Mixing a struggling heirloom with a modern landrace and select to steer towards heirloom phenotype

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I like the possibility of this scenario, i have no idea is it based in reality though or if anyone has attempted it.
So to make my point more clear. The modern landrace variety has to be in end phase, more monotone and not a beginners grex or hybrid swarm. Then it will be crossed with a local struggling heirloom doomed to dissapear together with the aging collectors who find it important. I like to think that after a few generations and mixing with a high dose of struggling heirloom we end up with a heirloom which is resistant to anything the modern times is throwing at it.

It would be a very strong argument against heirloom fanatics that hate the idea of modern landracing/ adaptation gardening and are horrified by the thought of mixing varieites if it would help them invigorate their struggling heirlooms in some cases.

I’ve not seen this topic discussed but maybe it has been somewhere , in that case i’d like to know where and what was said. All thoughts welcome.

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I really have enjoyed researching and finding and then systematically crossing with the early modern tomatoes of my region over the last couple of years. These are tomatoes which were bred during an era when folks wanted mostly red short season tomatoes for a reliable crop for home canning here in Montana. My intent with them is to include them in double crosses incorporating three elements: including South American genetics for deep diversity, the early moderns as a source of local adaptation, and modern fancy and European/American heirlooms for their flavors / colors / and wow factors. So, in my view: incorporate that beloved heirloom from early on- no need to wait for the breeder’s grex to mature first- it might in fact be the phenotype source for the grex. If you really like its phenotype you are preserving it by reinvigorating its genotype. Or it may, as in my case, just have a few important characteristics that may make it useful in breeding. Like earliness or hardiness to local conditions.

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Sounds like a great idea, Hugo. On a symbolic level (the level of human thought and feeling) what I think you’re proposing is a hybrid cross between “heirloom paradigm” and “landrace paradigm”. Those kinds of integrated differences can often work as bridges. It speaks to that part of heirloom gardeners that also like vigor, health, adaptation and tolerate some diversity.

If I were you I would work on finding a good name for that method. Maybe “Revived heirloom” or even “Resurrected heirloom” or “Reawakened”? I think that could be a really interesting project to work on.

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I appreciate this kind of prompt for reflection and synthesis. I think Hugo’a scenario is similar, but distinct, from efforts to (re)establish a historic landrace as a diverse population in a place. I think about this with my “modern candy roaster squash” project.

In terms of terminology, I wonder if this is one of the situations when “adaptive” might be a useful term. Something like “an heirloom adaptation project” or “an adaptive heirloom variety.”

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Good thinking of a terminology Malte & Mark.
As i understood a modern landrace variety can become over time a new heirloom in fact, with not a lot of variety within the population at all. Stable over a few generations. Like the ‘end stage’, i am far from that in any of my grexes so far, so even that stable stage is something mythical to me, but i have heard Joseph about it, or read it in his book. So i guess we can agree that it could be done.
Then in comes the suffering heirloom, always problems because of genetic bottlenecks, snails, frostbite, aphids, gophers, slow weak plants etc. But the grower knows it used to be all that, back in the day and they keep going with it despite all the troubles. And hope to get other growers to care about all these dwindling heirloom varieties and they discover other people that do the same and they all share this purity complex and make it worse in the group think dynamic, and without realizing it they make things worse and worse for each other, they become stricter and more rigid about it every year.
And then we come and say we have to mix everything up. Heathens that should be burned at the stake. Who is this creature from hell saying plasphemous words about crossing varieties.
So needless to say, we clash with the purists. Also in Antibes they left a table where @Joseph_Lofthouse and @mare.silba where seated, angry.
So… this is a thing, their hate blinds them from seeing that we do mean well, but just simply come from different angles.
But… i think if the heirloom grower would take the heirloom seed and mix in a bit of stable landraceor fifty procent or do i know what is a good measure, surely depends on the crop grown and it’s promiscuity. Then in theory it should be possible in a few generations of reselecting for crosses that are close to the heirloom, to get fairly close to the heirloom characteristics, but are refreshed, revived and better than before on many fronts.
So i don’t know if this is possible, if it’s been done and discussed long time before and i’m late to it, but because it’s so critical that we get these haters on our side i raise the topic.
And sure i like that you come up with all kinds of names for this, and i agree with Mark that adaptation should be in it, to directly link it to adaptation gardening, but has somebody experience doing something like this? Does it even work?

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It should work fine. It all depends on the way people view the heirloom.

What die-hard heirloomers fail to see is that the variety they grow is not the same plant as the original. They have maintained a phenotype but the genetics have weakened over generations.

What you are trying to do is strengthen the genetics.

The problem is, even selecting for and maintaining the desired phenotype, they will likely see the change as impure. Even though there is already previous and current changes. Every time you grow a seed, especially in different growing conditions, there will be genetic change.

The other side of this idea is that you could also adapt old “heirloom” varieties to new and different climates/growing conditions. Selecting for the phenotype but introducing genetics for drought/heat/cold/disease resistance or whatever traits are desired.

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Thank you for starting this conversation @Hugo, it’s something I’m thinking a lot about since Antibes.

The beauty of landracing, as I see it, is it’s wide adaptability. On one side you can go ‘crazy’ and mix it all up, on the other you can gently and slowly adding bits of new genetics to a uniform variety, and there’s all situations in between those two extremes.

Talking to so many different people in Antibes, few things really stood out:

  • the more marginal growing conditions are, the more people are prepared/eager to adopt landrace/adaptive style of growing seeds, especially if they already tried to grow something from your standard/heirloom seed which didn’t work that well
  • faithfulness and connection to heirlooms/traditional varieties is primarily about culture - think traditional foods!!, identity and in some cases resistance to oppression
  • for ‘commercial growers’ - people who grow crops as a primary source of income - most important things are that it grows well i.e. gives a satisfying yield, and that certain traits that are important to their customers are present such as bread making characteristics, flavours, etc.

I don’t know about angry, guy that I talked to was more baffled and couldn’t grasp how can you have different populations of wheat (in that particular case) each with a certain specific trait (for breadmaking) when, according to him “you mix all varieties together it all comes uniform at the end, everything is the same”.
To be fair, we didn’t have time to really talk about it, and I was a bit brain dead at that point for a concise and short explanation (also his English weren’t that well to begin with, so slower flow of communication)

That workshop, on the subject of growing cereals around the world and selection of seeds, was a great example of what I wrote above.

At our table we had all three points present:

  • 4 of us, including Joseph and me, were on the landrace/evolutionary populations side, all with difficult and marginal growing spaces/conditions
  • 2 people - one from Basque country and other from border area of Lebanon/Syria/Palestine - both working on searching for and bringing back old “heirloom”/traditional varieties for local community seed banks - theme of identity and culture (food) is very present here
  • guy I was talking with was a farmer and his main concern, as mentioned, was having crops with that particular traits/qualities important for breadmaking

When all groups were presenting their discussions, it was mostly a variation of those reasons and concerns. Interestingly, all groups agreed that taste and adaptation to terrain are really important (that part could be our “way in”).

My favorite thing that I’ve heard in Antibes comes from this workshop, from an Iranian farmer talking about selection for seeds - how his plants talk to him when he is in the field, and a plant communicates “look at me, I’m good, choose me”. I think he is actually a part of a group of farmers in Iran that grow evolutionary populations, at least for some crops (with the support of CENESTA institute).

So what did I learned from all those conversations… When talking to “heirloom” people, I think it’s really important to have in mind the above, particularly points two and three. Maybe even change the initial approach accordingly.
For the ‘culture and identity’ group emotions are a big part of it, and it pays to show proper respect (to the seeds, growers, culture etc.).
For farmers it’s more about a good and not-too-complex-for-start explanation about how the genetics and selection of trait works in this context.
Me, I also have to remember to say - yes, in landracing you can also grow several different populations of one thing, and in that case you do pay at least some attention to isolation distances/times. My brain think that goes without saying :grin:

I also feel that getting across the point about genetic uniformity (poorness?) of ‘pure’ varieties and an inherent lower level of their adaptive abilities is an important step. If people can understand about how much certain crop can adapt is dependent on it’s genetic diversity, then further conversation should be easier (I hope).

Probably a good direction of conversation, at least for some, can be about crops they struggle with, a not about beloved heirlooms that work good at the moment. Leave the (emotionally) heavy stuff for later, when they are more familiar and/or comfortable with the idea.

On a technical side I think there are many different variations you could do. From the amount or percentage of ‘new’ seeds you’re mixing with the variety - low to high, to how wide do you go in different genetics you introduce to the variety - certain varieties with certain traits (one, or two, three… many), only something that looks/tastes/grows/whatever as your thing but from all over the place as you can get, stable landrace, etc.

Which particular variation, or you could say method, is appropriate to use depends on the attitude, emotions, knowledge and goals of people involved… Not an easy answer, I know.

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