Date: Wed, 24 Sep 1997 12:54:56 -0300 From: Rand Nicholson <writserv@nbnet.nb.ca> To: cp@opus.hpl.hp.com Message-Id: <aabcdefg3684$foo@default> Subject: Re: inbreeding, etc
>Jeff writes:
>
>>A simple way to begin producing new cp clones/varieties/cultivars is
>>careful breeding of selected plants. Inbreeding will allow mutations to
>>surface that may have been hidden and if desirable tissue culture can be
>>used to quickly propagate the individual clone(s).
>
>Rand replied:
>
>>I am not sure if you mean to use the term "inbreeding" in quite the fashion
>>that you have. Are you talking about recessive genes expressing themselves
>>through inbreeding?
Andrew replies:
>
>I guess he is.
>
>>If so, these types of expression most often lead to things such as
>>albinism, single testicles, congenital dysplasia, sterility and other such
>>abberations which are not lightly tolerated in nature for any length of
>>time.
>
>Yes, but many other traits are also recessive, but beneficial. Also, you
>are relating back to animal genetics in which inbreeding is less tolerated
>than in plants,
(Heh. I just _knew_ someone would bring this up. I think the analogy holds
true in principle and is more accessable. Your point granted.)
>>I would rather save the species and the habitats that are left. I
>>believe this would be more in focus with the "conservation" part of the
>>subject header of your post:
>
>I totally agree, but wouldn't it be better if some breeding work was done
>to make the plant more easily grown/more attractive, etc, while also
>maintaining the original wild material?
As I said, I believe that is a judgement call. Will you grant me that there
are deplorable Frankensteinian excesses being commited in such areas as
orchid breeding, to name one? To what end? Beauty? "Expert" orchid judges
encourage and commonly award grotesqueries, which command thousands of
dollars at auction and are unable to exist outside of expensive artificial
environments, yet lament the depradation of species habitat. A judgement
call.
>> "Re: Production of new CP varieties and conservation"
>
>>I believe that hybridization is a judgement call and desirability depends
>>upon perspective. Having said that:
>
>>Skeins of "purebred" dog lines have been genetically disfigured by
>>"inbreeding for **desirable** traits."
>
>This is usually due to 'too much' inbreeding, how else is it possible to
>produce a uniform breed?
Why does anyone need a "uniform breed"? What are the criteria for that?
Most working dogs that were bred to have an actual function were
established well before the industrial revolution. Ninety percent of
uniform breeding today has to do with cosmetics and, as a result, the most
popular breeds today carry detrimental genetic garbage. (Equinox, No. 94,
1997. "Breeding Disaster")
>
>>Other examples of ornamental breeding gone wrong by "scientific method"
>>abound.
>
>Can you name any?
Yes. I have already mentioned orchids. The domestic animal trade is rife
with them. Any hybridised plant that cannot sustain itself at a natural, or
on a commercial, level without artificial, environment damaging support
will do. Lawns.
I quote:
> Did you know that commercial wheat and oat
>>cultivars are both so inbred as to be almost totally homozygous? This is
>>why they grow true from seed, as with many other inbreeding plants.
And stand to be felled by any single disease organism and/or critter which
happens to adapt to find them tasty. The current wisdom on the so-called
"flesh eating bacteria is that it would not exist, but that we bred it
because we didn't know what we were doing with antibiotics. All very clear
... in hindsight.
Nature abhors a vacuum: predators evolve with, or adapt to their prey.
_Always_. No matter the method, natural or artificial. The "remedy"?
Back-crossing with fast disappearing resistant native or heritage stocks.
The cycle can then repeat itself. Left to itself, grass will attempt to
evolve into something unpleasant to a cow. Some cows will evolve into
something that likes to eat that grass. That is one of the driving forces
of diversity.
In nature, no single species exists in an environment by itself; the checks
and balances are built into the habitat. When man attemps to construct a
single resource habitat, it invariably fails to maintain itself without
self-defeating artificial interference which has direct and devestating
effects upon the surrounding environs.
I did not intend to get into this nor ramble on as much as I have. To
return to what I was specifically talking about in my original post:
"Why not look for and to the marvellous plants that are already out there
***(in this CP context),***
try to understand and preserve them ..."
... and I was referring to CPs, specifically, for reasons stated previously
>
>>This is not to condemn ligitimate research, but to suggest that we quite
>>likely have started down a long road without really knowing where we are
>>going.
>
>With many things this is the case, but how can you know where you are going
>if you have never been there before, it is a road of discovery.
If you have no idea of where you are going, you would do well to ask for
directions. No one is _that_ isolated in this world, except by choice.
Discovering something is not at all the same as purposely _altering_
something.
>>Why not look for and to the marvellous plants that are already out there
>>(in this CP context), try to understand and preserve them, and leave nature
>>to make the variants, or mutants, for us to find? By most reports, there
>>are enough of them out there. Surely we are not so bored?
>
>The problem with finding mutants, or leaving nature to produce them, is
>that it takes a long time, and in nature only mutants which are
>advantageous in the environment in which they are growing will usually
>survive and prosper.
My point exactly.
>Andrew
>
>Andrew Bernuetz
>University of Sydney
>Plant Breeding Institute
>From your signature, I can guess your perspective and assure you that I do
not entirely disagree with it, as I hope I have shown. Aside from other
philosophies, I just have a problem with the ostentatious gilding of the
lily.
Kind Regards,
Rand
Rand Nicholson
New Brunswick
Maritime Canada, Z 5b
<writserv@nbnet.nb.ca>
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