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nafex - Re: [NAFEX] breeding the russett out

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  • From: "William C. Garthright" <billg@inebraska.com>
  • To: North American Fruit Explorers <nafex@lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [NAFEX] breeding the russett out
  • Date: Wed, 14 Nov 2007 10:56:00 -0600


Perhaps breeding wasn't the right word. Many varieties vary by way of mutation when I single branch on a given tree has fruit of a significantly different quality. This is called a sport.

Changes in a cultivar through vegetative "sports" where say a branch after a
certain point on the branch bears perceptibly different but similar fruits, are thought
to be due to single-gene mutations which occurred during the growth of the plant, and
are considered to be the same cultivar. A mutation which decreases or increases
russeting, or red colour, may affect a lot of other things including flavour.


OK, thanks. Note that I wasn't questioning the word 'breeding,' but just the idea of calling a genetically-different tree by the same cultivar name. I guess I just thought that such sports would be renamed, since they would no longer be clones of the original.

But I can see how single-gene mutations might be considered as the same thing - basically - even though they are somewhat different. Certainly, they'd be a lot less different than any seedling. Yet after a few such sports, you could get something quite different than what you started with (which was the whole point of the original post, I know).

Thanks, both of you, for the info!

Bill
Lincoln, NE

--
Separation of Church and State is one of America's greatest contributions to modern religion and politics. The adoption of this as a political principle marks an epoch in the history of mankind. Previously at least half the wars of Europe and half the internal troubles since the founding of Christianity had a religious basis. - Edward Frank Humphrey




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