Selective breeding
Selective breeding
- In selective breeding (artificial selection), humans choose which organisms breed:
- choose the individuals with the features you want,
- cross them to make the next generation,
- choose the offspring with those features, and repeat over many generations.
- Used to improve crops (higher yield) and farm animals (cows that give more milk).
Practice
In selective breeding, the parents are chosen by:
Selective (artificial) breeding is done by humans choosing which organisms breed; in natural selection the environment "chooses".
Practice
Selective breeding is used to:
By repeatedly choosing the best parents, humans improve features like crop yield and milk production.
Natural vs artificial (Supplement)
- In natural selection, the environment decides which survive.
- In artificial selection, humans decide.
Practice
The key difference is that the environment selects in natural selection, while humans select in artificial selection.
Natural selection is driven by the environment; artificial selection is driven by human choice.
You've got it
Key idea
- selective breeding = humans pick the parents, repeat over generations
- used to improve crops and livestock
- (Supplement) natural selection = the environment chooses; artificial = humans choose