Sweetcorn seeds

 Went to another garden centre yesterday and again could only find F1s.
 

I think you'll have to order some. It might be worth trying Premier Seeds on Ebay (got my Delicata Squash seeds in 2 days). I know that Tuckers and Realseeds in the UK do them, but you may find a wider variety on the US heirloom sites if you'd like to try something completely different to the norm.

Why do they have to be isolated? What's the problem with F1 seeds?

I'm new to all this and would appreciate some tips...thanks
Jan

An F1 is a hybrid produced by the crossing of two different varieties, to produce a plant with particular characteristics.

The seeds produced from this hybrid will not be the same as those you planted, so if you saved them you couldn't be sure what you'd be growing.

Seed saved from an open-pollinated variety will breed true, and so you can guarantee that saved seed will give you plants identical to those you grew the year before. If, that is, you can isolate them from other varieties of the same species growing nearby.

Isolation is the prevention of pollen from neighbouring plants and gardens from tainting the strain by pollinating your plants, thus conserving the purity of the original seed. This is not always possible for the allotmenteer, since the proximity of our neighbours means that there is always a chance of pollen transfer.

I've just ordered from Tuckers seeds - good value Rob, thanks!  two non-hybrid sweetcorns and two non-hybrid squashes.  

I wonder how isolated they will have to be to avoid cross-pollination.  Are they pollinated by air or by bees?  (Another dumb question to add to my collection.)

Sweetcorn plants are wind-pollinated, and are grown in square blocks rather than rows,to give nature a hand with this.

Squashes are insect-pollinated and some will cross with one another, depending on species. Tell me what you've bought, and I'll work out for you whether they can be grown together safely.

Have a look on the Real Seeds website. They have an illustrated section devoted to saving seed, including how to save seed from squashes of the same species grown in close proximity.

Good job, Sweet, I completely lost who was selling them. Thanks.

Rob I bought:

Organic Jubilee (50 seeds) 1 pkt(s)
Organic Golden Bantam (50 seeds) 1 pkt(s)*note Gobs
Jack Be Little (10 seeds) 1 pkt(s)
Uchiki Kuri (Winter Storage) (10 seeds) 1 pkt(s)

Thanks

Jack be little pumpkins are from the pepo family, Uchiki Kuri(I'm also trying these, they're supposed to be lovely) are maxima.
The upshot is that they can be grown together without crossing, so saved seed will be true to the parent.

If you want to save seed from your sweetcorn and be reasonably sure they don't cross-pollinate , grow them at either end of the plot to give you the best separation.

Are you growing any other cucurbits? Particularly squashes, marrows, courgettes or pumpkins. Melons and gourds are from different families so you can ignore these.

Right! I'll start again. This time face the blackboard and pay attention, and put that mobile phone away or I'll confiscate it.

First, the sweetcorn. Any one variety is capable of crossing with another by transfer of pollen.

If you isolate one variety, you will keep the strain pure. If it manages to exchange pollen with another variety, you will end up with some crossing, with the resultant seed giving plants that have a mixture of the characteristics of both varieties.

If the variety you are growing is open pollinated AND isolated, the resultant seed will produce plants similar to the parent, this is the essence of the seed saving technique. Over several generations, by saving seed from the plants which do best in your own garden, you can actually improve the variety for your own use. Grow TWO open-pollinated types together and they will cross to produce a hybrid. Bantam and Jubilee grown close together will therefore give you Bantam/Jubilee hybrids, this is why I suggested growing them at opposite ends of the plot.

Unfortunately you have no control over where your neighbours site their own crops, so just do the best you can. Sweetcorn can suffer from poor  pollination unless it's grown in blocks rather than rows, so it's safe to assume that they don't need a huge separation distance for isolation to be reasonably effective.

F1 seeds are produced by crossing two varieties in controlled isolation to produce a single variety with a particular set of characteristics. The seeds produced when F1 plants pollinate each other WILL NOT produce plants of the same variety the following year, they will give you a mix of the two parent strains, so you can't be sure what you are saving. In addition, the plants which are crossed to produce the F1 are often markedly inferior to their progeny, so saved seed is likely to produce poorer plants.

Clear as mud, eh? Now for the squashes then. You are correct in your assumption that squashes are insect-pollinated, so the bees will transfer pollen from one plant to the other.

There are 4 main families of squashes. Cucurbita pepo, C.maxima, C. moschata and C.mixta. All of the pumpkins, courgettes, marrows and squashes belong to one of these families.

Varieties within each family will cross with one another. Varieties from separate families will not.

Courgettes belong to the pepo family, giant pumpkins are maxima and butternuts are moschata. A single variety of all three growing in the same garden will not produce crosses, so any saved seed will be true.

Of your new varieties, one is a pepo and one a maxima, so the Uchiki Kuri can cross with the giant pumpkin (both are maximas), and the courgette with the Jack be Little pumpkin (both are pepos).

You can get around this by hand pollinating your squashes. Check out the Real Seeds site for a great explanation of this technique, it's easier than you might think. They offer a pdf to download, with seed saving ideas for all the popular vegetables.

http://www.realseeds.co.uk/seedsavinginfo.html

I hope this makes it all a bit clearer for you, SN.