunaga from Hawaii. He seems to be generously relinquishing some information which he kept secret for a long time. It's quite enlightening

I didn't understand everything he was saying but I gather that breeding 4n to 2n works just fine. You'll end up with a 3n cross which will have similar advantages to a 4n plant but it will be sterile.

3n plants, according to Roy, are a good product for a breeder to sell. High quality plants for collectors but sterile so other breeders cant use your lines. He figured all this out so that he could propagate by seed and save money on cloning. It's a very interesting lecture and I'm sure you could take the logic and apply it to achieve any qualities you want.

That said, he did some major groundwork to
Get his breeding lines where he wanted them. Selfing to isolate genes takes the chance out of things. Seems like you can keep it simple and just make the cross and see what you get. Or you can go deep and understand how to get exactly what you want. Either way, good luck!

There is a lot of gems in this lecture. Every time I watch it I'll pick something else up. He is finally releasing a lot of his 4N lines as they scale down their nursery towards retirement dont miss out!