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#breeding drawbacks

2 public questions tagged with this topic.

Plant Breeding 3

A limitation of clonal selection is:

Vegetatively propagated clones maintain narrow genetic base because all individuals within variety are genetically identical, carrying same chromosomes and alleles fixed by mitosis. Uniformity, while commercially desirable, creates vulnerability to evolving pathogen races, insect biotypes, and environmental extremes, leading to boom-bust cycles such as potato late blight in Ireland. Lack of sexual recombination restricts generation of new variability for adaptation, slows response to climate change, and limited buffering through genotype mixtures reduces ecological resilience. Seed storage and

Ref: Esnault et al. Challenges of clonal crops; FAO report on clonal genetic vulnerability

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Plant Breeding 3

A disadvantage of mass selection is:

Retaining many parental plants without progeny testing yields genetically heterogeneous population where individual plants differ in maturity, height, and quality, reducing market acceptability and certification standards. Seed lot lacks uniformity required for mechanized harvesting, DUS testing, and uniform product quality demanded by modern industry. Phenotypic selection confounds environment with genotype, so inferior heterozygous plants with favorable micro-environment may be selected, limiting genetic advance, especially for low heritability traits like yield where h² below 0.2. Without c

Ref: Allard RW. Chapter 8 – Limitations of mass selection. Poehlman 1995: uniformity issues

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