Do hot & sweet peppers cross and make hot fruits?

13 years ago

I would think the answer is no, but last year, I bought some gypsy pepper plants and some other sweet peppers (marconi, etc.), and in the same garden I had a couple of hot chili pepper plants I bought.

The sweet peppers were all hot. The fruits looked right, but tasted hot.

So now I'm wondering if it's safe to plant hot and sweet in the same garden or not. Never had that problem before, and honestly, I thought if things cross pollinated, it just affected the next generation's seeds.

What happened to make my sweet peppers so hot?

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Comments (8)

digdirt2
13 years ago
Only explanation I know of is that the plants you purchased must have been grown from saved seed that had crossed the previous year. The current fruit isn't affected by cross-pollination, only the seeds, and only certain varieties will cross with each other. Plant those crossed seeds the next year and you might get a hot sweet pepper or a sweet hot pepper.

See the FAQ below and here is a long discussion on the question from over on the Peppers forum here.

Dave

Here is a link that might be useful: If I Plant A Habanero Next To My Banana Pepper Will I Get A Hot Banana Pepper?
jmwolff
13 years ago
I hope not because I have 6 of those Bhut Jalokia killer pepper plants and I don't want to contaminate the whole pepper harvest!
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"I thought being "heirloom" meant it wouldn't cross with other plants." Heirlooms are open pollinated. They will come true from seed as long as you prevent them from cross pollinating. Pepper flowers are self pollinating and do not need insects. The flowers just have to be wiggled/jiggled/vibrated/moved around in some way (such as getting blown around in the wind) for them to set fruit. Insects do pollinate the flowers but they are not needed and are not wanted when you plan on saving seed. That's why isolation cages are recommended to prevent insects from cross pollinating. Bagging individual blooms will also work. It's possible that some of your saved seeds will come true. But are you willing to go through the process of starting the seeds, tending the seedlings, transplanting, waiting for the plants to set fruit, and all this just to bite into a pepper that sets your mouth on fire? If it were me I'd start with fresh seed. As for why the first ones you picked weren't hot, I oftentimes have hot peppers that are sweet or mild early in the season (such as my serranos this year). Especially if I pick them while still small. I attribute it to the cooler weather and the plants being young. But they soon correct themselves. Rodney
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I believe that is why we are here, to help and to learn, plus just chit-chat. I was the only seed catalog that I had beside my chair. Check out tomatogrowers.com, they only sell tomatoes, peppers, eggplants and tomatillos. They sell small quantities, with a few varieties larger than 30 seed/pkt, but I find their prices of the regular stuff that I sell too expensive. I have 'shopped' over 40 companies over the years, and still find someone new that MIGHT compete for my business. Several seed companies, buy seed in bulk and repackage with their name. I've found some that have forgotten to put 'their' name on the packet. Marla
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Seeds produce no capsaicinoids (the stuff that make peppers hot). The only reason that they are hot is due to their close proximity to the placenta, they absorb some of the capsaicin. Capsaicin is produced in the placental tissue, usually concentrated where the ribs meet the wall. When people remove the seeds, they also tend to remove this material which leads to the false presumption that the seeds are the cause of the heat. The placental tissue only contains maternal tissue. The same as the pepper walls, etc. The reason people clean out the seeds is that 1) they are bitter 2) they are not fun to chew 3) they are not fun to look at Sweet peppers also tend to be easier to clean that hot peppers, due to the size (sweet tend to be larger) and the danger of handling them. They tend to have more pronounced placental tissue (once again due to fruit size). This tissue is rubbery when consumed and contains no taste benefits. In hot peppers, it is beneficial to keep it as that is where the capsacinoids are produced.
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Peppers cross-breed freely when there are bees involved. I don't know what you will get, but I know you probably won't get the Red Cheese Sweet Pepper. To collect reliable seeds from peppers you have to protect the flower buds from the bees so the only pollen is from the pepper's own flowers. Get some cheap organza wedding favor bags and put one over the flower branch before it opens. Don't remove the bag until you see a tiny pepper growing. Then tag that pepper with some yarn so you don't accidentally eat it. Let it go completely ripe, until it's shriveling and drying on the vine. Then pick it, remove and dry the seeds.
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teauteau
13 years ago
Hi,
Dave is correct and he has provided a good source of info on this often discussed subject. Last summer, I researched this and found my answers at TAMU. I planted everything from sweet bells to HabaÃ±eros, jalapeÃ±os, hot cherries, serranos, etc. All of my sweet peppers were sweet and all the hot ones were hot. So, I can tell you first hand having hot and sweet peppers next to each other this season does not affect the current fruit production. Now if you save the seeds? That's a different matter to be experienced the next season. My GAWD can you imagine Bhut Jalokia flavored Orange Bell Peppers?! Not in this lifetime!
cyrus_gardner
13 years ago
OLD REPEATED WONDERIND QUESTION.
THE ANSWER IN SHORT IS:
IT IS POSSIBLE BUT NOT PROBABLE.

CYRUS
eileen_nv
13 years ago
It's not so improbable. I've run into this before. The seeds in a cross-pollinated pepper will have the capsaicin (hot stuff) in them, and it can diffuse into the walls of the pepper fruit.

(The seed has gene activity from both pollen [male] and ovule [female]parents, and can thus be hot)

If this happens, the heat is mostly in the membranes, and the top shoulders of the fruit.

One bad experience, and I now keep the hot and sweet peppers in different beds. It does not take a lot of separation - peppers are mostly "air" pollinated, and self-pollinated at that. 4 -5 feet will usually be fine, unless there's a bumblebee who really has it in for you...LOL :-D
User
13 years ago
Sexual production/pollination cannot make a recessive gene pepper fruit suddenly produce capsacin.

I'd check your seed or plant sources if this becomes a problem.
digdirt2
13 years ago
Agree with nc-crn but as you can see every time this question comes up there is always at least one who swears it is possible because of some experience they have had and they didn't understand how it happened. So they blame it on cross-pollination.

This despite decades of genetic research. The seed contains nothing but a collection of genetic material. That mass of genes MAY have the potential to produce capsaicin some day once it develops but it contains no capsaicin. It "diffuses" nothing to the current fruit.

Dave
fusion_power
13 years ago
Investigate the word "Metaxenia". The short summary is that metaxenia is when pollen affects the female plant tissue. It is possible that hot pepper pollen could cause a sweet pepper to develop some capsaicin but as previously posted, many years of research says it does not happen.

Corn is a different story. When you grow white corn and it is pollinated by pollen from a corn plant that produces yellow seed, then the white corn plant produces kernels that are yellow. This is because one set of dna from the pollen is incorporated into the corn seed and since that dna codes for yellow corn and since yellow is dominant over white, the result is yellow corn kernels.

The general rule of thumb is that the seed are affected by the pollen source but the fruit that houses the seed is not. There are examples such as apple that break this rule for specific characters.

DarJones

Do hot & sweet peppers cross and make hot fruits?

Comments (8)

digdirt2

jmwolff

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