Thank you for the interesting discussion.
I might be bit rusty on my genetics, but I’m fairly certain that the resulting crop would have traits from both the donor and the receiver of the pollen.
I understand your point concerning the soybeans and even your point concerning the utility (lack thereof) of planting the resulting hybrid.
That said, the patent issue still remains, because certain genes were patented, not just the complete resulting hybrid. Therefore, it is logical to assume that depending on the dominant nature of that gene, it could very well be present in the resulting crop or animal.
The patent holder might choose not to sue, for the reasons you stated, but that doesn’t address their ability to sue.
Let’s say you patent a certain dog gene that you’ve created to produce bright green eyes in Labs. Now one of your male Labs jumps the fence and tangos with one of female dogs. The resulting puppies have green eyes. Is my possession of the puppies a patent infringement? What if I desire to sell the puppies or breed them? What if you were breeding tastier deer and some got away, do you own the rights to the resulting line of wild deer that you don’t own or control?
My point is that it opens up Pandora’s box on certain matters of “control”.
I presume that these gene patents expire the same as regular patents?
A plant patent has a 20 year life, I think.