What do you get when you cross a Chihuahua with a St. Bernard?

[SlipperKing]

WOW Leo, what a mouth full! OK, I admitt when I said Ross will get a beefy Babi-Doll I was guessing!

 

[Leo Schordje]

Glad you guys get that I'm poking fun, I am every bit as guilty as anyone of making predictions with great certitude from vapor thin facts. When I do it discussing orchids, most of my friends let me get away with it. When it comes to politics, history or anything else - my friends beat me up and kick me out of the bar. I'm considering giving up drinking. I'll never quit prognosticating.

I really do appreciate the work and expertise that Robert and other serious professionals put into breeding, and all the amatuers, Ross, myself and others who do breeding on the side.

 

[Leo Schordje]

For the record I probably have done about 50 different squashes of root tips. My masters Plant Breeding Thesis dealt with Cytogenetics, so I got pretty good in observing chromosomes and counting them.

My hat's off to you - 50 is huge. You certainly have squashed more orchids than any other human I've heard of. For those of you who occasionally pop off a question - hey what's the chromosome count of this or that - think about it - it is tedious, pains taking work. Doing 50 was more than enough for a Masters Degree, that is a good measure of how many actually are done out in the hort industry. I'd be buggers after the third squash.

(I do recognize the Masters wasn't for the counts, it was for the skill with which the data was interpreted).

 

[Ross]

I love the excellent discussion! For my part, being relatively inexperienced and completely uneducated, I listen to as many people with experience and knowledge as possible, and then make my own decisions based on my circumstance. Not needing to produce commercially viable crosses with consistency gives me a certain amount of freedom to experiment and that is what I am doing.

Concerning big plant or small plant for seed bearing, I seem to have had more success producing seed when using the small plant as the seed producer. I have no objective proof of this. Maybe it is simply because I try more crosses this way.

 

[Hera]

Thanks to all for the educational discussion. I'm not sure that I understand much of it, but its interesting to get into the heads of the professionals.

 

[Yoyo_Jo]

Thanks to all for the educational discussion. I'm not sure that I understand much of it, but its interesting to get into the heads of the professionals.

Ditto, and never again will I ever pop off a question like, "hey, what's the chromosome count of so and so orchid..." :rollhappy:

Holy crap, I gotta go back and read this thread again, it's scrambling my brain. You guys are awesome!

 

[Roy]

Thanks to all for the educational discussion. I'm not sure that I understand much of it, but its interesting to get into the heads of the professionals.

I like this thread also BUT the whole outcome from any hybridist is " Do It & see what happens "
An understanding of ploidy etc is useful and whether one plant or another breeds well and what clone is better than another and which ones are more dominant. The best one can wish for in breeding is to pick plant A & cross it with plant B with a thought in mind of what he/she would like to achieve in the progeny. A good read of the RHS names & parentages and a look through the awards register usually highlights which plants are producing the best offspring and work from there.
IMO, the best knowledge can be gained from the efforts of past breeders. Depending on what you want to achieve, many times similar crosses have been done before. If the results are close to what you are trying to achieve go for it or ask yourself, "would you buy this plant?", if the answers no, look for something else to cross.