Not a dumb question.

Most fruits exhibit only maternal characters, because the fruit is
derived mostly ovary tissue. You can grow different tomatoes next to
one another, all sorts of melons intermixed, etc.

Where the effects of any cross-pollination will be observed is in the
*offspring* of any cross. The plants that grow from seeds from a
cross will not exactly resemble the parents. Thus, if you grow all
sorts of tomatoes together, save the seeds, plant them, and harvest
the fruit next year, you may end up with some interesting results.

Peppers are a bit different, though. The above holds true for them as
well, BUT the heat in a pepper (capsaicin) is primarily in the seeds
and placental tissue, the tissue that attaches the seed to the fruit
wall. In peppers, the genetic makeup of the seed has some effect on
the chemistry of the placenta, so, if you are growing habaneros next
to your poblanos and they cross, the hybrid seeds of the poblano fruit
may be carrying "hot" genes and the placenta in the poblano fruit may
be hotter than normal.

Monique Reed
College Station, TX

Mark wrote:

You don't want to grow different types of corn too close together,
right? Cross-pollination being the problem.

What about tomatoes and peppers? I seem to remember hearing something
about getting super-hot bell peppers and mild habaneros if you grow
the two too close to one another.

Can you grow, say, roma tomatoes next to grape tomatoes?

I'm trying to plan my garden layout with height considerations in
mind, and it might help things if I could put similarly-heighted
plants in the same areas, but not at the expense of having
cross-pollination screw up my yield.

Thanks for the help.

Mark