HelpfulGardener.com

Hi all,

I don't know if this is even possible, and you might think I'm crazy, but is there such a thing as a tomato/pepper plant hybrid?

This year I've gotten a lot of "volunteers" in my vegetable bed but one has peaked my interest.

It looks like a tomato plant but it has a smooth, straight stem like a pepper plant. The leaves are also in the shape of a pepper plant leaf but they are fuzzy like a tomato plant...

[img]https://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm113/drew4allyou/garden/0705121118-00.jpg[/img]

[img]https://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm113/drew4allyou/garden/0705121118-01.jpg[/img]

[img]https://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm113/drew4allyou/garden/0705121119-00.jpg[/img]

I've also found one in my dad's garden. It's sprouted up in one of the corners of the garden where we have an old glass coffee table that we store plants ontop of. It seems like the greenhouse effect.

This one is more like a pepper plant. The stem is of a pepper plant but the leaves are a bit fuzzy like a tomato plant. And there are like 5-6 blossoms on the blossom stems just like a tomato but the flowers look like pepper flowers.

I don't have a picture of this one yet, but I'll post some later today hopefully.

So is this possible or am I just crazy? I would have thought different species couldn't cross pollinate with each other.

No they cannot cross pollinate with each other.

I'm thinking your pictures are of a weed, perhaps amaranth/ pigweed.

If it is amaranth, both the seeds and leaves are edible.

Looks like a sunflower to me.

Ok, let's play "what is it".

This is the one I was telling you about in the previous post.

[img]https://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm113/drew4allyou/garden/0705121901-00.jpg[/img]

[img]https://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm113/drew4allyou/garden/0705121900-00.jpg[/img]

Well you are right about it being in the same family, from you decent pictures it looks like black nightshade, which is a toxic plant. The tall one in the first photo is a wild amaranth Aka pigweed.

soil wrote:Well you are right about it being in the same family, from you decent pictures it looks like black nightshade, which is a toxic plant. The tall one in the first photo is a wild amaranth Aka pigweed.

Thanks. I'll be pulling both of them tomorrow!

Your top photo looks like a sunflower to me too. I agree with ruggr10.

Nope, really don't think so. Look at the middle picture top down view, shows it best.

amaranth:

[img]https://www.ecurry.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2009/08/Amaranth-1-500x375.jpg[/img]


sunflower:

[img]https://kaweahoaks.com/html/annual_sunflower_leaf.jpg[/img]

Ah, thought those were two different plants in the photos

I thought it was 2 different ones too.

mmmfloorpie wrote:Ok, let's play "what is it".

This is the one I was telling you about in the previous post.

[img]https://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm113/drew4allyou/garden/0705121901-00.jpg[/img]

[img]https://i294.photobucket.com/albums/mm113/drew4allyou/garden/0705121900-00.jpg[/img]

That plant looks like the 'garden huckleberry' that some plant catalogs give to their customers as a free gift. Once you plant it in your graden, you'll have it as weeds every year.

I think it's the same thing, but some seed catalogs have what is called "wonder berry". It has fruits that are larger than commone weed black nightshade, and it's supposed to be NOT toxic and sweet.

But when I looked it up, there were varying reports and the bottom line seemed to be that if you are not sure don't eat them, some people are more susceptible and others seem to have tolerance/resistance to the toxin, and only get seeds from a reputable seed source.

applestar wrote:I think it's the same thing, but some seed catalogs have what is called "wonder berry". It has fruits that are larger than commone weed black nightshade, and it's supposed to be NOT toxic and sweet.

But when I looked it up, there were varying reports and the bottom line seemed to be that if you are not sure don't eat them, some people are more susceptible and others seem to have tolerance/resistance to the toxin, and only get seeds from a reputable seed source.

Don't worry, it's long gone haha.

I have so many volunteers this year, I have no idea where they are coming from!

So far I've staked up 3 of them just to see what happens.

Two of them have some nice size fruit already!

I planted cherry tomatoes in dirt that once was used for peppers and this is the result

I have the same question if there is anyone who can tell me what this is? It looks like a tomatoes but.... it's bottom looks like a pepper with these random 2 leaves

@chefk the two leaves at the bottom are the cotyledons/ seed leaves. They are the first to appear when the seed sprouts and they do not look like the true leaves, which are all the other ones that appear forever after. Usually the seed leaves drop off after awhile. Yours will eventually too.

@batman. It is not a tomato pepper hybrid. It is a tomato. It is not the cherry tomato you thought you were planting. There can be various explanations for this. If it was a seed you saved, the cherry tomato might have crossed with some other tomato. If it was a commercial seed, sometimes other seeds sneak into a packet. Or it is a seed that was in the soil some other way. Everywhere I put my compost down, I get dozens of tomato seedlings sprouting from seeds that survived the composting process.

The definition of what makes two similar things different species is that they are different enough that they cannot crossbreed. Tomatoes and peppers are both in the nightshade family, but they are different species and cannot (without laboratory help) cross breed.

Actually, peppers of different species can cross, and even species that we previously thought could not cross with others, have been crossed, though often the plants produced are sterile. Here is a link showing these crosses: https://www.superhotchilli.com/info2.html

Tomatoes and peppers are each in a different genus. I haven't heard of crossing in different generi, but no telling what they are trying with GMO!

Well, different species can be made to cross with each other, but will not do it naturally.

Where I said "The definition of what makes two similar things different species is that they are different enough that they cannot crossbreed," I really should have said that they will not usually cross breed in nature.

Different genera can be made to cross only with GMO gene splicing techniques, which can create all kinds of chimera which would never be found in nature.



This is a geep, a chimera of a goat and a sheep.

Gene splicing can be done in a lab but not in a garden. If the cherry tomato was an hybrid, no telling what the next generation will look like. but it will not become a pepper/tomato cross...unless you have a trained scientist and a very expensive set of biologic equipment on your property.

Yup, that was my point, exactly!