- See "offset" for other uses of the term.
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Offsets are layers of plants in the plant nursery business. They are clones of the mother plants ("hens and chicks"), meaning that they have the same genetic code.
Offsets form when meristem regions of plants, such as axillary buds or homologous structures enlarge, and differentiate into a new plant with self-sustaining structures. Tulips and lilies are examples which display offset characteristics.
When propagating plants to increase a stock of a cultivar, thus seeking identical copies of parent plant, various cloning techniques (asexual reproduction) are used. Offsets is a natural means by which plants may be cloned.
In contrast, when propagating plants to create new cultivars, sexual reproduction through pollination is used to create seeds. The recombination of genes gives rise to offspring plant with similar but distinct offspring genome.
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