How did Mendel learn about traits caused by hidden factors in pea plants?

Answer 1

The short answer is because they were easy to observe. But say you dont know anything about heredity, here is the long answer:

Mendel discovered that the traits of pea plants such as blossom color, stalk length, pea size, etc. were hereditary. this means that the traits were passed on from the parent plants to generation (Gen) I and then the traits of Gen I were passed on to Gen II and so on. The common assumption would naturally be that the traits would combine, ex. if a purple pea plant was crossed with a white pea plant then the spawn would be a lighter whitish-purple. But Mendel discovered that some genes are dominant and some are recessive, which can be explained in a punnet square:

This is a punnet square (if it didnt load right just Google images it. it was the second choice on my computer). Lets say that capitol G is the symbol for a purple pea blossom, and the lower case g is a symbol for a white blossom. The G is capitol because the purple blossom is the dominent gene. Lets also say that the Gg over the square is the gene map for the female plant that is being crossed. The dominent gene always takes over, so GG is purple, Gg is purple, and gg is white. The recessive gene only takes affect if there is not dominent gene. So if the top plant is the female, and the one on the right is the male, and both are Gg so both are purple, the four boxes set up a scenario. Each gene represents an offspring. If the crossed plants have 4 offspring, then one will be GG, one gg, and 2 Gg. You simply bring the letters down. All traits work this way. Eye color fur color, flower color, etc.

I hope this answers your question...

Answer 2

He collected detailed information on inherited traits of pea plants.

Answer 3

They appeared in first and second generation offspring I think.

Answer 4

Mendel was a monk and grew peas for food in the monastery. The obvious answer then is that they were readily available.

Answer 5

well it depends did u read notes or someting in the passage