Food "Forest" Ideas?

[GardenBlooms22]

Yes, possible toxic cross pollination is definitely something to keep in mind. However, it is worth noting that I've heard if you try tasting a mystery cross-pollination variety of squash, it will be very obvious if it is toxic. A tiny piece will taste very bitter if it is toxic (namely, contains unsafely high amounts of cucurbitacins).
Most squash hybrids are perfectly safe to eat, and should the very rare occurrence of wild cross pollination occur (resulting in an inedible squash), you will know immediately upon tasting (in which case, be sure to spit it out!).

So to summarize, (from what I've heard) while toxic cross pollination in squash in cucumbers is definitely something to be aware of, it rarely actually occurs in home gardens. And if it did, you would know immediately upon tasting, in which case you would spit it out and simply not eat the inedible fruit.

I hope this helps.

 

[nao57]

I feel like I should redo my comment. i was in such a hurry to post that somehow I missed a few things. A lot of the information about gardening is propaganda by big companies to get you to buy their stuff.

This is why some areas making your own seeds is illegal. Really? Criminalizing independence and self sufficiency?! It really happens.

And then they spread ideas about toxic crossbreeds. And other propaganda.

They basically want you dependent on always paying and giving someone else the rewards. While you go empty. I don't trust a lot of mainstream ideas. And when you do your own gardening experiments you see how bad it is. how much wrong information there is out there.

You shouldn't be afraid to try to MAKE your own vegetable plant hybrids. People actually do this all the time. And they do it to create and build and make life better. This is why there's hundreds of varieties of tomatoes and so on. They start with cross breeding, and then breeding those back into main stream with an alteration included still. And then just rinse repeat till they get something 'cool' that people like.

I've never run into toxic hybrids personally and we have more often than not had volunteer garden plants every year. 'Volunteer plants' often are cross bred some how.

AlSO! Heritage breeds are more diverse than GMO varieties. The descendant plants of heritage breeds are rarely if ever the same. They can be very diverse and never uniform. GMO tend to be uniform... and if there is anything weird that comes out, its usually because something in the GMO mix had something strange in there resurfacing while a heritage nonGMO breed usually tends to remain safe.

 

[HollowOfWisps]

I would not even be remotely worried about toxic squash syndrome. It is not only listed as extremely rare, but the study that got everyone scared leaves out the important part of just how rare “extremely” is. There were 350 cases of poisoning reported over a 4 year period in France (2012-2016). That is 87.5 cases per year and for reference France’s population in 2016 was 63,989,319. That means that 0.000001367415709% of the population per year experienced poisoning from toxic squash syndrome. I would also like to point out that in the study most of those cases were actually from store bought squash. What does this mean? That your chickens are more likely to be poisoned from E. Coli, salmonella, or listeria from store bought produce than from a forest garden with squash.

 

[GardenBlooms22]

I would not even be remotely worried about toxic squash syndrome. It is not only listed as extremely rare, but the study that got everyone scared leaves out the important part of just how rare “extremely” is. There were 350 cases of poisoning reported over a 4 year period in France (2012-2016). That is 87.5 cases per year and for reference France’s population in 2016 was 63,989,319. That means that 0.000001367415709% of the population per year experienced poisoning from toxic squash syndrome. I would also like to point out that in the study most of those cases were actually from store bought squash. What does this mean? That your chickens are more likely to be poisoned from E. Coli, salmonella, or listeria from store bought produce than from a forest garden with squash.

Good to know, thank you for sharing!

 

[Sally PB]

My comment is:

Take COPIOUS notes about what you planted, and where. Diagrams are helpful too. This has nothing to do with a possible toxic cross. But you'll forget what kind of squash you planted in that corner, and you'll love it. Or hate it. And want to be sure that you plant some more, or never plant it again. You get the idea.