@admmad
Maurice, I truly do not know how to thank you for your generosity in sharing your knowledge. Your post has helped me understand alot of the information I have read this past year.
I have read alot of older threads on this forum including those which you have been part of. Some of what you wrote in your post in this thread was familiar to me such as the environment of the parent plant , the environment the seed experiences while forming in the pod, foliage habit etc. I actually didn't plant any seeds outside because I remembered reading about needing to build up enough resources to survive the winter (being now August) but then I wondered about the environment the seedling experiences since the environment the seed came from was much warmer. Well I'll just say it lead to alot of questions. Essentially I had bits of knowledge/information yet didn't know how it all fit together. I don't have a biology background nor a genetics background, just an average gardener here.
Anyway, the information you provided pieced together all this information in a way I could understand. I also found it very interesting to read. So a big thank you. You have helped me out tremendously.
I do have one question, if I may, based upon the following statement in your post.
"One of the factors that may determine the fate of a seed is whether it is "dormant" or not."
How does this factor play a role? Just as a background I started seed from my garden last year indoors. First time, so I read alot here about growing seed and that some seed may be dormant and need cold moist stratification. That you can't tell seed dormancy by looking at the seed; nor based upon its parents; and in fact a pod may contain both evergreen and dormant seeds. Going back to nature and survival, a pod would drop seeds. The species would have a better chance of survival by dropping both seed that is not dormant and seed that is dormant. So if the seed that was not dormant sprouted, experienced cold (before it had enough resources) and died, the dormant seed which requires cold would live on and sprout at the appropriate time. [Feel free to correct me on any of this]
With all that in mind I was thinking, the heck with that, if a pod has both types of seed, dormant and not dormant, i would just keep the ones that sprouted quickly and toss the rest. Essentially breeding out seed dormancy by then continuing to cross my seedlings. I am only doing this as a hobby, for fun. I find it all so interesting. I start the seed indoors to try and shorten the time I have to wait to see it bloom. I know I could plant outside in the Fall and have it naturally experience the cold and sprout in the Spring but I guess I choose to complicate it all by starting indoors.
So my question is, if the seed is not dormant, would that have any effect on cold hardiness of the seedling? If so then would it be more or less a factor than everything else. Meaning if there are three factors favoring cold hardiness and one factor favor not, most of the seedlings would then have a descent chance of surviving the winter. Or of course you can flip it the other way towards a less likely survival. Do we know if any of these factors weigh more heavily than another? Would my chosing to proceed with only non dormant seed be a bad idea considering my location. I think our last frost date is end of May and first frost maybe October. I would have to check so dont hold me to that but essentially most of the year is not growing season.
As a side note, last year I crossed a Tet and dip. Tet being the pod parent. I mentioned it in a thread a while back about mixed ploidity which I think you responded to. (I don't expect you or anyone else to remember that. Seed was viable and one of the seedlings recently produced a scape. It's the funkiest think I ever saw.
