"Rodger Whitlock" wrote in message
...

[snip]

There is some genetic variability, if I can trust my reading.
Some authors claim quite a lot, but I have my doubts about that.
(I've seen serious claims that the genetic variability among the
twigs of one apple tree is comparable to that among a similar
number of seedlings of the same apple.)

If that were true, it would make a total mockery of the naming and
"patenting" of varieties. How would one then legally establish
whether two varieties which looked very similar were in fact
propagated from the same plant or not?

Franz