hybrid Unintentional Crosses

coachspencerxc

coachspencerxc

I currently have about 250 pepper plants growing in my house. About 1/3 are older guys that are about 6-8" tall, 1/3 are 2-4"  tall & 1/3 have just their first set of real leaves. About 150 different varieties. 1 plant of most but as many as 4-6 of a few. Very few are from isolated seeds... maybe 25-40. The rest are from pods I harvested from or traded OP seeds. Sooo, how many unintentional crosses should I be expecting?
 
It's about to start getting interesting seeing how many pods don't match up with their tags. 
 
i had reapers , scorpions , brainstrains , red douglahs , peach scorp / ghosts , chocolate 7 pod ,out in the garden last summer . kinda hoping for a  gnarly ,twisted ,bumpy , crazy looking pod to come out of some of the peach scorp / ghost seeds  this year .    :onfire:
 
I typically do <50 plants a year (it's been <25 the last couple years) and I've had at least one cross every year. Granted... some of those seeds were from Judy, so I think just have bad luck.
 
I must have really bad luck.  Out of 110 plants last year, I had at least 15 to 20 that weren't true.  I did go cheap early one before learning of this site and some of the more reputable vendors so some is probably my fault.  Of those, a few were OK, one was great and I hope to keep trying to grow it out.  Was supposed to be a chocolate hab but turned out to be some red think with some scorpion in it for certain, but probably closer to a really hot habanero for heat.  It was really good.  The other chocolate hab plant pushed out the nastiest looking and tasting things ever seen, should have saved some seeds, but taste was so bad didn't bother.
 
sporehead said:
Hey jcw10tc: were the seeds you sent out true or is there a chance of some crosses?
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They were grown openly and not isolated like I put in the giveaways.  So there is always a chance for crosses.  But I only saved seeds from plants that grew true to pheno.  I think the majority of free seeds on here and in seed trains are not isolated.  I don't have the space to isolate with the amount of varieties I have going.  A few of my crosses last year were from some one of the more reputable vendors, so its always possible to get something that doesn't grow as planned.  One example from a reputable vendor was a Naga Morich that grew out to be some really large smooth habanero shaped pod with 0 heat.  I am hoping for the best from everything I saved.  All my yellow brain strains and morugas I am growing this year are saved from my grow last year.
 
I'm not too worried about seeds I have being mislabeled. ...maybe but I trust the sources of the seeds- from pepperlover, from pods I handled myself or from members here. What I'm not so sure about is whether the seeds came from cross pollinated pods. Excited to see what comes next. 
 
You might enjoy reading this article about some experiments with pepper isolation. Upshot seems to be "nobody really knows".
 
Good luck with your grow! It'll be really exciting to see what you end up with! :)
 
One thing I'll mention, and it could be coincidence, but all of my crosses popped up after selecting for the strongest seedlings. For example one year 2/3 of my tepins were hybrids, and those 2 were much stronger growers than their brothers and sisters.

Same thing happened with my Brain Strain Yellow. Had several starts but figured I only needed a couple plants, the strongest grower turned out to be a hybrid.

I'm not convinced hybrid vigor always applies, but in my experience it seems to be the case.
 
So I'm wondering something. Of the seeds I received here (many thanks jcw and others), I intend to grow 6 of each to a point and then keep at least 3 of each. In regards to seed saving and the chance of cross pollination, what does one do? I'd like to bag one of everything to save that gene set but I wouldn't know if it was a cross already. Alternatively I could bag all of them but I don't have that kind of money or time. SO then the alternative becomes saving seed of  whatever plant and isolating each pod and saving seed of all of those separate. This is ridiculous. Am I over thinking this or is this reality? I'd like to have seed on hand for next year (and don't mind crazy crosses) but would like some solid true to name variations. What to do and what have all of your experiences been with open pollination?
 
Last year I had some volunteer Jamaican mushroom that I determined was crossed with a hybrid sweet banana
Two plants where red and was bigger the flavor was slightly sweet with a fruity tropical then came decent heat about regular habanero to cayenne.
The yellow version had the flavor of a hybrid sweet banana and was just awful
 
The odds are aginst crossing by accident. Think about it..... you first need a cross pollination (peppers are self pollinating), then you have to choose the fruit with the seeds that are cross pollinated for next years grow out. It happens all the time but, you need to play your cards right.
 
Terravexti said:
The odds are against crossing by accident. Think about it..... you first need a cross pollination (peppers are self pollinating), then you have to choose the fruit with the seeds that are cross pollinated for next years grow out. It happens all the time but, you need to play your cards right.
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Tell me about it.. Even self pollinating flowers only pop about what 20% of the time max ?? And that's with 5 juicy pollen producing anthers sitting 3 mm from the stamen.... Then to add a time frame of maybe 24 hours where the anthers are immature and a third party flower could possibly dust the stamen before it pollinates itself... Add to that even if the flower takes it might die soon after from too high or too low temps, dehydration and other issues.
 
 I'm certainly not saying it doesn't happen because it does but open air cross pollination is uncommon to say the least. I'd expect it to be less than 1% of pods to be contain F1, even in areas where multiple breeds are shoulder to shoulder outdoors. 
 
I am no scientist, nor am I a agriculturist and everything I say is pure here say.. Just don't believe its that common.
 
The most common way to get what you thing is a cross is receiving seeds from someone saying its Plant A variety and its actually a Plant B variety.. A few pods look a bit off for plant B so you automaticly start thinking tits a cross between the two when its really just a Plant B only.. 
 
I received red habaneros seeds instead of Peruvian White seeds, I could of shouted Cross Cross Cross to the world. but its probably just a mistake from the supplier lol
 
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