Bilbo Baggins viola

Hi - I have bought Bilbo Baggin viola (Viola x williamsiana Bilbo Baggins )
from Park seeds - they seem very expensive to me (even on sale) for just 25 seeds.

Is it possible for me to raise a few of these in isolation, hand pollinate them, and get viable seeds? Or would I be wasting me time?

here is the link:

http://www.parkseed.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/StoreCatalogDisplay?storeId=10101&catalogId=10101&langId=-1&SearchText=Bilbo+Baggins&mainPage=textsearchresults&RequestType=NewRequest&go.x=11&go.y=4

It's an hybrid, so the offspring of your plants will not come true to the parent no matter if you hand pollinate. They will revert back to the parent plants, or variations of the two.

What you CAN do is stabilize the plant to an open pollinated form. It will take as long as 6 or 8 seasons, or as little as 2 or 3.

Save your seeds this year and plant them next year.Then,save the seeds from the flowers that closest resembles the original. Make sure that you pay attention to how high they grow, amount of blooms, and size of the blooms. There should be a few in each generation (every year is a generation) that will look like the Bilbo Baggins. By planting only the seeds each year of the flowers you wish to save, and ruthlessly pulling out all the others so they cannot cross with your good ones, you can, over time come very close to the plant you like. It won't be an exact copy because genetics just won't let that happen, but you can come close with time and care.

Rats! I just wanted lots of seeds for a Fantasy Seed Swap I plan to run in September. I guess it will have to be in September 2015! lol.

Thanks for the info, though. :-)

I will still try to get the seeds using the method you have described :-)