Cross-pollination question
 

Hi

I have 3 Ben Lomond blackcurrant bushes in a border of my back garden
which are producing quite a good crop of green berries at the moment. I
have also noticed this year that a flowering currant (ribes) bush
elsewhere in the back garden is full of green berries too, and also that
a couple of these bushes planted across the road from our house are also
full of them! Could it be that bees have pollinated these usually
berryless (apart from a very few) with pollen from my blackcurrant
bushes and made them grow berries? I realise that they are related but
this didn't happen last year that I remember?

If the flowering currant bushes go on to produce crops of berries are
these perfectly edible and are they as nice as cultivated blackcurrants?

Lynda

Cross-pollination question
 

On Thu, 15 May 2003 12:29:54 +0000 (UTC), Lynda Thornton
wrote:

Hi

I have 3 Ben Lomond blackcurrant bushes in a border of my back garden
which are producing quite a good crop of green berries at the moment. I
have also noticed this year that a flowering currant (ribes) bush
elsewhere in the back garden is full of green berries too, and also that
a couple of these bushes planted across the road from our house are also
full of them! Could it be that bees have pollinated these usually
berryless (apart from a very few) with pollen from my blackcurrant
bushes and made them grow berries? I realise that they are related but
this didn't happen last year that I remember?

If the flowering currant bushes go on to produce crops of berries are
these perfectly edible and are they as nice as cultivated blackcurrants?

Lynda

I think that's very likely. In the book I have it implies this is common.
It might just be a lucky year for weather/bee timing as well.
I suspect the berries wouldn't be so nice as yours. The flowering ones are
cultivated for their blooms, and the qualities of the berries are a
secondary consideration. They should be edible though, I'd have thought.
Tim.