"Claude" wrote in message ...
hello everyone!

Sorry, might be a dumb question but...

what is the difference between selfing and cloning?

My understanding is that selfing is pollinating the plant with it`s pollen,
that way, you get seeds and can go flasking.
Cloning is taking cells from a part of the plant ang grow it in flask!

Am I right? If so, what are the difference?

Not a dumb question, but there is a difference:

In selfing there is only one parent but it's still sexual reproduction.
The plant has two copies of each gene which may be different (alleles).
Each pollen grain and each egg contain one copy of each gene and the
choice is independent each time, so you get different combinations when
they are put back together in selfing.

Each time you self, for each gene, there is a chance that the offspring
will get two copies of the same allele (homozygosity). This means that
for that gene there is nothing to vary when that offspring is selfed (it
will 'breed true' for whatever characteristics that gene determines).
If you self repeatedly, you'll end up with a plant that is homozygous for
all genes, and if you self that its offspring will effectively be clones.

They will also be fully inbred (which is the same thing as fully homozygous)
which is something vegetative clones aren't necessarily.

Leo