hybrids vs. heirlooms

[WildOlive]

I have never paid any attention to whether the vegetables I've planted in the past were hybrids, but I'm sure most were. I'm interested in learning to save seed though, so this year I'm perusing the heirloom selections. What I want to know is, are there some things that are just best grown as hybrids? I mean, I don't particularly want to waste my time growing something that isn't going to produce well. In the Johnny's catalog, I noticed that some of the seeds don't even come in a non-hybrid option. But in the Baker Creek catalog, they are all non-hybrid. So why does Johnny's carry only a few? Is it that the hybrids are really so much better, or because they don't really want people to save seed? :think

Should I just start with a few heirlooms, or go great guns with it?

Also, when you are growing heirlooms to save for seed, if you are growing more than one variety of the same vegetable, do they need to be separated, so they don't cross?

[Hermana Linda]

I don't know much, but I do think that hybrids are sometimes disease resistant. :think

[melliethepooh]

Hoo boy. The answer is as much political as anything.

Baker Creek has a great forum, called idigmygarden.com or something like that. Perusal therein will give you a lot of insight.

I only grow heirloom because I don't trust the companies that produce hybrids. Baker Creek goes to great lengths to get GMO free corn, even testing what they produce. I trust Baker Creek pretty much absolutely because I know they're idealists.

I don't entirely understand how hybrids work, but I know that they have what we call 'hybrid vigor'. You know how a mule (horse+donkey) can't have offspring, but they are very robust and strong? Hybrid plants are the same way: you might have a very disease resistant or heavy-bearing plant, but it won't be able to pass on those characteristics. I don't think they're GMO (necessarily-yet) but you won't be able to save the seed. I also don't know if any particular hybrid is *better* than an heirloom...there are some crummy heirlooms and some crummy hybrids. It all depends.

If you want to save seed, Baker Creek or Seed Savers Exchange are both great bets. My advice is to start with easy ones like tomatoes, and maybe let a carrot or onion or something stay in the ground over the winter and get the seed next spring. If you don't till, that's easier to accomplish.

ETA: You don't have to get heirloom seed to save it...you can get any open-pollinated variety. It's just easier to peruse for heirloom because you know those are open pollinated; I don't think all hybrids are labeled. It's also easier to go for heirlooms because they're varieties that have stood up to the test of time. SSE has instructions on each seed packet for how far apart plants need to be if you want to save them...for instance vining plants (pumpkins, squash, etc) need to be like 1/4 mile apart or something; beans you can just about plant on top of each other.

[WildOlive]

Melinda, that is great information, thanks!

I've just been reading Independence Days, by Sharon Astyk (http://sharonastyk.com/), and have renewed enthusiasm for saving seed. She points out that even if you've been gardening for years, if/when the economy tanks, *everyone* is going to want to garden, and there is going to be a serious seed shortage, she estimates it will take 5 years, I think, before the seed companies could catch up and there would be enough seed produced for everyone to grow their own gardens. So I think it is really important to start saving seed now, because I do think a big crash is nearly inevitable. She has a lot of great info on her site (in fact, a lot of what I read in the book is word for word from her site).

[melliethepooh]

Do save your seed! You've listed a lot of good reasons there and it's fun too. The world needs more seed savers.

[Maggirayne]

I am planning on buying seeds soon here and was looking at Gurney's and was like, um hybrid, hybrid, hybrid. :-/

[WildOlive]

Yeah, I was really surprised at Johnny's. I know a lot of back to the land families that use them, so I was really surprised once I began paying attention.

[melliethepooh]

IMO the seed companies prefer you use hybrids because if nothing else, you're dependent on them for seed year after year...

[Macky]

Okay, I need to get on the soapbox again here. HYBRID DOES NOT MEAN GMO. Also, heirloom and open-pollinated are two terms meaning the same thing. Take two established heirloom/OP varieties of something (let's say tomatoes, for example) and cross pollinate them to produce fruit and thus seed. Until you can prove for X number of consecutive generations that that new crossed seed produces true to itself, guess what it's called... a hybrid. HYBRIDS ARE NOT AWFUL, TERRIBLE THINGS TO AVOID AT ALL COSTS. They are steps in the breeding process. Sometimes they produce true to themselves and are eventually classified as new OP/heirloom varieties. Sometimes the cross produces a spectacular plant that unfortunately doesn't produce true to itself, so they have to keep crossing the original parents to get the spectacular plants. No foreign genetic material has been spliced into them to make them into some sort of mutant. It's just plain old genetics. Disease resistance can be bred into some varieties simply by repeatedly breeding individual plants who manage to survive under disease conditions. It's not GMO until they start messing with the genes in unnatural ways and inserting things that have no business being there. HOME GARDENERS CANNOT EASILY PURCHASE GMO SEED. It's simply NOT available through regular, reputable seed catalogues and shops. There are contracts involved. You would know if you were buying trademarked GMO seed. Ordinary hybrids are not some huge conspiracy. Seed producers focus on hybrid sales because people like the results (vigour, resistance, etc.); it's just unfortunate that they can only tend to so many varieties at a time. If customers are demanding hybrids, they'll carry more hybrids and less OP varieties. Supply and demand.

I grow a lot of hybrids because most OP/heirloom varieties of the vegetables I like to eat need a much longer season to ripen than I can provide for them at my latitude. Hybrid varieties that I grow have been selectively bred to mature early; the first plants to produce were year after year, bred to each other (same way toy dog breeds and miniature horses, etc. have been engineered by human intervention). Nothing mysterious or conspiratorial at all.

To answer your direct questions...

If you want to save seed that one can pretty much guarantee will produce true to itself, buy OP/heirloom varieties IF your season is long enough to allow the seed to ripen properly. For example, I can grow the earliest heirloom green beans to snap bean stage, but we're hit by frost long before the seeds can mature for dried beans or seed. Hybrid bush beans are my best bet to guarantee food in my freezer for the winter. Yes, that means I'm buying my seed every year. So what? I'm still spending pennies to grow hundreds of dollars of vegetables.

You'll find some catalogues have more heirloom seed options than others simply because of a) location, b) personal philosophy and/or c) that's what their customers demand.

Yes, hybrids can be better, depending on your climate, soil, personal tastes, etc. You have to judge this for yourself.

Yes, most OP/heirloom varieties raised for seed need to be separated. By how much depends on how important it is for you to have untainted seed. The backyard gardener doesn't have to be as sticky about separation as the seed breeder. Corn is particularly bad for cross-breeding; this can be avoided by planting varieties that tassle at different times if you don't have enough room to separate by distance. Tomatoes usually self-pollinate, but some separation is still good as some of the flowers will inevitably be pollinated by insects or wind. You really have to read up on each vegetable you want to grow for seed, especially if you want to store the seed long term and have dependable germination rates. The New Seed Starter's Handbook (http://www.amazon.com/New-Seed-Starters-Handbook/dp/0878577521) is a superb source for seed-saving information. :tu

[Hermana Linda]

Thank you for all that info. :heart

[melliethepooh]

See...political :) Just defining terms here: I never said that hybrid=GMO. I also don't trust that new varieties' purity can be trusted. Quite simple.
Also, heirloom is not synonymous with open pollinated. An heirloom is a variety established before 1943, which iirc is when hybridization took off. There are open pollinated plants that have been developed since then.

[WildOlive]

Yeah, I wouldn't care about buying new seeds every year. Hybrid doesn't bother me. I *know* there are benefits. IF I could guarantee that they'd be available in the future, I probably wouldn't bother to save seed. But if I save my own seed, I depend on ME, not the seed company. That's why I'm trying to look for OP stuff, and trying to figure out which stuff I will have to go hybrid for.

Personally, I have nothing against GMO. I do think Monsanto is evil, but I think GMO has promise for feeding a rapidly growing population. :duck

[WildOlive]

Phew! Just sent in my orders. I am a little :nails nervous b/c I have never planned such a large scale garden before. I ordered almost everything from Fedco, b/c they were significantly cheaper than Baker Creek. I ordered a few things from BC that Fedco didn't carry or was sold out of. I also ordered my potatoes and onions from Fedco. It was hard to know how much to order.

Anyway, I ordered mostly open pollinated stuff, except for broccoli & cauliflower, I think. Those are things I can live without, if they become unavailable.

I also ordered Seed to Seed, from ILL.

I still need to find reasonably priced shop lights and bulbs, b/c our windows are not good for starting seeds.

[raining_kisses]

I need to purchase seeds but it's all so over whelming.:nails

Maybe it's just like cloth diapers, it just seems over whelming until you actually purchase stuff and jump in feet first.

[Hermana Linda]

I need to purchase seeds but it's all so over whelming.:nails

Maybe it's just like cloth diapers, it just seems over whelming until you actually purchase stuff and jump in feet first.
:think Probably. :yes

[Lady TS]

Okay, I need to get on the soapbox again here. HYBRID DOES NOT MEAN GMO. Also, heirloom and open-pollinated are two terms meaning the same thing. Take two established heirloom/OP varieties of something (let's say tomatoes, for example) and cross pollinate them to produce fruit and thus seed. Until you can prove for X number of consecutive generations that that new crossed seed produces true to itself, guess what it's called... a hybrid. HYBRIDS ARE NOT AWFUL, TERRIBLE THINGS TO AVOID AT ALL COSTS. They are steps in the breeding process. Sometimes they produce true to themselves and are eventually classified as new OP/heirloom varieties. Sometimes the cross produces a spectacular plant that unfortunately doesn't produce true to itself, so they have to keep crossing the original parents to get the spectacular plants. No foreign genetic material has been spliced into them to make them into some sort of mutant. It's just plain old genetics. Disease resistance can be bred into some varieties simply by repeatedly breeding individual plants who manage to survive under disease conditions. It's not GMO until they start messing with the genes in unnatural ways and inserting things that have no business being there. HOME GARDENERS CANNOT EASILY PURCHASE GMO SEED. It's simply NOT available through regular, reputable seed catalogues and shops. There are contracts involved. You would know if you were buying trademarked GMO seed. Ordinary hybrids are not some huge conspiracy. Seed producers focus on hybrid sales because people like the results (vigour, resistance, etc.); it's just unfortunate that they can only tend to so many varieties at a time. If customers are demanding hybrids, they'll carry more hybrids and less OP varieties. Supply and demand.

/snip


Slightly OT...


I agree with most of what you said in the above post, but did you know that the Roundup Ready corn, soy, canola, cottonseed and sugar beets(which are different than regular beets-these aren't ones you'd grow to eat, ya'll ;)) are no longer regulated? (edited to add: will no longer be regulated after 2014.... broken link here (http://www.%20monsanto%20.com/newsviews/Pages/roundup-ready-patent-expiration.aspx))

I think it was because their patent expired(still trying to find my source on this...I think it was on the actual Monsanto site around last April but my virus software is saying it's not a safe site to go on...I think the new gen is called Roundup Ready2 or something like that).

At any rate, last year they came out with a new generation of GMO corn/soy. We rent out part of our farmland and when they were planting the corn/soy, I went to the truck and read the bags. Yep. Second generation. I got online and saw that farmers can now legally keep their old-generation Roundup Ready GMO corn as seed for the next year(where previously they would have been sued by Monsanto).

Anyway, just thought I'd toss that tidbit of info out there. It *is* possible to buy GMO corn seed w/o filling out the paperwork(but unlikely if you don't live in corn country ;)). But the GMO corn we're talking about is not what you eat as sweet corn, although I suppose you could use it for corn meal.:shrug3 And it is possible to purchase corn w/undisclosed GMO genes from a seed company if they don't check it (like Baker's Creek does) for having been cross-pollinated w/GMO corn. (But that's been covered already.)

Personally, it just depends on my mood and how anal I want to be about it, when I am making my gardening plans. :shifty:giggle



As to the OP, I don't have anything against hybrids. Many hybrids produce better than heirlooms. :shrug3 BUT you can't keep the seed AND rely on it to produce the exact same thing next year. I kinda like to play with hybrid seed just to see what it produces the next year. We've done it with grape tomatoes, letting the volunteers from the previous year grow. They were still tomatoes, just not as tender and juicy as the grape tomatoes were. So, still food, but not nearly as good.

---------- Post added at 01:31 PM ---------- Previous post was at 01:26 PM ----------


Personally, I have nothing against GMO. I do think Monsanto is evil, but I think GMO has promise for feeding a rapidly growing population. :duck

I entertained this idea for awhile....but in case you're interested(please ignore if not, k? ;)), here (http://www.combat-monsanto.co.uk/spip.php?article698) is an article that got me thinking some more... not sure I completely agree, but it did get me thinking... :think

We really should start a GMO discussion, but I'm not sure where to put it!

Apologies to the OP for going OT. :shifty

[WildOlive]

Thanks Tanya, I'll read that link when I get a minute sans kids in my hair.

Cate, I agree it can seem overwhelming. I'm sure I'll think that even more when all my seeds, potatoes and onion sets arrive. :bag :giggle

If you've never gardened before, I'd start kind of small. You could always buy extra seed that you plan to just save, for security. Many seeds can be saved for more than a year. That way you could have a small garden this year, and if TEOTWAWKI happened, you'd still have stuff to plant for next year. ;)

[WildOlive]

Interesting side note: I just received my order from Baker Creek today with a note that said "sorry for the delay, we've had a huge increase in orders". Maybe more people are getting the self-sufficiency bug. :rockon

[raining_kisses]

I am putting my order in today. :tu thanks for the advice WO. I think I will start a GMO thread, because dh and I are becoming very interested in it latetly and are trying our best to go GMO free.(very hard to do).

[Lady TS]

Oh no! I hope there are seeds left when I order next weekend!