Hybrid Seed

Hybrid seed is seed produced by deliberately crossing two distinct, usually inbred, parent lines to combine their traits and exploit heterosis, the vigor and yield advantage the first-generation cross displays over either parent, at the cost that the resulting plant's own seed does not breed true and must be repurchased rather than saved. The spread of hybrid seed, first in maize from the 1920s and 1930s and later in many other crops, reshaped both crop yields and the seed industry's relationship with the farmer who used to save seed freely.