I can address a few of these. Many of the Vaccinium species will cross easily, but usually only if they have the same number of chromosomes-there are 2x, 4x, and 6x types. The 2x x 4x crosses rarely work, but 4x x 6x crosses usually do work although the hybrids typically have low fertility. A good example is highbush blueberry x rabbiteye. Deerberry will cross readily with lingonberry and maybe cranberry, but less likely with the other Vaccinium species. Bilberries cross easily with lingonberries in the wild, but the hybrids are usually sterile. V. ovatum will possibly cross with bilberry, but not highbush blueberry. The true huckleberries will not cross with Vaccinium. Native and European gooseberries cross easily and American black currant will cross with European black currant. The native northern persimmon has been crossed with kaki persimmon (both hexaploid), but with great difficulty. The more common southern race is tetraploid. Some of these crosses will yield hybrids that are sterile or low in fertility. The gooseberry, mountain ash, and crabapples should produce fertile hybrids easily, and some of the Vaccinium species will cross easily producing fertile hybrids, such as augustifolia x corymbosum. The southern highbush and northern highbush blueberries are totally cross compatible. You will probably not get good answers from NAFEXers about many of these crosses (but you should still join). If you can find the three volume Fruit Breeding series, edited by Jules Janick and James N. Moore, you should be able to get answers to most of these questions. These are very expensive books so try borrowing them through a library. You can also get a good portion through Google books. The link below is for Vol 2, vines and small fruits. Vol 3 covers the nuts. Vol 1 covers tree and tropical fruits. ~kiwinut Here is a link that might be useful: Fruit Breeding Vol 2 preview

Well thank you everyone for your kind comments ,i agree Lisa i like the soft peachy tones ,those plants are bred from Vr,fenestralis ,all the others have Vr'Milky Way' in them , and Andrew the parentage of Vr'Michelle Cameron' is my Vr'Uluru Sunset' x 'Milky Way' i grew 12 seedlings out the cross and the others are burnt orange tones ,Nev ,there is now not a lot of culling to be done (and that is a problem as you want to keep all ) as the quality of the parents improves ,so do the offspring ,Michelle is a beautifull lady and her husband Mal is a great bloke ,they grow perfect plants and are nice friends , No Nev , i dont farm them out ,though no one would mind i guess ,Hi Yong ,thank you my friend ,Sorry but my vinicolor x your Wer, did not work ,still there is allways next time ,at this stage Yong i do not send out of Australia ,otherwise you would have some ,i have included a piccie of the other plants from the cross of Michelle to show the difference They are nice high coloured plants , 'Uluru Sunset' is very strong ,but 'Milky Way' came through on 'Michelle Cameron ' its now very apparent that you will allways get quality from 'Milky Way' cheers ,Jack

I know the original message was posted almost to years ago... But I cross all my vegetables. Just to see what I get mostly. I have many squash crosses. And many, many brassica crosses. I've also crossed peppers. Bell peppers X jalapeno. Jalapeno X ornamental Thia Hot. If interested in the results, let me know. As for brassicas. One intersting cross I made was a red indian mustard (Brassica juncea) and Chinese Cabbage (B. rapa). I mostly got empty pods with vestigial seeds. But I did get one viable seed. This bolted immediately and grew into a tall (about 4 1/2 feet) weedy looking plant. Leaves were very small and narrow and only slightly reddened. It branched heavily and flowered profusely. I only allowed other chinese cabbages and bok chois to flower at the same time and cut back any mustards that bolted. I let the bees do the work. At the end of the season, I had 13 seeds from this plant. I planted all of them the next year and they all grew. They all basically looked like mustard plants, some very red, some slightly red, and some green. I allowed them to be pollinated by other indian red mustards and and southern giant curled mustard (also B. juncea). I now have a very mixed mustard that I grow every year. They range from red through green. Some leaves have jagged edges, some have curly edges, while most are more rounded. Their seeds are bigger than typical mustard, more like B. rapa. They also cross more easily with othe B. rapas as well as B. juncea. Aproximately 25% of the seedlings have 3 or 4 seed leaves instead of 2! These for some reason are usually red. I once pollinated a brussel sprout from a wild winter cress just to test viability. The brussel sprout produced well developed fat seed pods but they were totally empty. I have many crosses including kale, kholrabi, broccoli, and/or cauliflower. I now have a strain of broccoli with white cauliflower heads that produces as early as broccoli. An annual kale X broccoli derivative was still growing and flowering in a pot in my yard here in N.H. until two weeks ago when I brought it into the heated greenhouse. It has been unuasually cold and into the 'teens many nights!! Two others potted next to it froze weeks before. Any more interest, contact andyspigeons@yahoo.com

It is more difficult with multiple daddies because you have to grow out several plants to see which is which. With a single pollen source cross you can start the plants early (mid winter) under lights and get a single fruit while the plant is still in a small pot. You can then take those seeds and do F2 growouts the same year (summer). It also helps to use a genetic recessive as the mother plant so you can see if there was a chance selfing before you got to it. There is a small chance for self pollinization before the bud opens and a much larger chance after the bud opens. I crossed Black Krim to Brandywine and figured I could just coat the stigma with pollen on opened flowers and ignor the potato leaf seedlings. It turned out that I had to plant a lot of seeds to get a few of the regular leaf hybrids because there was such a large percentage of self pollinization. In other crosses made when buds were just breaking open I found a few selfings in the seedlings. That combined with my percentage of failure pollinating unopened buds gave me a lot of respect for the professionals who provide commercial hybrid seed.