How do we feel on back crosses.

[Theodoreorchidking]

So I have a question on back crossing. I was looking at krullsmith and they have paphiopedilum Lady Rothschild. This is lady Isobel crossed with rothschildianum again. In your guy's opinion who have bloomed these, I have no back crosses in my collection, do you think it makes for a good flower and improves it or just makes it pretty much like the dominant flower, in this case rothschildianum?

 

[Stefan Neher]

So I have a question on back crossing. I was looking at krullsmith and they have paphiopedilum Lady Rothschild. This is lady Isobel crossed with rothschildianum again. In your guy's opinion who have bloomed these, I have no back crosses in my collection, do you think it makes for a good flower and improves it or just makes it pretty much like the dominant flower, in this case rothschildianum?

What is your idea of a good flower? There are many different ways to backcross with different color forms or selecting for other features, especially in such a popular species.

Additionally, gene recombinations in sibling populations can be varied, and aren’t an exact 50/50 of esch parents’ traits all the time.

What exactly are you asking?

 

[tnyr5]

So I have a question on back crossing. I was looking at krullsmith and they have paphiopedilum Lady Rothschild. This is lady Isobel crossed with rothschildianum again. In your guy's opinion who have bloomed these, I have no back crosses in my collection, do you think it makes for a good flower and improves it or just makes it pretty much like the dominant flower, in this case rothschildianum?

Generally, breeders do backcrosses to reinforce recessive traits that they're trying to bring to the front. A backcross can often work better than a sib cross for this, because the results can be more predictable, but the parent in mind must be of sufficient quality to be worth the effort.
It's just another tool in the toolbox; the goal of the breeder is what matters. In the case of Lady Rothschild: stonei is very dominant as a parent, even over rothschildianum, so you need to backcross Lady Isobel to rothschildianum if you want most of the progeny to have roth shape but Lady Isobel color.

 

[spujr]

As Tony and Stefan said, it helps to have a goal in mind. For example, Bel Royal x roth could be a nice way to get a roth- like flower but more flowers per inflorescens. Or you could go the other way, Bel Royal x kolo to make a larger flower kolo with more color.

I think it is a great strategy but just realize that variation will still be between the two parents and progenies will never be judged as species, only as different hybrids.