what is a hybrid

[stokes]

I got two chickens along time ago I was told they,re Rhode island reds but when a friend came to have a look he said they're hybrids so I don't know anyone with any ideas

 

[Basskids08]

I got two chickens along time ago I was told they,re Rhode island reds but when a friend came to have a look he said they're hybrids so I don't know anyone with any ideas

Here's a thread to read up on, http://www.farmforward.com/features/hybrid.
Explains everything

 

[Chris09]

Let make it easy,
Hy·brid
hīˌbrid/
The offspring of two plants or animals of different species or varieties, such as a mule (a hybrid of a donkey and a horse). In biology a hybrid is an offspring of two animals or plants of different races, breeds, varieties, species, or genera.

It is a "fancy" word for cross bred.

 

[SweetSilver]

That is the definition, but I would add that for plants and animals, those usually referred to as a hybrid rather than just a cross breed are those that are cross bred specifically to get that particular outcome, and repeatedly. Seed companies produce hybrid broccoli seed by cross two specific parents to make the hybrid seed, the hybrid is named and recognized and production for that specific hybrid continues until demand for it drops. Cornish crosses, sex links, isbars (I'm still learning this stuff--hope that's right) are all hybrids. Mules and hinnies are hybrids.

Yes, barnyard crosses are hybrids, but in agriculture it also carries a specific *connotation*.

 

[Chris09]

That is the definition, but I would add that for plants and animals, those usually referred to as a hybrid rather than just a cross breed are those that are cross bred specifically to get that particular outcome, and repeatedly. Seed companies produce hybrid broccoli seed by cross two specific parents to make the hybrid seed, the hybrid is named and recognized and production for that specific hybrid continues until demand for it drops. Cornish crosses, sex links, isbars (I'm still learning this stuff--hope that's right) are all hybrids. Mules and hinnies are hybrids.

Yes, barnyard crosses are hybrids, but in agriculture it also carries a specific *connotation*.

Right In animals and plants when a particular outcome is achieved it is considered a hybrid.

Example --
When Hunts was developing the 1439 Hybrid tomato they knew that they wanted a tomato that was determinate, firm, crack resistant fruit. Resistance: verticillium wilt, fusarium wilt. It turn they crossed the Heinz 1350 and the Campbell 135

(The Heinz 1350 is a Eastern State 54-1878-3 x Experimental Hybrid)

In poultry (chickens) We can take a Rhode Island Red Rooster and cross him over a Columbian Plymouth Rock Hen and the outcome is a chick that is sexable at hatch.

Most Production Reds are also a Hybrid by crossing a Rhode Island Red with a Light Brown Leghorn and then back crossing to the Rhode Island Red.

There all cross bred but we add a name like Hybrid to them when there is a outcome in mind.

 

[Chris09]

I read that link to Farm Forward and had to chuckle,

Quote:
I wonder if the writer of this article knows that all chickens are "hybrids" and were accomplished by a complicated breeding program that involved inbreeding and crossbreeding?

Quote: Yes and so was every other chicken on earth, (there is no such thing as a "wild chicken", we bred the wild jungle fowl into the animal we call a chicken by picking specific "genetic mutations" we liked).

It's funny how someone can twist the truth in order to make a word like Hybrid look so bad.

 

[Basskids08]

I guess I should have read the article before linking it! I saw the headline and thought great info!

 

[SweetSilver]

The other important aspect of "hybrid" is that the particular characteristics can only be achieved with the first generation, or a particular generation anyway. For example (using something I know very little about, of course

) you cannot cross an olive egger with another olive egger and get olive eggs. To achieve olive eggs, chickens must be hybridized. Eventually, over generations with careful *cross breeding*, developers can come up with new *breeds* or *varieties* that can reproduce truly from generation to generation. But "hybrid" connotes something that is only achievable by crossing different parents each time.