Jette Randlov wrote:
Have anybody tried it? I am wondering if you save seeds from apples grown in
a normal garden, the seeds will likely be cross pollinated and the offspring
F1 - so theoretically the offspring should give fairly healthy, large
apples. The taste cannot be guessed.

People do it all the time. Think of all the hundreds of apple
varieties that are available. Every one of those varieties came from
an original seed grown tree. After each was discovered to be
worthwhile, they made more of the same by grafting. Some new
varieties are the result of a careful breeding program trying to get
a desired quality by crossing 2 known parents. Even then, they cut
down thousands of worthless trees to find the one or 2 worth keeping.
Many varieties are just chance seedlings that sprang up in the wild.
The variety Delicious comes to mind. (Now we call it Red Delicious
to keep it separate from Golden Delicious which came later and is
not related at all except by name.) Anyway, Delicious, at one point,
had over 40% of the market for apples eaten in the US and it was
just a chance seedling that someone discovered to be something special.
Apples are no more F1 than you are F1 because your 2 parents were
not the same person.



I keep hearing people saying that the new tree is highly unlikely to produce
good/eatable/normal apples. Is that really true?

To find one that is so good it will be grown commercially some day
is about as likely as winning the lottery. To find one that is good
enough to eat or maybe make some apple sauce isn't that hard. You
might easily find one you like enough to keep and enjoy just because
it is YOURS.


Would it be worth trying just as a fun experiment? If the offspring is
interesting one could graft it on some existing tree.


Sure. If you have room, grow several. As a business, it would likely
be a looser but as a hobby, it would be fun. Plant them out fairly
close together because you will be thinning out the really bad ones
eventually anyway.

Steve