[kdlynn (OP)]

i'm confused, and i'm hoping someone knows... how does one kind of plant combine with another kind of plant to make a whole new kind of plant? if it's just from the pollen ending up on the wrong plant, wouldn't it be almost impossible to grow more than one of the same kind of plant? unless bees and insects only visit one kind of plant a day..."buzz, you have corn today. buzzy, since it's your first day out of training, you can check out the dandilions..." ??

[neilep]

Great question Kadie.....Karen is our resident cross-bred expert !!..she used to do stuff like that...didn't ya Karen ?

[Karen W.]

I don't know much about natural cross breeding. But laboratory plant tissue culture and cross pollinating via human intervention I know some and have done it! It is interesting and generally with human intervention requires more then simply mixing the pollens although that is a part of it, mostly the juice from the stamen and the bulbs from other Lilies, that is what I worked with.There are certainly many steps to the procedure.. it is complicated but it was interesting work and I liked it!

[Karen W.]

Not all pollens will cross with other plants much like trees, They only work with their own spicies of pollen. At least to a extent.Those who are compatible may be pollinated once and reproduce others of the same cross. But in nature I am not sure but it takes a bit more in a lab setting to start a line of new plants. It is time consuming! I will try to explain in a few days better maybe find you some pictures! LOL

[kdlynn (OP)]

the reason i ask is that my mom planted some roma tomatoes next to some pepper plants in her garden. she picked what she thought was a long skinny red pepper, but when she sliced it open it was a tomato! nobody thought to take a picture... we ate it and it was good! but how in the world did this happen?!