Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
The first thing the breeder must do is to understand the
genotype of every trait that is featured in his/her 'ideal' strain. In order
to do this the genotype of each parent strain or population for that
same trait must be understood. Since there are 4 traits that the breeder
is trying to isolate then 4 x 2 = 8 Genotypes for these phenotype
expressions must be made known to the breeder.
Let us take the Pale Green Leaf of the Silver Haze for starters.
The breeder will grow out as many Silver Haze plants as they can find.
They will then note down if any of the population have any other leaf
color trait. If not, then the breeder will note that the trait is
homozygous (We will call the trait - M). Now it can either be MM or
mm. If other colored leaves appear in with the population then the
breeder must assume that the trait is not homozygous, but
heterozygous.
If it is heterozygous then we must lock the trait down before
we can continue. This is done through selective breeding. Let is look
closely at the parents for a moment.
If both parents where MM we would not have seen the
variations in the population for this trait. It is a locked down trait. We
know that this trait will always breed true in its population without any
variations.
