Some more specifics on tree breeding

[Servillo]

So I know how to combine trees to get new species, planting trees next to each other and having bees pollinate. One thing I'm not sure about is how to move traits from one tree to another successfully, while controlling which sapling I'm getting. I'm assuming it's like breeding bees without any of the fancy Extra Bees machines; breed one tree without the traits I want with a tree that has the trains I want, and pray the traits propagate without changing the tree type.

What I don't get is how to do that with base-level trees. For example, I know people want to get Apple Oaks with high sapling and sappiness traits. This is a base level tree, meaning nothing breeds into it as far as I know. How then do I get the traits I want onto that tree?

 

[whizzball1]

Sieves?
Oh wait, this is 1.4.7.
Actually no, that doesn't work either.
Hmm...

 

[Servillo]

Surely someone here knows. I guess if nothing else, my guess would be getting a tree with the traits I want, and then breeding those backwards through the breeding chain to get what I want.

 

[egor66]

you answered your own question.

 

[Zjarek_S]

It works very similarly to bees, except that when mutation happen, resulting sapling will always be pure with traits specific for tree. Crossbreeding is rather easy. Let's say that you want to move triple saplings trait from balsa to apple oak (I think Balsa is dominant, but I'm not sure), than just plant some and get some normal crossbreed saplings. Than just plant crossbreed saplings, wait a good amount of time, so most leaves will crossbreed. After this operation for each trait of the tree from resulting saplings 1/4th will have one pure version of it, 1/4th other pure version of it and 1/2 will have hybrid. So if you want for example get 3 good pure traits (assuming they are recesive) you will get it after about 64 crossbreed saplings in this second run. You can just choose better saplings from this run and crossbreed them again.

You need to collect a lot of saplings for it to be efficient. In 1.4.7 I just had logger to cut down trees and water streams to collect saplings. In 1.5 I just plant them manually on inactive multiblock farm (with dirt on top, not humus) and when I see that there is enough changed leaves I just activate farm, which is kind enough to cut trees and automatically collect all saplings for analysis and further use.