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Eastern Washington State

Hi All. Here's a somewhat trivial question that maybe some others of you have been wondering about also:

In your experience, with the exception of the undeveloped seeds, do all the seed out of a particular pumpkin have the same 'look' to them?

I've only opened up maybe a dozen pumpkins, and I've noticed that while seeds can be vary tremendously in size, shape, and color, all the ones from a particular female plant are the same. My hypothesis is that the appearance of the seed coat, like the fruit itself, is controlled by the genetics of the female parent and not the pollinator.

Any observations or thoughts?

12/12/2008 6:37:27 AM

Minnesota

I'm curious about the shape, I did see a 1068 wallace seed here on bigpumpkins and it looked round, were all the 1068's round.

12/12/2008 11:39:20 AM

Deer Park, WI

Interesting question, Brian. A good way to test this is by taking a white seed, selfing it to produce another white seed offspring, and pollinating with a tan seed to determine the outcome. Probably been done before, perhaps someone can chime in?

I believe seed coat influence is species specific- Ever plant a stand of sweet corn next to a stand of Indian corn? you'll have the most colorful sweet corn you've ever eaten. Male corn pollen determines kernal color in corn. are pumpers of the same ilk???

12/12/2008 6:55:51 PM

Eastern Washington State

Joze,

Been there done that with the corn. Blue kernels speckled in the otherwise yellow sweet corn. In corn the developing endosperm, which is derived from both parents, is what you see as color. The actual outer seed coat is derived from different tissue layers in different species. Usually though one of the outer layer or layers is maternal tissue. However I'm not sure where the color comes from in pumpkins is, hence my question. I work in wheat, and I know for sure that the red seed coat color is derived from the female parent only. The pollinator has no effect in that case.

12/12/2008 8:49:05 PM

Springfield, Missouri

well people have grown more than one pumpkin on a plant with diffrent pollinators for each set, so if all the seeds look the same only the female matters, but if the seeds inside of diffrent pumpkins on the same plant look diffrent than male could play a role in how the seed forms. (personaly i think only the female will make the diffrence, there are seeds that have already started to form before the pumpkin is pollinated)

Logan

12/13/2008 12:24:32 PM

Santa Rosa, CA

Brian,

That is an interesting question. My daughter grew a 748 Pukos '06 and we kept the seed shell after it came off the cot leaf. I just compared the seeds we harvested from the pumpkin and they look the same.

Also, I just happened to keep the seed shell from a 1,226 Kline '07. I had a back-up seed and compared that and the shell to the seeds I harvested from the 1,226.5 and they were extremely similiar.

So, it appears that the seeds may have the same "look" to them.

Chuck

12/13/2008 12:33:51 PM

Eastern Washington State

Thanks for the reply Chuck

Logan,

That was my thought as well, It seems logical that it is a "female parent only" thing for the outer seed coat layers. I think I've been a scientist too long and have the almost compulsive need to collect and interpret observations before assuming anything.

12/13/2008 7:04:55 PM