From the looks of it it looks like from random cross to little fingers I had, although similar fruits could arise from any other cross also. I also made some random crosspollination to make sure to get a good blend. That would have been now F3 (if counted from original cross. If it’s from that, it would be interesting as that wasn’t the best here. Just a little slower and thus less cold tolerant. I still wanted to save seeds (after recrossing) and see if it has something to offer. Might be that there are some traits that are more necessary there than here, although I would expect that the more generations they are selected at least in some ways to similar challenges they will do better in different climates.
I think this just goes to show that F2/F3 really are when you need hard selection and collect the best of the best for recrossing until you have a blend where all are same in some genes and have flexibility in some genes. Hopefully this plant also has good amount of seeds. It seems really variable. Some have hundreds of seeds per fruit and others barely have any. Latter will self eliminate quite quickly. At some point maybe need to select for medium seediness, but right now anything that survives is fine.
On eggplant, I tried 3 F2 from Jesse this year. Thanks a lot Jesse, by the way ! I was very curious to try seeds coming your place. They were not in true selection pressure, I grew them in greenhouse and realized that their bushy architecture were more adapted to open field context. Some of them made realy big fruits. Some of them (wildboar x X F2) have a wonderfull pannel of colours and I made some crosses with my favorite eggplant (“Dourgazilla” a mutation occured in my farm from “Dourga”, big white pearshaped eggplant) to get bigger fruits and thicker branches (I do not train eggplants, I need them as steady as possible when branches are loaded).
This year I crossed as well Dourgazilla with a vigorous pearshaped zebra green eggplant that appeared in a sowing of “Black Beauty”, to try to improve as well architecture.
I haven’t made any selection in the initial crosses or subsequent seed savings from the crosses so there might be all kinda growth habbits and other traits. I took all the crosses that worked (about 15 distinct) and made the grow out. From growout I took all the seeds and mixed them to F2 mix (some are F3 also). So in crossing only selection pressures were that they would make fruits in my climate, which in that year was quite hard selection. The growout last year worked better, but some made more fruits earlier and some had more seeds than others. There were some that I could eliminate in later generations, but I first wanted to have as wide a blend as possible. That’s why also made random hand pollination, besides what pollinators did.
If I understand correctly, those are seeds that @ThomasPicard grew out from my F1? As I didn’t have that cross separetely. In any case, that wild boar cross wasn’t my favorite in terms of growth habbit and yield potential. Also it seemed like more fruits would spoil than in other plants. It was early and like said I didn’t want to make too much selection early on. Let the competition sort that out in the subsequent generations.
F2 didn’t go quite as planned. You can read more about in the thread I update progress, but to recap it conditions look like they have affected growth that it’s hard to say if they would have grown like that in different conditions. I suppose selection pressure is still good, it’s just hard to say what kinda growth habbits many will have.
So what you are looking for is upright growth habbit? I did have some that even this year had upright growth, and besides the first fruit, fruits would be of the ground (if branches can hold the load). With direct sowing I didn’t get direct results on yield potential, but I would guess that if they had had a month of good weather more they would be loaded. Personally I don’t know if that would be ideal here as I can’t trust that they will have extended fruiting period. More reliable would be that plants would start to make 4-6 fruits within a week from the first flower. It would be good to know what others find useful so that instead of eliminating I separate those and share to those that might find them more useful.
Correct: was f2 (seeds) after growing season of 6 of your f1s at my place last year.
Also: must say that growth habits were quite diverse from one cross to the next last year: from bushy to tall, some high some low yielding, etc. And yes some had very big dark fruits and I found some again in the field yesterday.
Also most of the eggplants I grew in here this year are from those f2 seeds. I may have some f3 from you too on top, should check, bit I think not. In eggplants from you the 2 plants arising from that african eggplant x usual eggplant cross you sent me don’t carry fruits right now. Got also a line of african eggplant (Stripped Togo, sol aethiopicum) starting to produce.
Anyway @malterod and all : will keep seeds of the most promising!
Exactly, these seeds from your work, I had them from Thomas. The two others were Big Mistery and Madrano x X F2; who give interresting sized fruits. And yes, what I look for in each eggplant breeding project is tendancy to have strong trunk and branches and explore well the third dimension in order to have higher density, weed plants with my mule without fearing to break a branch creeping on the ground and never spend time to train.
I’m sorry for that. I later found out that the cross should have been the other way around and that (based on what I have heard) is a dead end in every way. Maybe there is some unlikely exception, but in general that’s not the way to go. Did they grow well though? For me they were the strongest growers last year and only when there was some rain they suffered. That’s why I’m thinking adding african eggplant to crosses might be beneficial in the long term. Can you still make some crosses using african eggplant as the parent? They seem fairly fast in ripening and should have ripe seeds in a month or so.
Using an old changing room for drying seeds in the fall and starting seed indoors in early spring. Have one UV-lamp hanging and one ventilator. Put up two reflective sheets, capillary mats on bottom and installed a hose so it is easy to water.
Sowed masses of tomato seed in a tray to germinate outside mid april. This is from excerted stigma tomatoes, so I assume enough genetic diversity that some will be able to germinate in the cooler weather faster than others. I will do this as a stepping stone to work on the great project @Joseph_Lofthouse succeeded in making directe seeded tomatoes.
Aubergine, peppers etc. are outside now and cold benches are full with them as well as leek, onion, perennial kale, TPS potatoes, tomatoes, perennial vegetables, artichoke,
Some of your seed from the Serendipity Seed Swap (EU) got into a legume quiz game I made (photo from the cheat sheet I made for teachers - we then lay out lots of different legumes and the students try to guess the names for all of them)
This looks less spectacular but I really like perennial kale with that many side shoots. They tend to get more long lived and also the shoots are the best thing to eat.
They seem fairly fast in ripening and should have ripe seeds in a month or so.
