| I have several varieties of squash in my garden. I also have several gourds growing on the fence around the garden. Will the gourds cross pollinate with the squash and cause problems? What is the minimum distance necessary to separate each variety? |
| Don't worry about separating these plants. The only concern is if you plan to save seed for planting next year. Cross pollination does not affect the current year's fruits--only the seeds. (This might be a concern if, say, you were planning to harvest pumpkin seeds for roasting.) However, if you compost the plants and some of the seeds sprout, you could have some strange gourd/squash mutants growing out of the compost pile! But there's no need to worry about this year's crop. |
