In general, it is useless to save seed from hybrids. They are "created" by crossing various parents with one another to select for specific traits. When the seed from hybrids is sown, it will produce reversions back to the parents. You'll not get the same traits of the hybrid and will probably get alot of irregularity in size, bloom, and disease resistance too.

If you want to grow plants that you can save seed from, look in catalogs for "heirloom", "selections", or just seed that do not mention "hybrid" or "F1", "F2", etc. The truth is there are alot more of those than there are hybrids, and their seeds cost alot less too.

I have a thorough understanding of "hybrids" and "crossing" as I studied genetics in college. What I find in many cases in the flower world is that many of the so called "F1" hybrids are not an F1 at all. Many were crossed to create a new item (introduce traits, etc.) then stabilized out, put into mass seed production and then sold as F1 crosses when in fact they are not. What I am curious about is the various trailing Petunias and whether they are truly an F1 cross or not. The only way to find out is to grow out a sample of at least 100 plants (F2) of a given variety (better yet 200 plants) and see what the variation is in the results. I was hoping someone here has done just that and I could get data from their findings. If anyone has grown out any of the trailing "F1" petunias produced seed (F2 or F3), I would very much like to hear from them and their results.

Blueflint

Sorry. I misunderstood your question. I will be watching this thread. It would be very interesting to hear if anyone has done that.

Last year I collected tons of seeds from purple wave petunias and decided to give them a try. Most of the plants had purple or pale lilac flowers, but I got a red one too. They were all really weak and had very little heat tolerance except for those with purple flowers, so I discarded all the other ones.

Right now I have 2 of them still growing and I have to say it's one of the best petunias I've ever had. It took them forever to start blooming, more than 3 months, but once they started - back in october - they never stopped. That's 5 months blooming despite the hot and humid brazilian summer.

The flowers look just like purple wave's but smaller. The plant is trailing too and huge(4 or 5 feet long, growing on a window box), and for some reason it doesn't set seed - which is a good thing, because they won't stop blooming.

I also planted seeds collected from tidal wave silver petunia, but the plants were too weak to be worth growing.

I'll take pictures when they recover from all the rain we had today.

I have about 100 F2 seedlings from a red spreading type parent stock growing now. All F2 seedlings are as vigorous as the F1 seedlings I have growing next to them. I will keep everyone updated on how these turn out. I noticed a similar thread to this:

I find this all quite interesting.

Blueflint

Here is a link that might be useful: petunias from seed Outdoors

I have a quick update here...the F2 "spreading" seed grown red petunias are doing well. Many are 7" to 8" across and have started to bloom. Although I am pinching most of the blooms off, each plant is allowed one bloom to develop so I can evaluate it. So far all are deep red like the parent stock (with simular size, etc.), all are spreading like the red F1 hybrids next to them on the bench. Though the F2 plants are still young and fairly small, all are indistinguishable from the F1 stock...so far. Time will tell.

Blueflint

I have saved alot of seeds from my store bought petunias last year and am waiting for them to germinate to plant in the garden. So I will be better able to answer this question later in the summer. But I did trade from seed saved two years ago and planted those and they came up as they were offered as even though I have forgotten the names except for Laura bush but she is different. But I have yet to meet a petunia I did not like. So to me it does not matter if it is a "little" or alot different than it mother plant. The blue ones were blue, the red were red, white were white and so fourth...

This year I am tring the frosted kind, and some of the named kind like raspberry blast from saved seeds.

Paula

Here is an update on my F2 red spreading type petunias. Out of 100 seedlings, all were red except for 2 which are red and white. All are trailing like the parent F1 stock. All are vigorous and healthy. I will be saving F3 seed this year and take it further and see what happens.

Blueflint