when you make feminized beans, you ARE altering genetics to a degree as your offspring won't have "true" male genetics
Of course they won't have "true" male genetics. . .they'll be all female and won't have ANY "male" genetics!
But *ALL* their DNA will still come from the mother and hermie-father plants the same as a conventional male/female cross. You won't be introducing any new genetic material that wasn't there to begin with. Nor will you be omitting any genetic material that "should" be there.
Imagine crossing an XX female with an XY female. . .you have a 50-50% chance of getting XY male or XX female offspring.
Now imagine crossing an XX female with another XX female. . .you have a 100% chance of getting XX offspring.
That's effectively what happens when you cross a female with a "hermie" female plant. Basically you're just taking the Y chromosome out of the mix. All remaining genes should be unaltered.
you will have offspring that are more hermie prone
Why? Since the tendency to express both gender flowers is controlled by a set of pre-existing genes, this simply doesn't make genetic sense.
If the offspring contain the same genes that the parents do (and they should) why should they be any more (or less) likely to go hermie?
and likely more prone to genetic waning as well due to the extreme inbreeding.
OK, so THIS is a valid point.
If you're doing repeated self-crosses, you can cause expression of normally silent extreme recessive traits, or amplify mutations.
So these are good reasons not to continually inbreed the same plant over many generations.
Another point is that some breeders simply create feminized seeds as a way to perpetuate what amount to unstable "clone only" lines. They're fundamentally not strong breeders with not strong stock. Their feminized seeds are weak not because the process creates weakness, but because using the process is the RESULT of weakness!
properly bred plants are going to be healthier in the long run. too much inbreeding, and you get royal families prone to disease.
That's exactly right.