‍fuchsiaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa @f0x@pixie.town

will I be boosting this every time I see baseless generalized javascript bashing on my timeline? abso-fucking-lutely

helo this is a post for vegetable gardener frens who like to grow stuff from seed. have u ever wondered why you're spending your precious dollar money on store bought seeds? can't you just cut out the seed middle man and use the seeds of the produce you buy at the stores? like, tomato have seed, yes? can i grow??? the answer to that is yes, yes you can (in principle), but you mustn't! unless what you want is a mediocre and/or unpredictable results. why is that, sentient internet egg with gardening advice, you'll ask. the bitch to blame is the diagram from your middle school biology book that showed you how hybrids work. basically seeds of all kinds can be split into two categories: heirloom and hybrid. well, the more accurate thing would be to call them stable hybrids and unstable hybrids, since, you know, everything was a hybrid once. but the thing with the latter, unstable ones, is they're most likely first generation hybrids. the probability that those will retain their qualities when propagating through seed are actually quite low. they might keep some and lose some, or get a random different set of features, or be infertile at all. this is where the hybridization biology diagram comes in. to get something where seeds are true to their parents one needs to make sure that the qualities they want are basically HAMMERED IN quite aggressively. 99% of what you buy in the store are hybrids, because they are in general more low maintenance and easier to grow, so getting seeds from them is a bit useless.

now for heirlooms. the only way to obtain a heirloom seed is to grow a hybrid that you like the qualities of, pollinate it with pollen from an identical hybrid, repeat that for enough generations that the qualities you've selected are pronounced, but it's not hella inbred, and then do the seed reproduction for multiple years to check that the desirable qualities are retained through seed. the goal of all this extravaganza is to insure that the children will be true to parents/exhibit stable qualities when seed propagated. I wasn't being extra with that HAMMERED IN shit.

all of that being said, the hybrids are typically easier to grow, if for no other reason because they can be specifically created to be disease resistant/hardy. they are most likely less tasty that the heirlooms, cause you know, pumping a 30yo production cycle just to get a average tasting tomato is a fucking overkill. So if you're a novice grower, just to get into the groove, hybrids might be a better choice. Just splurge some on the store seeds so you know what you're getting, and don't collect the seeds from what you grow.

another (pretty cool) advantage of growing heirlooms. plants are hella smart, so they adapt to the conditions they are grown in. that means that if you collect the seeds from your heirloom harvest, then the plants that you grow next year will be more suited to thrive in the environment you give them, whaaaaaaaaaaat? i told you it was pretty cool!

a final practical note: most online places that sell heirlooms are sold out by the beginning of growing season, so set a reminder for buying for like, february. now go start your splendid plant dynasty, you wonderful doofus you!

Neon Genesis Evanjoebiden