MadSci Network: Botany
Query:

Re: Can I Creat a new Plant with two other kind of plants

Date: Sat Jul 29 17:59:27 2000
Posted By: David Hershey, Faculty, Botany, NA
Area of science: Botany
ID: 964747176.Bt
Message:

It is not true that a banana tree can be combined with an apple tree by cutting 
the trees in half and putting the two halves together to produce a banana with a 
new taste. Banana and apple are too distantly related to graft together. Banana 
is also a monocot, and monocots generally are not graftable because they lack a 
vascular cambium required for grafting.

Molecular biologists can transfer genes from apple to banana so they might be 
able to one day produce a banana that tastes like an apple but I'm not sure why 
they would want to do that. It would be much more useful to do something that 
would be more valuable, such as produce a banana that doesn't spoil so fast 
or that could be stored yearround as you can do for apples.

You can do all sorts of novel things with grafting, such as grafting several 
different apple cultivars on a single tree.

Reference

Garner, R.J. 1988. Grafter's Handbook. London: Cassell.


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