breeding How Likely Are Crosses?

HotandHeavy

HotandHeavy

Howdy,
 
So I'm growing 5 different varieties, Reaper, Bhut Jolokia, 7 pot Primo, not? Trinidad Scorpion, not? Choc. Scorpion. All are in very close proximity, they've been moved about, there are lots of pollinators that come by for a visit...
 
Should i expect crosses from the seeds and to what extent? Thanks for your help.
 
Cheers,
Brian
 
I would suggest isolating the flowers that you plan to save seeds from. I don't know exactly what the chances are, but plants close together and lots of insect pollinators are going to increase the odds of crosses. I put fine mesh baggies over a few flowers before they open to prevent insects from cross-pollinating them. Then I tag those pods so I know which pods have the isolated seeds. There are other methods as well. Some people will glue a flower shut until it self-pollinates, for example.
 
Anything that is not isolated in setup like yours will pop few crosses here and there. Considering its openly pollinated and pollinators just jump from flower to flower so yeah there will be some crosses to what extend? how can someone even answer that? :P 
 
HotandHeavy said:
Howdy,
 
So I'm growing 5 different varieties, Reaper, Bhut Jolokia, 7 pot Primo, not? Trinidad Scorpion, not? Choc. Scorpion. All are in very close proximity, they've been moved about, there are lots of pollinators that come by for a visit...
 
Should i expect crosses from the seeds and to what extent? Thanks for your help.
 
Cheers,
Brian
Click to expand...
You should expect crosses. How many? That will vary.
I usually have under 5% crosses with my own non isolated saved seeds, but always expect more.
I always plant more than I want, close together and pull any untrue plants, leaving space for the true plants to grow.
It's a bit easier to manage when growing so many plants.
When not able to isolate individual flowers, there are factors that come into play, that cam help keep the %s of crosses lower.
If you only planted seeds from one pod, every seeds in the one pod could be crossed, meaning every offspring would grow untrue. But if you planted twenty seeds from 20 different pods you would have a less chance of crosses showing up.
Saving pods from in the middle of a plant, for seed, can also contribute, as those flowers are surrounded by flowers of its own, and more likely to get pollinated by itself by insects.
Isolating flowers is the best bet to keep the lines pure though, and there is plenty of info available here on how to do so.
Good luck.
 
Thank you very much for the information, kind people.
 
I'm actually excited for the prospect of crosses considering what I'm growing. But I'm not sure how many plants I'll start from seed next year as I've not got a ton of space and I hope to have second year plants going.
 
Also, I'm giving seeds away so I wanted to be able to let  people know what they might expect. This helps a lot, thanks again. :)
 
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