What's new
TerraForums Venus Flytrap, Nepenthes, Drosera and more talk

Register a free account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members through your own private inbox!

It's genetic!

This is an update to this thread:
http://www.terraforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=120805
Basically the story is that I got a bunch of seed from Bob Ziemer last fall when I paid him a visit. I put it all into cultures and nearly all of it germinated. Some of the cultures got contaminated and I had to deflask them to save the babies. One of them started flowering a month after being deflasked. That means that the bloomer was 3 months or so old and I never had them on any hormones. Here's a photo of the "early bloomer":
ead8110f9d0a087e994f9603.jpg

Well, I self-pollinated the single flower that bloomed and it set seed! I then took all 15 or so of the seeds and flasked them on 3-1-2010. Only 6 of them germinated and it took nearly a month, but amazingly after two months in vitro from seed, two of the babies are already flowering:
a8f167c478a810223e271fdd.jpg

a317960bc2ceda3560e9beee.jpg


They aren't on any hormones and never have been. I think it's genetic! It might be another cultivar...Dionaea "Early Bloomer" :)
 
Precocious little bugger!

I too have had seedlings send up a sprout a few months after germination -- but easily twice the age of yours, about eight months at the earliest.

Congratulations . . .
 
Whoa!
Very interesting! Keep us updated.
 
Horney little buggers! :-D

Is the original "early bloomer" showing any other aberrations now that it is maturing...
er, maturing more?

I remember reading a long time ago, about there being a higher incidence of mutations & polyploidism in TC plants,
even without using hormones. (Article was not about CP's in TC.)
What can I say? Seems no one can wait to grow up now-a-days! :-))

Interesting indeed!
 
A new Mad Scientist has emerged!
 
Congratulations . . .
Thanks!
Whoa!
Very interesting! Keep us updated.
I'll do that! I'm planning on propagating the two that are blooming already...one month after germinating! Hah!
Horney little buggers! :-D

Is the original "early bloomer" showing any other aberrations now that it is maturing...
er, maturing more?
Nothing unusual. I snipped the flower stalk as soon as the seed pod ripened. It's growing up with the rest of the deflasked babies and appears normal otherwise.
A new Mad Scientist has emerged!
You know it! I love my TC work. If I can only figure out a way for it to pay the bills I'll be all set :)
 
Hah! Nice! I got a description for it: Dionaea "Early Bloomer" was a plant arisen from tissue culture, that can be recognized by flowering earlier than most Dionaea clones; hence the name Dionaea "Early Bloomer"

Good Luck Matt!
 
Did the plant that you got the seed from survive after flowering at such a small size?

---------- Post added at 10:43 AM ---------- Previous post was at 10:41 AM ----------

Now you just need to sow some of the seeds ex-vitro and see if they still bloom as babies, to rule out the possibility of it being the conditions in TC causing them to bloom.
 
  • #10
Wait. Don't TC plants just age waaaaay faster than others? Hence the flowering?
 
  • #11
Wait. Don't TC plants just age waaaaay faster than others? Hence the flowering?


Commercial tissue culture plants do grow quickly due to being on hormones and a rich blend of nutrients. These haven't been treated, so it's probably a genuine mutation. Do the plants also grow faster than usual?
 
  • #12
Commercial tissue culture plants do grow quickly due to being on hormones and a rich blend of nutrients. These haven't been treated, so it's probably a genuine mutation. Do the plants also grow faster than usual?
Oh yes, they grow much faster than usual. But most plants never flower in vitro. I've germinated hundreds of seedlings in vitro now and only a handful have flowered. And none of them have germinated quicker than 5 months or so. This one flowered a couple weeks after germinating!
 
  • #13
I'll be the first to by one! ;)
 
  • #14
I'm curious to see if the seed is sterile or not... granted I know nature does things for reasons but this is man, not Momma Nature. Then again I know nothing about TC plants so please prove me wrong! :p
 
  • #15
This would be a moot point if you cut your VFT stalks.... ;)

I think to see if it's really genetic to do some non-TC propagation, like regular flower stalk cuttings or leaf cuttings.
 
  • #16
It's interesting that so many people have concerns and doubts about the fact that the little seedlings are out of TC. I've created tens of thousands of flytraps in tissue culture and I've yet to see one mutation. While they do happen, especially when one uses hormones, I don't think that they're as common as most people here think.

Every clone I've propagated through tissue culture has been true-to-type and I've not seen any seedlings come out of tissue culture with genetic abnormalities that I would guess were caused from tissue culture. While it's possible that this particular genetic aberration (early flowering) might be a result of tissue culture, the fact that both the parent and the offspring (from a self-pollinated flower) flowered very early in their life (the parent did so in vivo, not in vitro) make it unlikely that the genetic trait for early flowering is a cause of tissue culture. I believe that a tissue-culture-induced mutation is very unlikely to be passed sexually to the next generation, but a genetic trait certainly is.
 
  • #17
Keep us posted. I'm interested to hear more about the little guy!
 
  • #18
Did the first one die after flowering?
 
  • #19
It's interesting that so many people have concerns and doubts about the fact that the little seedlings are out of TC.

It's science, baby. Eliminate those variables! ;) I agree with you that it seems improbable that, of thousands, a single individual would do this, and then only its progeny would also display the same aberration/trait. However, it seems like starting another batch of seeds not in vivo would be the next step. Leave nothing to chance. ;)
 
  • #20
Keep us posted. I'm interested to hear more about the little guy!
Will do!
Did the first one die after flowering?
Nope, it's alive and well.
It's science, baby. Eliminate those variables! ;) I agree with you that it seems improbable that, of thousands, a single individual would do this, and then only its progeny would also display the same aberration/trait. However, it seems like starting another batch of seeds not in vivo would be the next step. Leave nothing to chance. ;)
Good point. I'll sow another batch of self-pollinated seedlings at some point in the future and see if the trait is carried onto the next generation again. The problem is that doing it in vivo takes about 5 times as long as it does in vitro. It's unlikely that anyone reading this thread (other than me) will even remember the "early bloomer" by the time it is verified in vivo :)
 
Back
Top