Selection Criteria

How I'm selecting what to cross with silverweed

For convenience, here is an index of my Silverweed related content.

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I laid out my arguments for integeneric crosses between A. anserina (silverweed) and other members of the potentileae tribe in my last post

Silverweed Breeding Progress Report #3

And now I want to talk more about my selection criteria - essentially, how I am deciding which plants to cross with silverweed. At the end of this post, I’ll layout the plants I’ve decided to breed A. anserina with and a brief reason why. In later posts, I’ll dive in deep on each plant for fun and science.

Selection Criteria

So there are more than 300 species in the potentilla genus, and last time I checked, I am but one person. So to narrow things down, here is the practical process I have had to go through:

1. Search online (via Google and eBay) to see what is easily available for purchasing

2. Of the ones that are able to be easily purchased, what edible or medicinal properties do they have?

   1. This requires me to dive into Google Scholar on a fairly regular basis. Someone, somewhere, probably knows whether a specific plant is edible or medicinal, and I only have a tiny keyhole into that through a few scientific studies (more trustworthy) or online blogs (less trustworthy).

3. For due diligence and curiosity, if I find just a few sources for an edibility of a plant, I will try and find the original reference and this often leads down a rabbit hole of references that end up at a book or source that is impossible to purchase or read online. More about this later.

4. If there’s just not record of whether they’re edible or medicinal, I’ll look up whether this plant has any atypical features that would be incredibly useful to give to the gene pool - traits like being evergreen or frost hardiness.

5. If the plant has “nothing of interest”, I scratch them off the list. I have to be ruthless because I am not a well funded research team. This is sometimes a shame because there are some truly beautiful potentilleae species out there.

P. atrosanguinea, no known medicinal use but very beautiful

An orthogonal approach is to survey the existing literature (Google Scholar is incredibly useful). I’ve found a few species that are known either as being edible or have other desirable properties. Some of these I’ve found sellers online for, but others I’ve had to ask online friends or locate locally on the astounding iNaturalist map

A sidebar, but the iNaturalist map is a modern marvel for hobbiest plant breeders like myself. It lets you filter a map of anywhere in the world for any species.

So what are you waiting for? Get the phone app and start uploading what you’ve found!

The candidates

Things in the A-List: I’ve already identified sources for or I’ve already purchased

Things in the B-List: are nice to haves but hard to get

The A-List

• P. alba - medicinal properties

• P. nepalensis - allegedly starchy (edible) roots

• P. reptans - high vigour in many different climates and popularly medicinal (small, bulbous storage roots)

• P. neumanniana - evergreen in mild climates

• P. crantzii - native to as far as Greenland

• P. erecta - the thickest storage tubers of any species I’ve found

The B-List

• A. Pacifica - a close cousin of A. anserina, but hard to source

How can you help?

Please tell me if you know of any members of the potentilleae tribe that I’m really missing out on for whatever reason.