To be honest, I'm not too knowledgeble on cross pollinations, but lately I've been wanting to do specifically that.

I know wikipedia isn't that reliable, but I sometimes look at it in times like this. Supposedly, Luffa fruit are from the genus Luffa, where cucumbers are genus Cucumis which means they should not be able to cross pollinate. That brings up my own question. In most plants different species can cross pollinate right? But animals can't? Or can they?(mule, tigon)I thought the definition of a species was one type of thing that cannot have offspring with another species.

links I used:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luffa
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cucumber

Well, technically you can get a mule from a horse & donkey IIRC :P

Great! Thanks for all the info. That means the community garden will have tons of seeds for next year and to give away since we only planted one type of luffa.

Hi!
You should invest in the book 'Seed to Seed' by Suzanne Ashworth if you are thinking seriously about saving seeds( it's $15 on amazon). The book is the best in the genre, and gives you everything to know about saving the majority of seeds as well as their history. In the book it says that loofah squash will cross pollinate with other loofah squash (ditto cucumber), but, although they are in the same family, they will not cross with each other. I was wondering the same thing because I planted mine together, and my cucs seem bitter, but I suppose that's because they became dry a couple times (drought and business on my part). Good luck!
Tara

Genus can't cross, but species can sometimes. But again, that really depends. The whole cross pollination and cross breeding thing really depends more on genetic distance than the generic taxonomy system allows for:-)

As far as I've read, luffa doesn't cross pollinate with anything but other luffa plants.

I know this is an old thread, but I've actually got a loofah that appears to have cross pollinated with my native passion vine! Trying to find more info. on this as well.

Yes, they do cross and you get a fruit that taste like loofah but smooth skin like cucumber

Mules and Ligers may be a cross but they can't reproduce. But also keep in mind that the crosses come from very similar animals, even if they aren't the exact species.