
What does F1 mean in tomato seeds?
If you have been studying the tomato seeds packs in your local gardening centre you will have noticed that a lot of the tomato seeds are F1 hybrids. What does this mean? What is an F1 hybrid tomato? Let’s have a look and find out. What is an F1 tomato hybrid? This just means the plant is a hybrid of two parent varieties of tomato.
What is an F1 hybrid plant?
If the breeder now takes the pure line of each of the two plants he originally selected and cross pollinates the two by hand the result is known as an F1 hybrid. Plants are grown from seed produced and the result of this cross pollination should have a good habit and good colour.
What are the children of F1 and F2 Tomatoes?
The children of F1 hybrids are F2. The children of F2 are F3, and so forth. There is only one domestic tomato species (Solanum lycopersicum, AKA Lycopersicon lycopersicum, AKA Lycopersicon esculentum), but there are thousands of varieties within this species.
What is a hybrid tomato?
What’a a hybrid tomato, and why would you want a list of them? A hybrid just means that someone cross bred different types of tomatoes in order to come up with a type of tomato that meets a specific purpose.

What does F1 mean in tomatoes?
Filial 1An F1 hybrid is simply the result of breeding two different strains of a variety to produce a third variety. The term 'F1' just stands for Filial 1 or 'first children'.
What does F1 hybrid mean for tomatoes?
What does it mean? Answer: "F1 hybrid" is the term used for the first generation hybrid seed/plant that occurs following the successful cross-pollination of one genetically uniform plant variety with another specific genetically uniform variety.
Can you save F1 hybrid seeds?
Do not save seed from F1 or hybrid plants if you want to be certain that the plants grown from the seed will be the same as their parents. Plants that grow from seed saved from hybrid plants generally are less vigorous, more variable, and usually have smaller blossoms and yield less than their parents. Why?
What does F1 mean on tomato seeds?
Filial 1What are F1 hybrid seeds? F1 hybrid seeds refers to the selective breeding of a plant by cross pollinating two different parent plants. In genetics, the term is an abbreviation for Filial 1- literally “first children.” It is sometimes written as F1, but the terms mean the same.
Can you collect seeds from F1 tomatoes?
Most tomatoes hold 100 or more seeds, so you only need a few fruits for seed saving. Seeds from F1 hybrid varieties won't come true to type, so only save those from traditional, open-pollinated tomatoes, sometimes called heirloom or heritage varieties.
Can you harvest F1 seeds?
With ordinary varieties anyone can grow them and collect the seed which can then be re-sown in the garden or, on a larger scale, sold.
Do F1 hybrids come true from seed?
Seeds saved from F1 hybrid plants will not produce plants that are true to the parent type. F1 hybrid seed is expensive as it has to be recreated by crossing the parent inbred lines again. Self pollination of the parent inbred lines leads to poor quality plants called 'selfs'.
What are the disadvantages of hybrid varieties?
Hybrid seeds also have some disadvantages: they are more expensive, less nutritious, and less tasty than heirlooms, and saving hybrid seeds is usually not practical. Of course, hybrid seeds have their place in gardening, and only you can decide if the tradeoff for hybrid seeds is worthwhile.
Can hybrid tomatoes reproduce?
Yes. However, be warned that hybrid tomato seeds will likely not produce tomatoes that are true to their type. By definition, a hybrid tomato plant is a cross between two different varieties. A hybrid variety can be re-created only by crossing the exact same two types of parent plants.
What is the difference between an F1 and an F2 seed?
F1 Hybrids These hybrids are more stable and help to produce high-quality yield. Most probably, these hybrids are productive and vigorous plants and have good resistance against various stresses. In comparison, F2 seeds are second-generation seeds and can be produced by hand pollination or open/self-pollination.
What are the problems with hybrid seed?
Problems associated with hybrid plants are: Hybrid seeds have to be produced every year. When the hybrid seeds are sown, the characters are segregated and not maintained in the next generation. The production cost of hybrid seeds is high.
What is the advantage of growing plants from F1 hybrid seed?
The advantage of F1 hybrid seed is that the plants grown from it are very predictable and uniform. They have been bred for specific characteristics, such as flavor, color, number of days to harvest, resistance to disease, etc.
What is the advantage of growing plants from F1 hybrid seed?
The advantage of F1 hybrid seed is that the plants grown from it are very predictable and uniform. They have been bred for specific characteristics, such as flavor, color, number of days to harvest, resistance to disease, etc.
What are F2 tomatoes?
That means it's a hybrid and is unlikely to reproduce the same size, shape, taste, etc is you save seeds from that F1. But, if you did save seeds from that F1, then those seeds would be the F2. Grow out the F2 seeds and harvest fruit and save the seeds from the F2 plant and those seeds will be F3. Etc.
Are F1 seeds GMO?
These carrot seeds are F1 hybrids… but not GMOs! I write about gardening every day and get very little negative feedback… yet every time I include the term “F1 hybrid” in a text, like a few days back, I receive angry emails from people accusing me of promoting GMOs.
What is an F1 variety?
An F1 hybrid is simply the result of breeding two different strains of a variety to produce a third variety. The term 'F1' just stands for Filial 1 or 'first children'.
What does F1 mean in seed?
On the seed packages next to the name you can see the designation F1. It suggests that this is not a variety, but a hybrid form. The abbreviation is easy to decipher:
Why are hybrid tomatoes so popular?
Others, on the contrary, choose them because they are more productive and less sick. Annually, tomato novelties appear on the shelves of gardening shops, most of them are hybrids.
How long does a hybrid receipt last?
The cost of hybrids is higher. The explanation is simple - the work on their receipt is manual, lasts for several months.
When buying seeds of a favorite variety, an experienced gardener at the end of the season analyzes its characteristics?
When buying seeds of a favorite variety, an experienced gardener at the end of the season analyzes its characteristics: early ripeness, yield, taste, color, and peculiarities of care. If he is satisfied with everything, he selects high-quality, ripe fruits, and releases seeds from them.
Can hybrids grow in a greenhouse?
It is more correct to grow vigorous hybrids (indeterminant) in protected ground, they grow to the top of the greenhouse, give more fruit per unit area. Many do not comply with the recommended planting scheme, they plant too often. There are well-established rules of landing.
Do you have to go to the store for F1 seeds?
Next year there is no need to go to the store. You can use your seeds. All varietal qualities are preserved. F1 is different. Seeds will have to buy annually, getting their own from the hybrid form does not make sense. The second generation may surprise unpleasantly:
Is hybrid tomato worth growing?
Hybrids of tomatoes are worth growing. Novelties are pleased not only with resistance to diseases and high yields, their fruits are distinguished by good taste and marketable appearance.
What is an F1 hybrid?
An F1 hybrid (also known as filial 1 hybrid) is the first filial generation of offspring of distinctly different parental types. F1 hybrids are used in genetics, and in selective breeding, where the term F1 crossbreed may be used.
How are F1 hybrids created?
These F1 hybrids are usually created by means of controlled pollination, sometimes by hand pollination. For annual plants such as tomato and maize, F1 hybrids must be produced each season. For mass production of F1 hybrids with uniform phenotype, the parent plants must have predictable genetic effects on the offspring.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of F1 hybrids?
The main advantage of F1 hybrids in agriculture is also their drawback. When F1 cultivars are used as parents, their offspring (F2 generation) vary greatly from one another. Some F2s are high in homozygous genes, as found in their grandparents, and these will lack hybrid vigour. From the point of view of a commercial seed producer who does not wish customers to produce their own seed via seed saving, this genetic assortment is a desired characteristic.
Why are F2 hybrids not produced?
F2 hybrids, the result of self or cross pollination of F1s, lack the consistency of F1s, though they may retain some desirable traits and can be produced more cheaply, because hand pollination or other interventions are not required. Some seed companies offer F2 seed at less cost, particularly in bedding plants where consistency is less critical.
Why are hybrids so expensive?
Both inbreeding and crossing the ancestral lines of the hybrid are costly, because of the time and number of generations involved, which translates into a much higher price. Not all crop species exhibit a sufficiently high heterosis effect to offset this disadvantage.
What is F1 cross?
F1 crosses in animals can be between two inbred lines or between two closely related species or subspecies. In fish such as cichlids, the term F1 cross is used for crosses between two different wild-caught individuals that are assumed to be from different genetic lines.
Is peppermint a hybrid?
This can happen naturally, and includes hybrids between species (for example, peppermint is a sterile F1 hybrid of watermint and spearmint ). In agronomy, the term F1 hybrid is usually reserved for agricultural cultivars derived from two parent cultivars. These F1 hybrids are usually created by means of controlled pollination, ...
How to define F1 hybrid?
The simplest way to define an F1 hybrid is to take an example. Let us say a plant breeder observes a particularly good habit in a plant, but with poor flower colour, and in another plant of the same type he sees good colour but poor habit. The best plant of each type is then taken and self-pollinated (in isolation) each year and, each year, ...
What are the characteristics of F1 hybrids?
In addition to qualities like good vigour, true-ness to type, heavy yields and high uniformity which hybrid plants enjoy, other characteristics such as earliness, disease resistance and good holding ability have been incorporated into most F1 hybrids.
Why is F1 seed so expensive?
Because creating F1 hybrids involves many years of preparation to create pure lines and these pure lines have to be constantly maintained so that the F1 seed can be harvested each year, the seed is more expensive. The problem is compounded because to ensure that no self pollination takes place, all the hybridising of the two pure lines sometimes has to be done by hand. So you often have to pay more for your seed or get fewer in a packet. Seed is often collected by hand too to ensure that each plant is as productive as possible.
What is pure line F1?
Sometimes, a pure line is made up of several previous crossings to begin to build in desirable features and grown on until it is true before use in hybridisation. To summarise, an F1 hybrid is the result of crossing two pure lines to achieve the desired result.
What is the name of the hybrid that crosses the lines of two plants?
If the breeder now takes the pure line of each of the two plants he originally selected and cross pollinates the two by hand the result is known as an F1 hybrid .
What is F1 hybrid?
What are F1 Hybrid Seeds? What are F1 hybrid seeds? F1 hybrid seeds refers to the selective breeding of a plant by cross pollinating two different parent plants. In genetics, the term is an abbreviation for Filial 1- literally “first children.”. It is sometimes written as F 1, but the terms mean the same.
Why Use F1 Hybrid Seeds?
So what are F1 hybrid seeds used for and are they better than the heirloom varieties we hear so much about? The use of F1 plants really blossomed when people began to do more vegetable shopping in grocery store chains than in their own backyards. Plant breeders sought more uniform color and size, looked for more definite harvest deadlines, and durability in shipping.
How are F1 hybrid seeds different from wild crossed seeds?
However, the F1 hybrid seeds that you find packaged on the seed rack at your local garden center are different from wild crossed seeds in that their resultant plants are created by controlled pollination. Since the parent species are fertile, one can pollinate the other to produce these peppermint seeds.
Why are F1 seeds so important?
One of the most important accomplishments of hybridization is disease resistance .
What were the first F1 plants?
These new F1 plants carried the characteristics that were dominant in each parent, but were identical to neither. The peas were the first documented F1 plants and from Mendel’s experiments, the field of genetics was born.
Can you harvest F1 seeds?
F1 seeds can’t be harvested by the thrifty gardener for use the following year. Some gardeners feel that the flavor has been sacrificed to uniformity and those gardeners might be right, but others might disagree when they taste that first sweet taste of summer in a tomato that ripens weeks ahead of the heirlooms.
Who was the first person to cross breed peas?
Gregor Mendel, an Augustinian monk, first recorded his results in cross breeding peas in the 19 th century. He took two different but both pure (homozygous or same gene) strains and cross-pollinated them by hand. He noted that the plants grown from the resulting F1 seeds were of a heterozygous or different gene make up.
Why are F1 hybrids better than other hybrids?
F1 hybrids have the advantage of genetic diversity, making them tougher and better able to resist diseases and pests.
What is an heirloom tomato?
In heirloom tomato is like a purebred dog, bred selectively over many generations for particular characteristics. The primary advantage of heirloom tomatoes is that they consistently produce fruit with particular flavors that many people love. If you save and plant seeds from a heirloom tomato plant, they will produce plants ...
Why are heirloom tomatoes weak?
The primary weakness of heirloom tomato plants is that they lack genetic diversity and the resulting hybrid vigor , which makes them more susceptible to diseases and other problems.
What happens if you save heirloom tomatoes?
If you save and plant seeds from a heirloom tomato plant, they will produce plants that are the same as the parent plant (their fruit will be similar in terms of size, color, flavor, texture, and other factors).
Is F2 a good hybrid?
F2 hybrids are a good choice for experimental gardeners who want vigorous, robust, low-maintenance plants and are willing to roll the genetic dice in the hope of producing something even better than what they had before. I’ve grown F2 hybrid cherry tomatoes on a number of occasions.
Can you grow F1 seeds from early girl?
If you save seeds from an F1 hybrid tomato plant such as Early Girl and grow them, you’ll get an F2 hybrid rather than a plant that is just like the original, which means that the fruit may look or taste a bit different and the plant may not produce fruit as early in the season (or the fruit may arrive even earlier).
Is F2 a purebred?
While heirloom tomato plants are like purebreds, F2 hybrids are akin to the tough, scrappy mutts of the animal world that tend to survive and thrive even when circumstances aren’t ideal.
What is hybrid tomato?
A hybrid just means that someone cross bred different types of tomatoes in order to come up with a type of tomato that meets a specific purpose. Some people cross breed them to mature faster, some cross breed them to withstand certain diseases, and others breed them for color, taste and shape. But please be aware of this fact: a hybrid tomato is ...
What is an indeterminate tomato?
The indeterminate tomatoes are a cross between JTD and Marglobe. They are suitable for slicing.
How big do cherry tomatoes get?
The indeterminate cherry tomatoes have a size of up to 3/4in per fruit. The fruits have a golden color. The tomato plant can reach 8 feet in height.
How big do determinate tomatoes grow?
The determinate tomatoes can be canned or consumed fresh. They grow on 3-feet plants.
How big is a red indeterminate tomato?
The red indeterminate tomatoes have a size of 0.5oz. Their grape-size is suitable for fresh consumption.
How long does it take for an indeterminate tomato to mature?
The indeterminate tomatoes come with a distinct golden color as they are high in carotene. They take 63 days to mature.
How much does an indeterminate tomato weigh?
Being larger then Early Girl, the indeterminate tomatoes reach weights of 5-6oz. They are known for their disease tolerance.
What is an F1 hybrid?
An F1 tomato hybrid occurs when you have two tomato plants of different varieties and then one is pollinated by the other variety's pollen. The seeds of the resulting cross-pollinated tomato will grow plants that are F1 hybrids. The children of F1 hybrids are F2. The children of F2 are F3, and so forth.
What does F1 mean in seed?
The seed will grow, but you don't know what sort of traits you'll get. F1 means that it came from distinct parents selected for certain traits. On the other hand, if you use open-pollinated seed, that comes from a plant that had parents of the same variety, so you can expect it to share the same genetic traits that both parents had.
What are the children of F1?
The children of F1 hybrids are F2. The children of F2 are F3, and so forth. There is only one domestic tomato species (Solanum lycopersicum, AKA Lycopersicon lycopersicum, AKA Lycopersicon esculentum), but there are thousands of varieties within this species.
Is F1 tomato fertile?
But, odds are in your favor that it'll probably be fertile. So, to answer your question, F1 tomatoes are usually fertile (but possibly on rare occasions, a sterile one might exist, although I've never heard of one, so far). However, hybrids don't usually breed true.
Can wild tomatoes cross with domestic tomatoes?
It's possible that some wild tomato species would cross with domestic ones and have sterile offspring. However, I don't know that this is the case with any of the wild species, but it is possible.
Is Sun Sugar a hybrid tomato?
If it retains its characteristics for 50 years-- then its a Heirloom. EXAMPLE. Sun-sugar is one of the best yellow cherry hybrids you will ever grow. Might be the best cherry tomato, period. But the F-1 seeds are expensive.
Do tomatoes need to be fertile?
As long as the parents are both pure domestic tomatoes, then the seeds should be fertile. It's like with dogs. As long as both parents are domestic dogs, the puppies should be fertile, even if their parents are of different breeds. They're all dogs.

Overview
Production of F1 hybrids
Crossing two genetically different plants produces a hybrid seed. This can happen naturally, and includes hybrids between species (for example, peppermint is a sterile F1 hybrid of watermint and spearmint). In agronomy, the term F1 hybrid is usually reserved for agricultural cultivars derived from two-parent cultivars. These F1 hybrids are usually created by means of controlled pollination, sometimes by hand pollination. For annual plants such as tomato and maize, F1 hybrids must be …
Advantages
• Homogeneity and predictability: The genes of an individual plant or animal F1 offspring of homozygous pure lines display limited variation, making their phenotype uniform, so attractive for mechanical operations and easing fine population management. Once the characteristics of the cross are known, repeating this cross yields the same result.
• Higher performance: As most alleles code for different versions of a protein or enzyme, having two different versions of this allele amo…
Disadvantages
• The main advantage of F1 hybrids in agriculture is also their drawback. When F1 cultivars are used as parents, their offspring (F2 generation) vary greatly from one another. Some F2s are high in homozygous genes, as found in their grandparents, and these will lack hybrid vigour. From the point of view of a commercial seed producer who does not wish customers to produce their own seed via seed saving, this genetic assortment is the desired characteristic.
See also
• Backcrossing
• Heterosis ("hybrid vigour")
• Heirloom plant