Pros & Cons of Hybridized Seeds

Part of the Video Series How to Harvest Seeds

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What is a hybridized seed, and what are the pros and cons of planting them versus planting native seeds? Find out and get expert tips from a professional organic gardener in this free online gardening video.

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Pros & Cons of Hybridized Seeds
Hybridized seeds are what most companies sell today. These are seeds that are crossed with two parent seeds of the same seed species, and these are crossed in order to get a bigger and better, higher yield- the big fruit you see, the giant grapefruit- the bigger and better is a lot of that comes from hybridized seeds. An example of this in my garden is in xenia seeds. I harvest seeds from my garden. My xenias, I’ve used the same seeds for ten years now. And in the beginning, the xenias were purple and orange and yellow, and each year, they’ve gone back more to the original seed, which is pink, and so the last three or four years, all the xenias have been pink.

The drawback to hybridized seeds, the first generation they have the high yield, larger fruit, the bigger and better sort of theme. But after the first generation, those seeds return to the parent stock and a lot of times the parent seeds that have been crossed are weakened seeds that are pulling out certain characteristics. So, it can go back to a much weaker product than a native seed. So comparing a hybridized seed to a native seed, long term, a native seed is better.

About the Expert

Expert: Gale Gassiot has been herb gardening for over 30 years. Read More