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Auxin

Hybrid Naming Conventions

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Recently I've observed a real mess developing with hybrid names.

Somewhere, college I think, I picked up my way of naming hybrids. Say SS01 is pollinated by SS02 and the progeny of that cross is used to pollinate J3. I always thought such a cross was supposed to be written J3 X (SS01 X SS02).

I'm not saying thats right, its just what makes a lot of sense for me.

But over the last two years as more trich hybrids circulate theres this confusing hodgepodge of naming styles. I dont even know what some mean so lets use different clone names. I've seen stuff like..

N1~Psycho0 x PC

N1/Psycho0 x PC

N1 x Psycho0xPC

N1 x Psycho0 x PC

What the hell. N1 x Psycho0 x PC could be two completely different crosses and does N1 x Psycho0xPC mean N1 is the mother or that N1 x Psycho0 is the mother?

Arent there rules for these things somewhere?

I'm just waiting to see the train wreak that would be caused by (Juul's Giant X Kimnach) X (((N1 X TPM) F2 X Psycho0) X Lumberjackus)

How do you write them down?

Edited by Auxin
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the problem with naming hybrids is you are refering to a whole batch of seeds and eventually batcheS (ie, i have to identify my seedlings from misplant by year when he does the x over again) of seeds... on the other hand i dont have a more suitable solution...

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From my limited understanding it should be written (please correct me if im wrong)

Mother x Father

so as the crosses get more complex eg Mother Psycho0 x roise and Father roise x Psycho0 i would think it should be written

Mothers 1st x Father of mother 2nd X Father 3rd x fathers partner 4th = Psycho0 x roise X roise x Psycho0

(maybe we should start using Big X for the current cross and little x for the previous generations cross)

To be fair any single cross name isnt that accurate for example pach x bridgesii, The pach most have crossed with something to become a seed, as would the bridgesii so i could argue technically all crosses should have 4 names rather then 2.

Cross names should only be an indication of the parents and not the current plant, as there will be 1000s of the same crosses all with different characteristic, unlike a clone

Edit

A good idea would be to add the date (year) of the cross and who made it because lots of people will be crossing similar plants, so its good to know where it came from.

Edited by Change
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Recently I've observed a real mess developing with hybrid names.

Somewhere, college I think, I picked up my way of naming hybrids. Say SS01 is pollinated by SS02 and the progeny of that cross is used to pollinate J3. I always thought such a cross was supposed to be written J3 X (SS01 X SS02).

I'm not saying thats right, its just what makes a lot of sense for me.

Yep - the above comment certainly looks right to me, just keep using more brackets as you get longer hybrids to denote each plants parents.

In regards to keeping track of the year that a particular cross between 2 plants was made, it really doesn't matter. For example, SS02 X SS01 made this year or made 5 years ago is still written exactly the same way and is still crossing the same genetics. For your records you may want to know if it was from Zelly in 2013 or 2015, but if it's the same 2 plants being crossed it makes no difference if you keep the year or not as any possible combination of genes could be in any one seed regardless of the year it was crossed.

Related to this is who created the cross, to be honest, if the seeds came from the same 2 plants it doesn't matter. For eg, if Zelly crosses SS02 X SS01 and so does a guy called Cactus McFucktus over in Wyoming, the resulting seeds still have the exact same genetic mix available to them, so both can quite easily be called "SS02 X SS01" with no qualifier needed, unless of course you personally just like to know where your seeds came from originally. (which I do too)

So basically, brackets are your friend in this and Mother's name is always first, and they're the standard usually used in plant hybridization as far as I'm aware. So a cross can be as long as you like and as long as you use the brackets properly to identify each cross within that plants parentage and have kept everything labelled correctly in the long term it doesn't matter. And remember, double brackets are also a thing. ;)

So if you cross a clone of SS02 with a clone of SS01 you would write the resulting seeds and plants as being "SS02 X SS01". Then say you grow two seeds from that same batch out and cross them back with each other when they flower you will have created a cross called "(SS02 X SS01) X (SS02 X SS01)"

Then say you used pollen from the above plant to fertilize a Psycho0 X Yowie flower - you would end up with "(Psycho0 X Yowie) X ((SS02 X SS01) X (SS02 X SS01))"

All this makes perfect sense to me and as long as you keep accurate records will give you a true history of the plants origins. And yes, that does mean the more you hybridize the longer the names will get.

Unless you just give up after all that time as it's too hard to keep proper records and start calling them by stupid names, like Anna, Rob, Len, Psycho0, Norma and so on. :devil::innocent_n::crux:

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To be fair any single cross name isnt that accurate for example pach x bridgesii, The pach most have crossed with something to become a seed, as would the bridgesii so i could argue technically all crosses should have 4 names rather then 2.

I'm going to go ahead and disagree with you there. Even though all trichos, (except spachianus), are self sterile and require a genetically different donor; if you cross 2 plants that are both pachanois but they aren't clones, then you still end up with "pure" pachanoi seeds and the resulting plants would be called "pachanoi", not "pachanoi X pachanoi". Same as if you cross 2 different bridgesiis, you still get "pure" bridgesii seed.

This isn't to say you couldn't cross 2 named pachanoi clones and keep those details with them. For example Pachanoi "Rod" X Pachanoi "Yowie" but that would still result in a plant/seeds you could/should just legitimately call "pachanoi".

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When you buy pachanoi seeds from koehres/or similar establishments/ it means you get pachanoi open pollinated..

pach x pach indicates the hand pollination .. so I prefer to get pach x pach than the 'pure' pach seeds :)

Edited by mysubtleascention
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So if you cross a clone of SS02 with a clone of SS01 you would write the resulting seeds and plants as being "SS02 X SS01". Then say you grow two seeds from that same batch out and cross them back with each other when they flower you will have created a cross called "(SS02 X SS01) X (SS02 X SS01)"

In this particular instance (SS02 X SS01) X (SS02 X SS01) would simply be the F2 generation of the original cross, so I expect it would be better written (SS02 X SS01) F2 (with brackets so people dont get confused and think the F2 might refer to the pollen donor.

It would sure save some typing when a cross is bred to a new variety over 8 generations :wink:

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When you buy pachanoi seeds from koehres/or similar establishments/ it means you get pachanoi open pollinated..

pach x pach indicates the hand pollination .. so I prefer to get pach x pach than the 'pure' pach seeds :)

True, but I think that may be more to do with business people not caring that they may be misleading people due to their desire to make money. Otherwise they would call them "Pachanoi OP".

Either that or it's willing ignorance, as I've heard before some nurseries don't believe trichos need to be crossed. It's not that hard to do some research.....

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fwiw- I think it was SS who created the original SS02xSS01 plant, as well as the reverse, SS01xSS02.

As for bracketing, pay close attention to spacing around each x in the following.... ss02xss01 x ss01xss02.......

Is that so hard to understand who each parent is?

In the very near future I will be posting a (mostly) numbered master hybrid listing of the Trich crosses I've made

I'm just waiting to see the train wreak that would be caused by (Juul's Giant X Kimnach) X (((N1 X TPM) F2 X Psycho0) X Lumberjackus)

seriously Auxin? :wink:

How many years do you suppose it will be before seedlings of Juul's Giant x Kimnach will be mature enough to produce flowers?

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I usually label my crosses like this: The 53th cross of 2015 would be like EG 53/2015 Trichocereus bridgesii "Eileen" x (Tr. pach "Yowie" x Tr. scopulicola). That´s the only generally accepted way to write down the parents of multihybrids. The more parents, the more complicated though and that´s why people usually name a decent hybrid if it is actually worthy of a name. The EG stands for the breeder and the number/date are just to keep track of the crosses. That is not a must but I really recommend it.

Edited by Evil Genius

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In the very near future I will be posting a (mostly) numbered master hybrid listing of the Trich crosses I've made

is it based on the numbers you are currently using on the seed packs? i noticed you are reusing numbers for recrosses; if so, will you give them a seperate identifier, like .1, .2, or 2014, 2015, to indicate which seed batch they were from??

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what's wrong with brackets?

have i spent too much time on a computer to not have a problem with nested parentheses?

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dnno if this is the best place to ask but erm.. does anybody happen to know if there's a Trichocereus; vincent, nigel or alfred ? :3

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Someone wants to commemorate a foursome :P
There is an 'Alf' clone

How many years do you suppose it will be before seedlings of Juul's Giant x Kimnach will be mature enough to produce flowers?

4+? I've seen people in Oz and cali go from seed to flowers in 4 years.
Granted, I regard those people as being so dripping with awesomeness I just want to rub them all over myself, but 4 is possible.

I usually label my crosses like this: The 53th cross of 2015 would be like EG 53/2015 Trichocereus bridgesii "Eileen" x (Tr. pach "Yowie" x Tr. scopulicola).

Not too different from my personal book keeping numbers. I usually keep track of harvested fruits, seed groups, etc. with a year/month/day number like 151217.
Not for naming but just for tracking. When collecting seed on hikes I can include hour and minute to match the packet with photos on my camera.

I still dont get /, for instance I've seen 'pachanoi/juuls giant x kimuras giant' around. huachuma has one [porn]. Does that name mean its (pachanoi x juuls giant) x kimuras giant or is it just a note on the species that juuls is or that both are?

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TI>

yeah there is an "alf" clone from oz. I stopped tagging it, as it looked too much like a PC. The same with "Omar"

I agree with Auxin and Zed, as far as naming and parenthesis is concerned.

I dont really agree with the concept of purity or a pure species in the case of many Trichocerei. Hopefully, in the next decade (?) we might have some more DNA research.. Where are all biologists, they could learn much from DNAing the cactacea !??!

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I dont really agree with the concept of purity or a pure species in the case of many Trichocerei.

I totally agree with you

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the problem i have with brackets is very similar to the problem i have of writing out full names such as pachanoi, bridgesii, huanucoensis, etc 1000+ times and counting....

A HUGE reason I went to a sequential numbering system is cataloging, finding and accessing 130+ different seed packets relatively quickly. Its much easier to look up a number than to sort thru hundreds of un alphabetized names.

also, casually make the observation that SS utilizes a system that suites their interests and not the growers of their seeds, unless one buys the CD's to do the translation to names....

what I will probably do is adapt EG's numbering system to the one I currently am using, which will allow a number to be assigned for all trich hybrids (and open pollinated flowers) that I've created since 2012. The number may change, but not the actual hybrid. It would also allow for names / numbers for other non-trich hybrids.

EG- to be clear, you would assign a new number for each year that you create a specific hybrid?

ie, lets say scop x juuls was your first cross in 2012 (EG 01/2012), your 7th cross in 2013 (EG 07/2013), and your eleventh cross in 2015 (EG 11/2015) ? Would you store each bag of seeds from the exact same cross in three different locations in your filing system? All jumbled together in one big box? :)

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im upgrading from a box to a folder with cardholder sheets,,, between you and interbeing im going to need a filing cabinet!

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Hi Zelly, yes, I always start again from let´s say 1-500 per year. So the 53th cross in 2015 it´s EG 53/2015 Tr. whateverensis x examplensis. The 3rd from 2015 would be 3/2015. After I am done with my crosses for 2015, I´d start countin from 1 again in 2016. So EG 1/2016 to as many crosses I made that year. This system helps to trace back everything, including the sister plants that were grown from the same seed. Later, after raising the seedlings from a particular cross, I also use this system to keep track of the sister plants:

When I have a large number of sister plants raised from one cross, I usually do it like that: EG 53/2015-1 Yowie x Tr. huanucoensis, EG 53/2015/1 Yowie x Tr. huanucoensis or EG 53/2015 Yowie x Tr. huanucoensis-1. The bold "1" stands for the first seedling from that cross. The second would have a "2", and so on. This system was originally intended to keep track of flower hybrids, because when raising hybrids for an optimal flower, every seedling can have a different one. So you can very well observe the number of crosses that produced the highest number of successful flowers. There are crosses were plenty of sister plants are great and there are some others where only one or two deserve to be propagated. Or none.

Edited by Evil Genius
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I think one thing we need to consider in this discussion is the difference between different types of labeling: names, lineage identifiers and catalog numbers.

In this context names are a relatively rare label generally reserved for plants and their clones that display some sort of desirable trait (color, spine length, etc.). A name should only apply to a single genetically unique individual and its subsequent clones, and can be applied to either a "pure" individual (bridgesii, pachanoi, etc.) or a hybrid individual. Hopefully if a name has been applied to a hybrid the parentage has been recorded (unfortunately we all know this is not often the case).

Lineage identifiers are the labels that Auxin is referring to and the method he mentions is what I have most often seen (mother)x(father), and seems to be the standard. I don't think there is anything wrong with using a different method (like zelly's ss02xss01 x ss01xss02) so long as there is some explanation to the formula (though I don't know how you would write out the label for the crossing of two plants obtained from ss02xss01 x ss01xss02 using the non-bracket method). As far as simplifying Auxin's nightmare (Juul's Giant X Kimnach) X (((N1 X TPM) F2 X Psycho0) X Lumberjackus) I have no idea. Catalog numbers might help, but you would need a key to figure out what exactly you are looking at.

I would consider the labels used/proposed by zelly and Evil Genius to be catalog numbers. I think catalog numbers make a lot of sense if you are a breeder creating multiple crosses each year, and potentially creating crosses from the crosses in the future. So long as you keep good records, complex crosses can be greatly simplified in terms of labeling:

Ky01 = N1 x TPM

Ky02 = Ky01 F2 X Psycho0

Ky03 = Ky02 x Lumberjackus

Ky04 = Jull's x Kimnach

Ky05 = Ky04 x Ky03 or (Juul's Giant X Kimnach) X (((N1 X TPM) F2 X Psycho0) X Lumberjackus)

The important factor here is keeping good records and letting folks you share your seeds with know what cross your catalog number refers to.

ie, lets say scop x juuls was your first cross in 2012 (EG 01/2012), your 7th cross in 2013 (EG 07/2013), and your eleventh cross in 2015 (EG 11/2015) ? Would you store each bag of seeds from the exact same cross in three different locations in your filing system? All jumbled together in one big box? :)

I don't know the best way to file these examples, but I like that each year they were created they were given a new catalog number, rather than all being assigned a single number tied to scop x juuls. If the progeny from EG 01/2012 turn out vastly different from EG 07/2013 and EG 11/2015 while the latter two are very similar you may be able to conclude that your pollination of the scop in 2012 with juuls was not as successful and that EG 01/2012 should be more properly regarded as scop OP.

One thing to keep in mind is that a name refers to very specific genetics, while both linage identity and catalog numbers are going to refer to a much broader group of genetics, especially as complex crosses of crosses are produced by multiple folks. I think eventually these labels will become almost worthless though, both because of complexity and because not everyone is breeding with the same clone from a particular cross (my SS01xSS02 is different than your SS01xSS02). The seed groups below would have the same lineage labels as they hail from the same 6 initial clones, but that may not say much since each group was derived from four different plants (each color denotes a different individual/plant).

((SS01xSS02)x(Psycho0xYowie))x(EileenxHelen) = Group A Seeds

((SS01xSS02)x(Psycho0xYowie))x(EileenxHelen) = Group B Seeds

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Yeah, it is important to keep in mind that crosses are sibling groups and not expected to be clones, or nearly so.

When I grew out the LC00x non-PC pachanoi & bridgesii crosses even in the F1 they produced three different spine lengths in the plants. One of the parents must have itself been a cross. That happens a lot in cacti, so sequential crosses are never entirely reproducible and even one cross is only reproducible in large numbers.

3/4 off topic but I have a side question. Zelly, I was drooling over your trich seed inventory and I saw you have one pachanoi cross named 'PC pachanoi X ...' does that mean that all other pachanoi crosses you have are non-PC?

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Zelly, I was drooling over your trich seed inventory and I saw you have one pachanoi cross named 'PC pachanoi X ...' does that mean that all other pachanoi crosses you have are non-PC?

nope :)

The non PC crosses are identified by clone names, such as Pach Leyenda, Pach Oscar, & Pach TPQC, in addition to (Pach) Huarazensis & (Pach) Kimnach

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What about in the case of a "Found" non named/ID'd Plant?

If this plant is unique enough (displays characteristics that differ to the majority) and I would like to propagate and cross with other plants.

I found a cactus (Bridgesii/Pach) and I have cross pollinated both ways with clone Eileen.

I would like to name this new variety for future trade and potential sale.

Can I simply name the "found" plant (Name of village where found most likely)?

Can I name the cross? If so, what is the thought around this? Thanks

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Yes you can do both. If you want to name a plant, it´s important that it is unique enough to be recognizable. But it´s not a must if you just want to keep track of your collections. Ben from SS uses a certain code to label his finds. It´s BK10.367.23. The BK stands for Ben Kamm, the ten is the year and the rest are either GPS coordinates or just collection codes.

Most German hybrid breeders only name the plants that are unique and good enough to deserve a name. But this system is mostly in use to keep track of the flowers.

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