wild Lettuce cross.

[Richard Watson]

Trying to find a thread where Joseph posted a group of photos showing crossing between wild and domestic lettuces, can any remember where that thread was, may have been on Home Grown Goodness.

[Nicolas]

https://permies.com/t/47494/Lettuce-breeding-seed-saving-advice ?

[Joseph Lofthouse]

I have been working with those naturally occurring hybrid crosses for 8 years now. Some years it was only because they are weedy in my garden, like the wild ancestor.

The past 3 years, I put good effort into selecting for non-bitterness. I'm also selecting for winter hardiness.

They are currently growing in an unheated greenhouse.



 

[Joran Marechal]

Or was it this one?
 https://opensourceplantbreeding.org/forum/index.php?topic=535.0


For 8 years now?  I'm interested Joseph!
This year I am growing f2 from four hybrid lines:
 https://joransseeds.blogspot.com/2023/12/crossing.html?m=1

Before focusing on bitterness I concentrate on selecting plants without thorns.
And for the moment, out of several hundred, all seem to have thorns.

Did you manage to make the thorns disappear quickly?

Is bitterness is according to you the biggest challenge?

[Joseph Lofthouse]

Thousands of lettuce seedlings grow in my garden. Because they grow in abundance, I can easily select against thorns.

Selecting against bitterness presents more difficulties to me, cause my tongue gets numb... Though selecting against milkiness works adequately.

Due to my super arid ecosystem, bitterness in lettuce presents ongoing problems, even in so called domesticated varieties.

[Joran Marechal]

Ok, I understand, it's the means of detection that poses the problem. ^^

There are no visual clues to estimate bitterness without having to taste?
Otherwise formulated: Is bitterness correlated with the abundance of latex?

According to your observations, are unpleasant odor and bitterness based on the same trait?  (And are therefore eliminated simultaneously)
Or are they two different traits?

[Joseph Lofthouse]

To me, latex and bitterness in lettuce seem highly correlated. I've never found a plant without latex in my interspecies hybrids, so it's a matter of degree rather that yes/no. If I was a lettuce breeder, I might cross one of the hyper-low latex varieties like Iceburg with my wild lettuce.

I suppose that if I were Luther Burbank, I'd plant 10,000 segregating seeds, and look for the one without latex.

I can't smell lettuce, so am unable to comment on whether taste and smell go together.