F1 hybrid seeds

Hi Tigerella

Hybrid seed began with maize in the 1920s, and became extended to vegetables and flowers; and more recently, rice and some forage crops. Hybrid seeds are produced from naturally out-breeding crops, from which inbred lines are produced by repeated self-pollination. The established inbred lines are crossed to produce first generations (F1) hybrid seeds.

A well known fact about F1 hybrids is that they don't come true from seed. All the gardening books warn you about this. If you save seed from your beautiful hybrid plants and sow them yourself next year, the results will generally be crap. They will revert to a motley mixture of feeble and substandard plants which may look nothing like the plant you took them from. Which means if you want to grow more of your treasured variety you have to go back and buy it again next year. Another reason seed companies luuuurve you to buy F1 hybrids.

So are F1 hybrids superior to open-pollinated varieties or not? That depends ... not just on how you grow it but on what it is. If it's sweetcorn then yes yes, go for an F1, they're way better. If it's tomatoes, then F1 hybrids are probably a waste of money. The reasons for this are slightly complicated, but here goes.

It's all to do with the way different types of plants reproduce and how they like to shake up their genes. There are two basic types: inbreeders and outbreeders. Inbreeders, which include tomatoes, peas, lettuces and French beans, have enclosed flowers which almost always self-pollinate. No bees needed. The offspring is genetically almost identical to the parents, and they're quite happy with that arrangement. Outbreeders, on the other hand, chuck their pollen far and wide in the hope of mixing up the genepool as much as possible. Sweetcorn, carrots, onions, beets and brassicas are all outbreeders. They rely on being pollinated by other plants of the same species. Otherwise within a few generations they start to suffer.

This brings us to the phenomenon of hybrid vigour. If you cross two different varieties of an outbreeding plant, the offspring may well turn out bigger, better and faster-growing than either of the parents. This is exactly what an F1 hybrid is: the term stands for 'first filial' generation and refers to a direct cross between two separate varieties. If you then cross the F1 generation with itself you get an F2 generation, and so on. But the hybrid vigour is not passed on. It's for one generation only.

The opposite of hybrid vigour is inbreeding depression. If you cross two outbreeding plants of the same variety, or it self-pollinates, the offspring can turn out weaker and slower-growing than either parent, and it gets worse with each subsequent generation. (This has major implications for people who save their own seed and I'll cover it in more detail soon in another post.)

Hybrid vigour and inbreeding depression only affect outbreeding plants. Inbreeders can inbreed to kingdom come and not show any ill-effects. But by the same token they don't show any extra vigour when you hybridise them. This is an important point. Because it means there's no special advantage in buying F1 hybrids of these plants.

Let's give an example. The back cover of this year's Thompson & Morgan catalogue has a lovely photo of their new and exclusive F1 hybrid tomato Harlequin. While it looks like, and probably is, a very fine tomato, the fact that it's an F1 is neither here nor there. It won't be any more vigorous than any other tomato, because tomatoes don't display hybrid vigour. But it is more expensive. A packet of Harlequin will set you back £2.89 for 8 seeds! Compare that with the open-pollinated old fave Alicante from the same catalogue, which retails at £1.69 for 100 seeds. So Alicante seeds work out at 1.69 pence each, while Harlequin seeds cost 36.13 pence each. Ewww.

In the absence of any hybrid vigour, paying twenty-one times as much for hybrid seed is a bit pointless. Unless you really like the variety, in which case fair enough, buy it. And then save the seed. Because the usual don't-sow-seeds-from-F1-hybrids rule doesn't apply to tomatoes, as they're inbreeders. Just as they don't display hybrid vigour, they also don't display inbreeding depression, so you can inbreed them all you like. It's my guess that if you grew some Harlequin and sowed the seeds from it, at least some of the offspring would breed true. After a few generations of roguing out any that don't look right you will probably end up with an open-pollinated version which you can carry on growing forever without buying more seed.

I'm not slagging off Thompson & Morgan here (I buy from them myself and they've always given me excellent service) ... I'm just trying to explain why some of the things they offer are much better value for money than others. Tomatoes are very profitable to sell as F1 hybrids because they are relatively easy to hand-pollinate and each pollination produces a large amount of seed. And if you keep going back to buy more year after year because you think you can't save the seed then they make even more profit.

There's more to this though than being ripped off. F1 hybrids are replacing open-pollinated varieties in the catalogues to such an extent that many reliable old favourites are becoming unavailable and this is seriously compromising the genepool which has been built up over centuries. Despite all the "NEW!" stuff that appears year after year, the range of varieties available is dwindling. This gives seed companies increasing control over what we grow in our gardens, and enables them to streamline their lists to the core varieties which maximise their profit margins and thwart the sustainable practice of seed saving. Meanwhile both our gardening heritage and the potential for future plant evolution are being lost at a rapid rate.

There has been a stealthy and active increase in the development of seeds which are only viable for one generation, as seed companies seek out ways to keep you coming back to buy more. The obvious headline grabber has been Monsanto's insidious "terminator" technology which has genetically engineered plants to produce sterile seed. But it's happening on a much more subtle level too. I bought some Calendula seeds a couple of years back ... normally something you only have to do once because they self-seed liberally. But then I read on the back of the seed packet that this variety had been bred to be "self cleaning – no dead heading required". The flowers just fall off as soon as they've gone over. That's supposed to make me think "woohoo, that'll save me some time and getting my fingers all sticky!" But wait a minute. Isn't there something fundamentally wrong with a plant which aborts its own flowers? Do I really want this in my garden?

Going beyond the realms of the domestic garden for a moment, there are serious issues with the introduction of hybrid seed in developing countries. What started off as aid has in some cases increased hardship and crop failure among some of the world's most vulnerable people. Big seed companies donate hybrid seed in vast amounts to community projects, which makes them look 'ethical'. In most cases this involves replacing the locally grown varieties which have been saved and replanted in these communities for generations. Once they have been given the hybrid seed, farmers are locked into a cycle of buying the pesticides and fertilisers to go with them, which are cripplingly expensive as well as unhealthy. The hybrid seed is not optimised for the local growing conditions and often does badly. Shockingly, many farming communities who have received well-intentioned charitable aid in this way are now worse off than they were before.

So, to sum up ... I don't think there's any need to completely avoid F1 hybrids. It's just a matter of being a savvy consumer and being aware of the wider issues. Work out the price per seed before you buy them and decide if it's worth it. Buy from a seed company which has a sustainable rather than a profit-driven ethos. Celebrate diversity. Save your own seed. Make your own hybrids.

Sorry Tigerella, probably more of a rant than an answer but I hope you get the gist!

Good answer Geordie, well thought out, lots of good info and very well written!

Must be raining !

The price per seed is an issue, but on open pollinated plants you can save the seed.
So even if you pay over the top for a few seeds of non F1 hybrids ie rare cultivars, the following year, by saving your own seed you won't pay anything, which in fact makes the initial high cost spread over a lifetime, negligible!
If you don't grow F1's and save your seed each year theoretically you never need buy another packet of seed again!

My head hurts, I'm going for a lie down now!

Hi

Very thorough advice, many thanks.
So if the seeds from a F1 is poor, is that just because it goes back to the same standard as the two parent plants. Or is it worse than the parent plant.

Tiger

Thanks Geordie
Tigerella: in a nutshell, F1 seeds are 'guaranteed' to grow as advertised, so if you want those tip-top plants again, you need to buy new seeds every year, not save your own

If you want to save your own seeds (and we should!) then don't sow F1

Well done Geordie, you put it much better than I could have. I dislike F1 hybrids for the simple reason that self-sufficiency relies on being able to grow from your own seed next year.
Monsanto are trying to take over the world by selling staples such as wheat and rice to third world farmers who are then 'in hock' to the company for ever more. Totally immoral in my book.

Thank you for taking the time to post that, Geordie - clear and informative - much appreciated.

I just wanted to add that T&M and others are supplied in the main by larger seed companies. The focus of these larger seed companies is COMMERCIAL growers - thats where they make their money, selling in bulk and breeding new varieties . Therefore, a lot of the varieties you buy from amateur seed suppliers are exactly the same as commercial varieties - hence the increase in F1 hybrids around - the hybrids give uniformity, disease resistance, predictable yields etc etc to the commercial growers who need to supply the supermarkets on a consistent basis.

Now, i know on the vine we are only concerned with GYO, not buying from the supermarkets, but ultimately T&M are going to supply in the main, the same varieties as you can buy from Tesco's and the like! (i can give examples if you wish, but i'm sure you'll believe me! )

Not sure if that made sense or not - but i wanted to point this out. I work for one of the larger UK seed companies and know we supply the amateur market, in fact we have a few lines which are ONLY supplied to the amateur market and are generally not F1's, we still supply open-pollinated varieties but are increasing our number of Hybrids available to commercial growers, which are then also available to the amateur suppliers. Its a small family business which IS concerned with the environment, supplying healthy food, creating diversity in crops, and our own breeding programme reflects this. Please don't knock F1's all the time - its not our fault our main customers require them! There are other suppliers who concentrate on heritage varieties which no doubt will be open-pollinated and hence you will be able to save the seed if you so wish.

F1's are grown for a specific quality whether it be uniformity, early cropping,late cropping,hardiness,size,resistance to disease etc...the list goes on!

What I have found is that taste usually seems to take a back seat though!

Having said that I can only grow an F1 hybrid sweetcorn in the North East!

If you have a freezer and want to clear all your sprouts on a single day, use F1 seed!

If you have clubroot you can use an F1 clubroot resistant cabbage!

So to sum up, I mainly use open pollinated seed BUT I use F1's for specific purposes!

Can't agree with this one i'm afraid! My fave cherry tomato variety Sungold is an F1 and has a reputation as being extremely tasty!!

The same could be said for F1 sweetcorn varieties - delicious!

I do agree though that if you want to crop over a long period (as most gyo's do), then some F1's are not a good bet - i founf this out last year when i had cauliflowers coming out of my ears for 2 weeks!! the neighbours were well fed (with cauli's anyway )

We'll just have to agree to disagree on this one methinks!
I've grown Sungold, when it first appeared, as a promotion you could get a packet for free if you bought two other seed packets!. I must admit, I wasn't impressed at all with the taste! Give me Gardeners Delight anyday!
I suppose taste is a personal thing, one mans meat is another mans poison!
The taste of F1 sweetcorn is not an issue to me as it's only F1's that will give me any sort of outdoor crop!

Seeds saved from F1 hybrid plants should be no better or worse than any seed saved from your own plants. The point is that F1 are pollinated under close supervision, by hand, and not by bees and other insects as happens when we save our own open grown seed. The seeds you save from your allotment/garden could be crosses (or hybrids) - the bees may have carried pollen from your neighbours plot to yours and he is probably growing a different variety to yours. This is called open pollination You may get very good results from home saved seeds, you may get very bad ones. It's called the luck of the draw!

Thanks for the good advice Geordie, I'm a bit clearer about the difference between inbreeders and outbreeders now.