Better way of breeding Purple Windflowers
I've read u/paleclaw's post and the wiki page on flower genetics. I was very interested by the subject and started to try some different paths. I think I found a better way of breeding purple windflowers specifically:
When breeding for purple windflowers the main method accepted by the community seems to be:
- White + White = Blue (25%)
- Red + Blue = Red* (100%)
- Red* + Red* = Purple (6.25%)
Added together this method converts a bit more than 0.347% of the initial flowers into purple ones.
What I suggest is to skip the blue altogether and do this:
- White + Red = Red+ (50%) and Red* (50%)
- Red* + Red* = Purple (6.25%)
This seems bad because you can't tell Red+ from Red* apart, but the thing is, if you just ignore that and place every red flower you breed this way together, there is a 25% chance that you will end up pairing two Red* flowers. This ends up converting 0.39% of the initial flowers into purple ones.
This is still a very low chance, with a very small 12.5% improvement, but this method also has less steps: you only need to breed seeded flowers and then you are one step away from your goal.
Also note that doing this won't make you miss out on blue flowers either, you will probably end up getting a blue flower waaay before you get a purple one.
Anyway, I don't know if this is actually relevant, but I hope some of you find it at least interesting.