Question
Can you help me find an article or site online about why non-hybrid/heirloom seeds are important, what would happen if you tried to get seeds from a hybrid, and just generally what the threat from hybrid seeds is?  I am concerned that there could come a time when people must grow more of their own food and will have a rude awakening when they depend on hybrid seeds.  I host a discussion group for readers of  THE LONG EMERGENCY by James Kunstler.  He does not address this issue and I would like to direct people to useful info.  Thanks a ton.

Answer
Visit our website: http://www.avant-gardening.com/biodiversity.html for more information about seed altering, biodiversity, and genetic engineering.

If you try to get seeds from a Hybrid, the seeds will not be true to the plant that you grew, or they may be sterile. These seeds, therefore, cannot be saved, or used to grow another crop. This is the danger of Hybrid seed, which is a great danger to their world countries to whom we are sending hybrid seed.  Many heirloom varities have just been "lost" forever.

Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson in his book called 揟he Diversity of Life?estimates that we've only identified and named about 10 percent of the species of plants that inhabit the earth, and asks that when we so little about our world, why are we in such a hurry to alter it?

Hybrid plants also require more fertilisers, herbicides, pesticides due to their inherent lack of resistence.

Open-pollinated varieties of seed have been grown and selected selected under organic conditions by nature over time for their desirable traits. They are also dynamic,  mutating and adapting to a local ecosystem, whereas hybrid seed is static, or unable to adapt, since their seed will not breed the original plant.

Here are some website with more information:

http://www.southernexposure.com/library/WhyOpenPollinated.htm

http://www.seedsave.org/

http://homepage.eircom.net/~merlyn/seedsaving.html#section10

Hope this helps!