Forums:

Your wildest plant breeding aspirations?

D. Logan

gardener

Posts: 1179

Location: Eastern Tennessee

520

I like...

posted 3 years ago

18
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

When I first realized you could breed your own varieties of plant, I remember trying to figure out what I might even want to do. I realized that new traits were mostly a matter of luck, so focused in on what sorts of existing varieties I might cross to look for useful combinations. At the time, I didn't know the world landrace, but I did consider a few landrace sets.

breeding a new vegetable variety

One idea I had (and am still quite fond of) was the idea of working to cross a moon and stars watermelon with a white sugar lump and work for a few generations trying to create a white-fleshed moon and stars watermelon. I can't say the pairing would have any practical value, but the idea of a watermelon variety I could call Moon and Stars: Winter Night strain ticked me. Perhaps one day when I have the space and time, I may try seeing if I can make it a reality.

Anyway, as the title says, I'd like to hear some of the wild and atypical breeding ideas people have considered when they have thought about doing their own plant breeds and varieties?

Outdoor and Ecological articles (sporadic Mondays) at http://blog.dxlogan.com/ and my main site is found at http://www.dxlogan.com/

PEP - BB40 Badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by gir bot

nest - sand badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Ash Jackson

plumbing and hot water - sand badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Mike Haasl

textiles - air badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Nicole Alderman

commerce - air badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Mike Haasl

tool care - air badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Mike Barkley

Food Prep and Preservation - air badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Mike Haasl

natural medicine - air badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Mike Haasl

Joseph Lofthouse

author & steward

Posts: 7149

Location: Cache Valley, zone 4b, Irrigated, 9" rain in badlands.

3340

posted 3 years ago

20
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

I fantasize about:

Tomatoes that are 100% out-crossing.

Direct seeded tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants.

Fruity tasting tomatoes with exciting aromas.

A watermelon that turns yellow when ripe.

Garlic that can be grown from seed in a single growing season, like onions.

Frost tolerant beans.

Winter hardy kale, lettuce, spinach, and bok choi.

Tepary beans with larger seeds.

New seed coat colors in tepary beans.

Fava beans with patterns on the seeds.

High carotene, sugary enhanced sweet corn.

A sweet corn that is green at the fresh eating stage.

Nitrogen fixing corn.

A squash that combines that wonderful flavor of maxima with the vine-borer resistance of moschata.

Landrace Gardening, author
Open Source Plant Breeding Forum, founder
Adaptation Agriculture: Video Course, Community, and Seed Share

D. Logan

gardener

Posts: 1179

Location: Eastern Tennessee

520

I like...

posted 3 years ago

10
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Joseph Lofthouse wrote:A watermelon that turns yellow when ripe.

Could the Royal Golden Watermelon work as a base for this? As I recall it is a vibrant yellow when ripe. I haven't grown them myself, but seems like a good start for your breeding stock since they have yellow skins.

Joseph Lofthouse wrote:Nitrogen fixing corn.

I have no idea where you'd get ahold of the seeds, but there's a corn that would make an excellent baseline for starting to breed these. If I understand right, it is a naturally occurring cultivar that developed a method of symbiosis with nitrogen fixing bacteria. The article below might give you some ideas where to procure seed samples to start your own attempts to refine and cross the trait.

Article About Nitrogen Fixing Corn

I kind of love the list you have. I could get behind almost all of these without hesitation!

Outdoor and Ecological articles (sporadic Mondays) at http://blog.dxlogan.com/ and my main site is found at http://www.dxlogan.com/

D. Logan

gardener

Posts: 1179

Location: Eastern Tennessee

520

I like...

posted 3 years ago

3
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Found another place working with the same corn.

Mandaamin Institute

Outdoor and Ecological articles (sporadic Mondays) at http://blog.dxlogan.com/ and my main site is found at http://www.dxlogan.com/

Ellendra Nauriel

pollinator

Posts: 820

Location: South-central Wisconsin

329

posted 3 years ago

23
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

I'd love to be able to turn all my fruits and vegetables into perennials. Or even just self-sowing annuals. I have a tomato that self-sows pretty aggressively, so that's a start.

I want a pumpkin so sweet you could use it as a sugar substitute, with good-tasting hull-less seeds, and also excellent disease and pest resistance.

I want a watermelon that is ridiculously sweet, but without sacrificing that old-fashioned watermelon flavor, and grows in a short season.

I want peas that grow tall enough the pods are chest-high on me, but without needing anything to climb on, and that taste like childhood summer memories.

I want a sunflower with the seed size of a "Mongolian Giant", the dyeing power of "Hopi Black Dye", and the 5' stalk height of commercial oilseed sunflowers.

I want an edible bamboo that grows in my area (zone 4), has sturdy canes big enough to use as building material, but doesn't spread more than a foot or two per season.

I want a flour corn with the flavor of Magic Manna, that is completely immune to corn earworms and corn smut, has 100% tip coverage, turns the ears upside-down to dry when ripe (like modern field corns do), and fills out every single ear.

I want a sweet orange tree that can handle harsh winters and still produce.

I want seaberries sweet enough to eat fresh.

I want hazelnuts and chestnuts that repel squirrels.

(This list keeps getting longer the more I think about it. I'd better stop there, or I'll be adding to it all day.)

Some of the things on this list are works in progress. Some are on my list of "someday projects". Some I wouldn't even know where to start.

Greg Martin

steward

Posts: 3422

Location: Maine, zone 5

1955

I like...

posted 3 years ago

14
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Not sure this is my wildest plant breeding dream, but I do want to make rewilded squash. I'd love to bring a guiding hand to a population of self seeding, tree climbing C. pepo squash that make an excellent nutty zucchini when immature and make excellent long pie pumpkins when matured. I dream of them invasively spreading all over the place. If, in future years, zucchini plants start climbing your trees and taking over....I'm sorry! (but I hope you love them)

Permaculture...picking the lock back to Eden since 1978.
Pics of my Forest Garden

Eino Kenttä

pollinator

Posts: 424

162

posted 3 years ago

14
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Shade tolerant potatoes is my current goal (to be able to grow in forest semi-shade). In my dreams this strain/landrace would also be hardy enough to go a bit feral in my area (Scandinavia). Don't know exactly how to achieve this, but I suppose either through a bit of frost tolerance or by breeding for varieties that put a few of the tubers deep enough to escape the frost. (Does anyone know if it's possible to find true seed of some tetraploid, decently frost tolerant potatoes anywhere?)

On the more far-fetched side, I've been fantasizing about turning Tilia sp. (basswood/linden) into a nut tree. Theoretically it should be possible, given that they have oily seeds of a decent size that aren't toxic (at least not that I'm aware), but I suppose it would take quite some time.

D. Logan

gardener

Posts: 1179

Location: Eastern Tennessee

520

I like...

posted 3 years ago

6
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Eino Kenttä wrote:On the more far-fetched side, I've been fantasizing about turning Tilia sp. (basswood/linden) into a nut tree. Theoretically it should be possible, given that they have oily seeds of a decent size that aren't toxic (at least not that I'm aware), but I suppose it would take quite some time.

That sounds like a generational goal, but one that would be an absolutely amazing one to accomplish. Adding a whole new food source to the common diet is no small thing.

Outdoor and Ecological articles (sporadic Mondays) at http://blog.dxlogan.com/ and my main site is found at http://www.dxlogan.com/

L. Johnson

gardener

Posts: 1871

Location: Japan, zone 9a/b, annual rainfall 2550mm, avg temp 1.5-32 C

930

I like...

posted 3 years ago

9
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

May not sound very wild to the veteran growers... but I fantasize about just having some basics for each season that grow, fruit, and don't succumb to pest pressure. Cucumbers, tomatoes, green peppers, eggplants, kabocha, potatoes, broccoli, daikon, cabbage, chinese cabbage... As long as they're edible and don't taste horrible I'd be fully satisfied for some time. As it is, I barely have a harvest so the pest resistant garden feels like a pretty wild aspiration.

On another side, if I suddenly came into enough sunlit land to experiment I'd like to try breeding citrus - something new like a Tosa Buntan mixed with Ruby Grapefruit. If I could ditch the Buntan's tough segment membrane and combine the color and some of the flavor from the grapefruit that would be a fantasy fruit for sure.

一期一会

oddball - sand badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Mike Barkley

round wood woodworking - air badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Mike Haasl

textiles - air badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Leigh Tate

homesteading - air badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by Leigh Tate

John Weiland

pollinator

Posts: 2536

Location: RRV of da Nort, USA

719

posted 3 years ago

15
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

I'd like to cross Canada Thistle with Artichokes and have them take over my pasture like the thistle does.

If quinoa would cross with my garden lambsquarter and still retain the nutritional and caloric value of the former, it would not even require seeding in the spring.

"Baseball"-sized brussel sprouts from which you could pick the sprouts in the fall, leaves throughout the winter and it would then produce a broccoli head in the spring.....

If we're getting close to putting humans on Mars, is this too much to ask?? :-)

“The most important decision we make is whether we believe we live in a friendly or hostile universe.”― Albert Einstein

J. Hunch

Posts: 22

Location: Sacramento, CA | Köppen Csa | USDA 9b

I like...

posted 3 years ago

7
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

I love this thread. Ellendra's list is particularly enviable -- high-sugar pumpkins! Frost-hardy citrus! Yes!!!

My own daydreams, in order from active projects to absurd fantasies:

-radishes with huge, colorful, fragrant flowers (and a corollary project: making some decorative crucifers {stock and honesty} easier to use as food)

-capsaicin-free versions of delicious spicy peppers

-convincing traditional warm-season crops to function as cool-season crops in zone 9 (especially phaseolus)

-a drought-tolerant stone fruit grex, starting with a bunch of zaiger interspecific prunus hybrids

-filling in some of the gaps in the citrus hybrid triangle (doesn't it look like there's room for a lemarine?):

+ crossing tasty citrus with the notoriously nasty, but cold-tolerant trifoliate orange

-red-fleshed (teinturier) seedless table grapes, and american-european grape hybrids with novel flavors (vitis labrusca has a lot of "fruit candy" flavor in its genome)

-selecting cucurbita squashes into sweet melon-like fruits that can be eaten as a raw dessert

-low or no-tannin olives (an oily fruit you could eat out of hand, like an avocado)

Plus a big pile of interspecific dream crosses: fragaria vesca x fragaria viridis (maybe then forced into tetraploid form with colchicine??), various crosses in the capsicum genus, experiments with mentha, growing out the f2 of the "paradox" black walnut x english walnut hybrid...

Allen Ayers

Posts: 19

Location: East Tennesee, Zone 7

I like...

posted 3 years ago

8
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

My aspirations are nothing too wild unfortunately, and many of them actually seem doable within my lifetime, but here they are:
- A cold-hardy citrus (not very original, I know!) that has the hardiness and wicked thorns of trifoliate oranges so they can be living fences that also give sour, juicy fruit with tasty zest without much trifoliate funk that can be used as lemon/lime substitutes
- A hardy pomegranate that thrives in Tennessee's summer humidity and winter dampness
- Gooseberries that don't just tolerate summer heat, but truly THRIVE in it
- In the same vein as the last, I'd like to select wild gooseberries and currants for larger and more numerous fruit
- Genetically diverse herb landraces, since not a lot of breeding work has been done with herbs
- A pepo squash with flavor and pest resistance comparable to a moschata
- Sunflowers that don't instantly get devoured by slugs the second they sprout

Garrett Schantz

Posts: 216

Location: Mississippi Zone 8b

posted 3 years ago

4
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

My "wildest plant breeding aspirations"?

Well, there are quite a few wild ideas / projects that I am planning on working on or playing around with in the future!

May as well start with the most far-fetched projects.

Lardizabalaceae interfamilial hybrids.

Holboellia, Akebia, Decaisnea - even Lardizabala biternata and Boquila trifoliolata.

Many Lardizabalaceae species have a wide range of flavors - "chocolatey" - "honey" - "pineapple" - "fruity". Boquila trifoliolata has leaves that can mimic just about any leaf - could work out very nicely in a permaculture setting. Flowers are also quite ornamental. Holboellia species have very large fruits!

Unfortunately chromosome counts are rather problematic.

Cucumis hybrids would be very interesting!

I am talking about C. melo, C. sativus, C. anguria, C. metuliferus and perhaps a few others.

C. hystrix may work well as an intermediate between Cucumbers and Melons (C. melo).

C. anguria x C. metuliferus could hopefully produce a jelly melon with edible flesh and less thorns.

Of course all of these will need intermediates - wild species to act as bridges. Still a lot of barriers even with wild species helping out.

General Solanaceae hybrids / breeding could be very interesting.

There are Solanum sisymbriifolium varieties with larger fruits, sweeter varieties and a variety that has ripe fruit as early as July. Embryo rescue could be used to create hybrids with S. lycopersicum.

S. sisymbriifolium also has a low fruit set unless at least one separate plant is present - meaning that it needs to outcross to a certain extent.

Australian Bush Tucker species are very interesting, hybrids can be made with different species.

Also hoping to grow a few different S. caripense accessions near "wild tomato species" and hybrids. S. caripense can cross freely with Pepino (S. muricatum). S. caripense is closely related to to tomatoes - probably in the same clade. Unfortunately, they don't appear to cross in nature. Perhaps hybrid populations could change things?

Fruity tomatoes, new fruit shapes - ornamental flowers. Lot of potential!

Probably worth noting that the "Tzimbalo Melon Pear" that was being sold by BakerCreek and a few others may not have been the "true species". This is according to a blog called "Unusual edibles and their wild relatives - Rare Pepino cousins (Solanum sect. Basarthrum)"

The leaves and flowers of the "false" species are quite different than the supposed "true" type (the true type looks very similar to S. muricatum in terms of flowers / leaves).

The false type still appears to be edible and quite cold hardy.

Also hoping to convert S. retroflexum - other black nightshades into an edible diploid landrace, with genes from Australian - European - Asian - North / South American species. End goal would be larger fruits/flowers, tastier fruit, high anthocyanin content, cold hardiness, insect resistance, lower solasodine content - probably some other things.

I want the population to be full of diploid converts in order to attempt hybrids with Tomatoes in the future. There are already a lot of incompatibilities that would need to be worked on - seed size differences (embryos), and all sorts of other "fun" barriers. Knocking out uneven chromosome counts while also creating separate breeding populations in the process should be interesting.

Tomatoes currently require light exposure for anthocyanin to show up. How about tomatoes that are deep blue inside and out?

Joseph already seems to be pretty close to the "100% out crossing tomatoes" goal otherwise I would mention that as well.

Perennial (cold hardy), outcrossing beans sound great.

Hybrids between Blitum bonus-henricus, Blitum capitatum and of course Spinacia oleracea would be amazing. Perennial spinach along with edible shoots...

John Weiland

pollinator

Posts: 2536

Location: RRV of da Nort, USA

719

posted 3 years ago

3
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Garrett Schantz wrote:Hybrids between Blitum bonus-henricus, Blitum capitatum and of course Spinacia oleracea would be amazing. Perennial spinach along with edible shoots...

Are bonus-henricus or capitatum perennial through cold climate winters?......Hardy to -30C? I assumed they were annuals with hardy overwintering seed. This would be interesting!

“The most important decision we make is whether we believe we live in a friendly or hostile universe.”― Albert Einstein

Garrett Schantz

Posts: 216

Location: Mississippi Zone 8b

posted 3 years ago

Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

John Weiland wrote:

Garrett Schantz wrote:Hybrids between Blitum bonus-henricus, Blitum capitatum and of course Spinacia oleracea would be amazing. Perennial spinach along with edible shoots...

Are bonus-henricus or capitatum perennial through cold climate winters?......Hardy to -30C? I assumed they were annuals with hardy overwintering seed. This would be interesting!

Blitum bonus-henricus is hardy to around USDA Zone 4 - which is around -25°F to -30°F.

Good King Henry is the common name for the species.

Blitum capitatum has large juicy red seed pods which are edible.

Spinacia and Blitum are closely related, no idea how difficult hybridization attempts would be.

Dorothy Pohorelow

pollinator

Posts: 240

Location: Southeast corner of Wyoming

I like...

posted 3 years ago

5
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

I don't think it is really far fetched but I would like my little micro dwarf tomatoes to come in all the colors and flavors of the big ones. Grow well inside under lights in winter and still make tasty, better for your health tomatoes.

The vision is plants that can "poach" the heat and light you are already using for your comfort to produce tasty and healthy food in your own house.

In the south when the wind gets to 75 mph they give it a name and call it a hurricane. Here we call it a mite windy...

Greg Martin

steward

Posts: 3422

Location: Maine, zone 5

1955

I like...

posted 3 years ago

4
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Dorothy Pohorelow wrote:The vision is plants that can "poach" the heat and light you are already using for your comfort to produce tasty and healthy food in your own house.

Right on Dorothy!!! All our indoor winter lights can totally have food growing under them!
Why the heck not....love imagining what lighting should look like designed with plants as an intended part of the fixtures, and what a home would look like drenched in light feeding the plants that feed the inhabitants.
Stack those functions! Live luxuriantly while also being extra efficient. I love that you are thinking this way too.

Permaculture...picking the lock back to Eden since 1978.
Pics of my Forest Garden

Dorothy Pohorelow

pollinator

Posts: 240

Location: Southeast corner of Wyoming

I like...

posted 3 years ago

5
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Greg Martin wrote:

Dorothy Pohorelow wrote:The vision is plants that can "poach" the heat and light you are already using for your comfort to produce tasty and healthy food in your own house.

Right on Dorothy!!! All our indoor winter lights can totally have food growing under them!
Why the heck not....love imagining what lighting should look like designed with plants as an intended part of the fixtures, and what a home would look like drenched in light feeding the plants that feed the inhabitants.
Stack those functions! Live luxuriantly while also being extra efficient. I love that you are thinking this way too.

The theory/plan is not my original idea but came from another member of the Micro Tomato Diversity Project. I really do agree that this could be one way of doing things in the future. But first we have to breed the plants that will excel in our living conditions. Not just tomatoes, there needs to be other single serving plants or cut and come again plants that will work under our normal living conditions. Of course these could also make great plants for a space station...

In the south when the wind gets to 75 mph they give it a name and call it a hurricane. Here we call it a mite windy...

Allen Ayers

Posts: 19

Location: East Tennesee, Zone 7

I like...

posted 3 years ago

6
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

As I was contemplating the upcoming task of hauling in my big, razor sharp pineapple plants for the winter, I couldn't help but think how nice it would be to have a cold-hardy pineapple so I could take that chore off my to do list forever. So add that to my idea pile!

C Lundquist

pollinator

Posts: 111

Location: Seattle, WA

I like...

posted 3 years ago

7
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

My not so wild breeding plans are

A pink California poppy - this has been done before, and one has popped up in my yard after selecting for the whitest and reddest flowers in the garden for years. This started when a white flower volunteered itself in my garden.

A large, tasty fava bean that is resistant to aphids and disease and adapted to my garden.

A dehybridized Sungold tomato that produces early and abundantly in my garden.

A red/purple dinosaur kale

My more wild breeding dreams are:

Hardy lemon, orange, and chocolate trees. When society collapses I will miss my chocolate and citrus greatly. 🍫

Little house with a big garden in the city!
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." ~ J. Krishnamurti

PEP - BB10 Badge (verified skill)
Skill verified by gir bot

Jenny Wright

gardener

Posts: 1050

Location: Zone 6 in the Pacific Northwest

534

I like...

posted 3 years ago

5
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

John Weiland wrote:I'd like to cross Canada Thistle with Artichokes and have them take over my pasture like the thistle does.

If quinoa would cross with my garden lambsquarter and still retain the nutritional and caloric value of the former, it would not even require seeding in the spring.

"Baseball"-sized brussel sprouts from which you could pick the sprouts in the fall, leaves throughout the winter and it would then produce a broccoli head in the spring.....

If we're getting close to putting humans on Mars, is this too much to ask?? :-)

Oh artichokes that spread like thistles! You made me laugh! If I could survive on thistles, no one would ever starve with the amounts that I battle every year. I heard you can peel and eat the stalk... Well I tried and maybe it's edible but it is truly nasty and doesn't taste at all like artichoke.

Quinoa with lambsquarter would be awesome too. Any spot the thistles spare in my garden was kindly taken care of by the lambsquarter. And yet the quinoa I planted didn't even sprout. In that vein, how about lady's thumb with a seed as big as buckwheat. The lady's thumb did much better than the buckwheat I planted.

C Lundquist

pollinator

Posts: 111

Location: Seattle, WA

I like...

posted 3 years ago

Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Jenny Wright wrote:In that vein, how about lady's thumb with a seed as big as buckwheat. The lady's thumb did much better than the buckwheat I planted.

Can you eat lady's thumb seeds? I always cultivate a patch because they make a vibrant colorfast golden dye, but I haven't thought about eating the seeds.

Little house with a big garden in the city!
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." ~ J. Krishnamurti

Jenny Wright

gardener

Posts: 1050

Location: Zone 6 in the Pacific Northwest

534

I like...

posted 3 years ago

2
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

C Lundquist wrote:

Jenny Wright wrote:In that vein, how about lady's thumb with a seed as big as buckwheat. The lady's thumb did much better than the buckwheat I planted.

Can you eat lady's thumb seeds? I always cultivate a patch because they make a vibrant colorfast golden dye, but I haven't thought about eating the seeds.

You can eat the leaves, stems and flowers but I've never actually seen the seeds so they must be pretty small. They are it buckwheat family. I keep meaning to check out the seeds but haven't been on top of it to catch them.

I know a lot of leaves and flowers that I can eat but I think it's something I need to explore more- eating foraged seeds/pseudo grains.

Jenny Wright

gardener

Posts: 1050

Location: Zone 6 in the Pacific Northwest

534

I like...

posted 3 years ago

2
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

C Lundquist wrote:

Can you eat lady's thumb seeds? I always cultivate a patch because they make a vibrant colorfast golden dye, but I haven't thought about eating the seeds.

I looked it up and yes, you can eat them and they are TINY! The zoomed in photo I saw they look like miniature buckwheat seeds

Heather Gardener

pollinator

Posts: 99

Location: Yorkshire, UK 🇬🇧 (Zone 8A, I think)

I like...

posted 2 years ago

4
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Hmm things that would be cool to breed 🤔 ….

Some caterpillar resistant kales

Garlic and potato varieties that reliably grow from seed, as well as cloves/tubers

Hardy, will grow through frost unprotected, salad leaves. I know there are hardy varieties, but it’s always advised to cover them and as far as I know they don’t actively grow through winter.

Hardy outdoor tomato that will survive a northern British winter and regrow next spring.

Hardy outdoor chilli peppers that will also survive my winters. Got a Rocoto pepper outside now that may be a contender for this, as this winter has been mild so far.

Drought resistant anything for all the times I forget to water in summer. Also handy for global warming and future proofing in the event of possible water shortages.

Forever oscillating between wondering how I can fit everything I want to grow into my tiny urban garden (hahaha I can’t) and how to make enough money to buy my dream mini farm where I can grow everything I want to grow, raise chickens and be a haven for my local pollinators and wildflower species 😁🌱🌻

Eino Kenttä

pollinator

Posts: 424

162

posted 2 years ago

3
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Ha, Heather, I thought when I saw this thread again that I might revisit it to mention a crazy project of mine (which I have started preparing for), but you beat me to it! It's the tomato one, but with the ambition of surviving norwegian winters... Will post on the forums once the first steps are taken, if it seems like it might go somewhere. (My idea involves some pretty iffy interspecific hybridization, so most likely it will fail miserably.)

Rebecca Rosa

pioneer

Posts: 112

Location: Western Oregon (Willamette Valley), 8b

I like...

posted 1 year ago

2
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Paste tomatoes suited to my garden which would carry through that amazing purple-brown tomato flavor through to the sauce.

Aphid-resistant brassicas, especially mustard and kale.

Prolific ground cherries with large fruit.

A diversity of tasty and useful annual plants that can out-compete rhizomatous grass. I can dream, right?

Observation is where intelligence is born.

T S Rodriguez

Posts: 75

posted 1 year ago

2
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

I want evergreen forage for cattle and goats that can sustain them through a long, bitter winter with heavy snowfall. Some kinds of bamboo do this already, but that is the only real option, and they do not exactly thrive.

The flip side to this wild aspiration would be to breed cattle and goats that can thrive in long and bitter winters without needing supplemental feeds.

C Lundquist

pollinator

Posts: 111

Location: Seattle, WA

I like...

posted 1 year ago

1
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

I've been working on my fava bean breeding. A main goal is a bean that sets seeds earlier so that it fits into my garden rotation.

I'm also on a list to grow up a hardy avocado, but haven't gotten a tree yet. Excited for when I do!

Little house with a big garden in the city!
"It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society." ~ J. Krishnamurti

Brian Cady

pollinator

Posts: 184

Location: Colrain, MA, USA (5a - ~1,000' elev.)

posted 1 year ago

1
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

I dream of creating another legume cover crop by crossing Vicia grandiflora and V. pannonica using colchicine to double the chromosome number, hopefully yielding a cold-tolerant nitrogen-fixing alternative to Hairy Vetch, to expand winter options.

Brian
-

Bethany Brown

Posts: 233

Location: Rural Pacific Northwest, Zone 8

I like...

posted 1 year ago

3
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

I don’t know how wild this is, I am just into cultivating and perhaps “improving” Wild edibles. I just ordered campanula rampunculus seeds because I found a different campanula on my property, IDed it and went down a small Wikipedia rabbit hole, read about c. Rampunculus, and thought, hey, edible, historically used culinarily, grows in poor soil, seems like a good crop… I want to try growing and domesticating camas and other edible native to my area. Plus landracing all the veggies I’m accustomed to- I’ve started on perennial broccoli. Want a C. Pepo That’s good as summer or winter squash. A butternut that does well in our short seasons and unpredictable summers. Tomatoes resistant to gray mold and blight, that does ok with cool nights. How about a cucumber that’s delicious and if you let it get overripe it’s like a squash or melon and has delicious seeds? I’d love a crispy iceberg lettuce that’s also nutritious. I’d like melons that can reliably produce in our short seasons and cool soils. I also am saving all my tree fruit seeds and planting to see what I can do with that…. And of course everything has to be delicious and healthy for humans but repulsive to deer and rabbits!
I’ve enjoyed reading everyone’s ideas and wonder how we could collaborate!

Garrett Schantz

Posts: 216

Location: Mississippi Zone 8b

posted 1 year ago

2
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Mitchella repens x Diodia virginiana - eventually moving into Coffea hybrid groups and making a cold hardy perennial coffee.

Cold hardy interfamilial "Taro" hybrids.

I also documented a probable Lima x Common bean a few years ago - I planted the low germ seeds out again. Likely Succotash x Alma's PA Dutch - the beans looked like runners, odd marked pods, that sorta stuff.

And they grew strangely.

The year before growing those Succotash beans, I grew them up a trellis near some tepary beans that barely did anything, and Alma's PA Dutch and some other common beans.

I didn't post about them much because of reasons.

Anyways. If what I'm growing again now, is the same stuff then that means I'll have a Lima x Common Bean.

The Lima had yellow flowers.

Getting back on topic. I'm also growing a few varieties of dwarf runner beans from Germany. I'd like to cross those back to other runners and Common beans (they're stable hybrids like Hestia).

Then, I'd ideally be able to cross them with a Lima x Common bean.

But first, I'd be crossing all sorts of different varieties into these populations.

Lohrey's Old Tasmanian beans, uptake salt into their beans for example. It's a common bean.

Succotash, has deep anthocyanin colorations.

There's a ton of cool limas and other beans with very nice traits, I probably can't name them all.

How about a deep yellow / red bicolor bean flower.

Limas pods are less edible than common beans - the same goes for Runners. These pods repel some boring insects to a degree. But, stringless large beans are up there.

Phaseolus polystachios, should be able to cross into a lima with more open flowers right? And give me cold hardy, mildew resistant, mold resistant, perennial beans? Finding different accessions seems difficult. Wild species you know?

Strophostyles helvola, Strophostyles leiosperma and related species. These are very closely related to common beans and Phaseolus. These have salt tolerance and some temperate climate adaptions, but different ones from Phaseolus polystachios - they may actually compliment each other with some traits.

Now, a bean with these traits: salt tolerant, cold hardy, perennial, different bean colors / patterns on single plants / pods, colored pods, salt in the pods from the soil, large pods, ton of beans per pod, stringless beans, mold resistant, borer resistant - high disease resistances, heat resistances, very nice flowers.

Limas can be perennials, but even in Florida - I've heard that the perennial types just simply die off despite making loads of pods. They're very tropical.

And, by cold hardy I mean cold hardy as in perennial cold hardy. I moved to Mississippi - USDA Zone 8b this year. So, I can't really select for some cold hardy traits or other things here.

I could, send seed off to others as I'm breeding and playing with stuff.

I also remember reading about a Phaseolus species that is traditionally ground into something like coffee? It was something that sounded cool. Teparies would be on a list to cross with too.

Bethany Brown

Posts: 233

Location: Rural Pacific Northwest, Zone 8

I like...

posted 1 year ago

Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Garrett Schantz wrote:Mitchella repens x Diodia virginiana - eventually moving into Coffea hybrid groups and making a cold hardy perennial coffee.]

Oh cold hardy coffee, yes! I volunteer to grow it all out.

Bethany Brown

Posts: 233

Location: Rural Pacific Northwest, Zone 8

I like...

posted 1 year ago

1
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Thought of a new one today- making dock more palatable/edible. Chickens seem to like the leaves and seeds. I haven’t tried eating it, and have heard it can be toxic if you eat much. Of course. How much is too much? How could we decrease the amount of toxic compounds? It seems like potential for a great multiuse crop- leaves, roots, and seeds.

Jan White

pollinator

Posts: 1455

Location: BC Interior, Zone 6-7

511

I like...

posted 1 year ago

5
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Potatoes that gophers don't like, beans that gophers don't like, peas that gophers don't like, alliums that gophers don't like, tomatoes that gophers don't like, peppers that gophers don't like, carrots that gophers don't like... I'll leave it at that for now.

Daniel Sillito

Posts: 49

Location: Alberta, Canada

posted 1 year ago

1
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Bethany Brown wrote:Thought of a new one today- making dock more palatable/edible. Chickens seem to like the leaves and seeds. I haven’t tried eating it, and have heard it can be toxic if you eat much. Of course. How much is too much? How could we decrease the amount of toxic compounds? It seems like potential for a great multiuse crop- leaves, roots, and seeds.

As far as I know the only toxic compound worth noting in Dock is oxalates. A low oxalate variety would be worth breeding for. The seeds are pleasant enough, though a bit fiddly. The book "Wild Wisdom of Weeds" has a whole chapter on the plant and its uses, though even the author notes that dock is only good for greens while very young and small.

Bethany Brown

Posts: 233

Location: Rural Pacific Northwest, Zone 8

I like...

posted 1 year ago

Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Daniel Sillito wrote:

Bethany Brown wrote:Thought of a new one today- making dock more palatable/edible. Chickens seem to like the leaves and seeds. I haven’t tried eating it, and have heard it can be toxic if you eat much. Of course. How much is too much? How could we decrease the amount of toxic compounds? It seems like potential for a great multiuse crop- leaves, roots, and seeds.

As far as I know the only toxic compound worth noting in Dock is oxalates. A low oxalate variety would be worth breeding for. The seeds are pleasant enough, though a bit fiddly. The book "Wild Wisdom of Weeds" has a whole chapter on the plant and its uses, though even the author notes that dock is only good for greens while very young and small.

I will keep it in my idea bank. I wouldn’t know where to begin, but maybe someday I will.

Greg Martin

steward

Posts: 3422

Location: Maine, zone 5

1955

I like...

posted 1 year ago

2
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Bethany Brown wrote:
I will keep it in my idea bank. I wouldn’t know where to begin, but maybe someday I will.

I haven't tried mine yet, but patience dock is supposed to be a really good one. Might be a nice place to start.
The Experimental Farm Network sells seeds

Permaculture...picking the lock back to Eden since 1978.
Pics of my Forest Garden

Garrett Schantz

Posts: 216

Location: Mississippi Zone 8b

posted 1 year ago

4
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

https://edgewood-nursery.com/

These guys sell Rumex crispus (Yellow Dock) and Rumex sanguineus (Bloody Dock).

Rumex species tend to hybridize readily when they're grown close to each other.

I considered starting a project with them before.

Hybrids are easy to spot, but tend to cross back to either parent.

So you'd need to move hybrids near other hybrids and select for traits.

Rumex species are quite easy to find anywhere.

There's a bunch of North American species, I wouldn't mind looking for plants at any point.

I actually planted some Bloody Dock in a area that was dug up to remove / move some electrical lines. It's all clay and stuff there.

I was planning on planting more Rumex species there eventually.

20230624_184332.jpg

Eino Kenttä

pollinator

Posts: 424

162

posted 1 year ago

4
Number of slices to send:

Optional 'thank-you' note:

Send

Not a toxin exactly, but docks also contain massive amounts of tannin, especially in the roots but probably in other parts as well. Might be something to consider. Also, as mentioned, Rumex patientia has at least some of the desirable traits, so might be a good base for breeding.

Doe, a deer, a female deer. Ray, a pocketful of sun. Me, a name, I call my tiny ad ...

permaculture and gardener gifts (stocking stuffers?)

https://permies.com/wiki/permaculture-gifts-stocking-stuffers