Rutgers

[Redbaron]

I know, I know. Rutgers is boring compared to all the fancy heirlooms and legacy types. But I am looking for a particular strain of Rutgers. The last in a long line of Rutgers dominance that for some reason got lost in the shuffle as Rutgers fell from grace with commercial growers.

However, for me Rutgers will always be the tomato by which all others are judged. It is the standard. A big tomato is bigger than a Rutgers, a small tomato is smaller than a Rutgers. An acidic tomato is more acidic than a Rutgers, a sweet tomato is sweeter than a Rutgers. Tomatoes are Rutgers red. Any other color is a blue tomato, a black tomato, a pink tomato, a yellow tomato etc... ad infinatum. Even the foliage! Whatever the adjective you apply to a tomato variety...that adjective describes the difference between it and a Rutgers.

This brings me to my problem. Does anyone have any of the real commercial grade Improved Rutgers semi-determinate Indiana strain seeds developed by Purdue University in the late 1970's?

It is called "semi-determinate" but technically it was a determinant that just happened to grow 6 feet + because it was so vigorous. Without staking they always were almost chest high and bushy. This particular strain was never offered in any seed catalogue as far as I know. My Dad got them in bare root bundles of 50 or 100 (can't remember) wrapped with brown paper and a rubber band. We would throw them in the refrigerator for a week or more until the weather cooperated for us to set them in the ground.

At the time it actually used to kinda tick me off. Because no matter what fancy hybrid tomato I grew from seed or bought plants, those abused bare root bundles Dad brought home for $5 ALWAYS did better.

I have found the really old indeterminate original strain. I have found the later released 1943 strain. I have also found the Indiana strain developed by Purdue in the late 1950's. But I have not found that last and best strain anywhere. If it helps. My Dad found them back then at the Hamilton County, Indiana farm coop extension agency and that's the only place I ever knew them to be found at. But surely they were obtainable by other commercial growers back then?

If anyone has even a rumor of where this strain might be found PLEASE message me. For me it is more than just a tomato. It represents memories from my youth.

[carolyn137]

http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=12969

Above is a thread from 2009 where Rutgers was discussed in depth, if you will.

I listed in one of the posts the various strains that can be found in the SSE YEarbooks and I've not seen one IDed to Purdue, but at Tania's website I found the following:

http://t.tatianastomatobase.com/wiki/Rutgers

The description of the one from Indiana is from the 1958 Gleckler Seed catalog.

Adam Gleckler has continued in his grandfather and father's footsteps and a few years ago restarted the company.

If you go to the Seed and Plant Source Forum here you'll find a link to Gleckler Seedmen and you can contact Adam that way, which right now is better than sending him a PM, his user name here is Farmall, b'c this is THE busy time of the year for him in terms of processing tomato seed and he also works full time for the family concrete business.

IS there a chance that they still have very old seeds of the Indiana one? I have no idea but it wouldn't hurt to ask. But you may not get an answer ASAP b'c it is so busy now, and Adam's father does help him from time to time, so he might remember better what OLD seeds they might still have.

Best I can do.

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=12969

Above is a thread from 2009 where Rutgers was discussed in depth, if you will.

...

Best I can do.

Thanks so much. Your best is very good indeed!

I used to work at a seed research company called Callahan's Seeds. I know just a little about how to pull 2-3 or even 100 strains out of any old OP variety. Or even how to introduce a kind of simulated F1 "hybrid vigor" to an old OP strain! Even if it has been stabilized for years. In fact it is actually easiest on the oldest most stable varieties.

When you make a "variety" really all you have done is select for a few traits and the rest of the plant should contain a certain amount of genetic diversity. So lets say you get some new unheard of disease ... lets call it "?1" .... that spreads throughout the world next year. That fictional disease kills 95% of Tomatoes. If I was a commercial breeder, I would plant 100,000 Rutgers and purposely give them "?1". They are ALL Rutgers, no cross was made, but hopefully if my variety was cared for properly, there would be 5% +/- that survive. Then I would self pollinate 5,000 "strains" of Rutgers to my target F? generation. Each line I would carefully try and retain all the standard "Rutgers" characteristics yet keeping each line isolated from the others and self pollinating. This is called "selfing" Eventually I would pick a few strains that had the best over all "Rutgers" characteristics but were "?1" resistant. Then I would cross those remaining Rutgers strains back to each other step by step until I have once again a relatively diverse genetically stable Rutgers but now it is "?1" resistant.

As you can imagine this method is incredibly expensive and many breeders might want to "cheat" and not run enough isolated strains before crossing them all back into each other. Especially since in the end you still have just "Rutgers". but with "?1" resistance. That's one reason why many so called "improved" versions of any fruit or vegetable often taste less than expected. They didn't maintain the integrity of the original because they selfed too few strains. The only ones willing to do that properly would generally be commercial growers (or a state run university like Purdue that had a lot of commercial growers in the state like Indiana) that had contracts with a large corporation like Campbells or Heinz to produce x amount of "Rutgers" for their processing. (My cousin was an executive at Van Camps and explained it to me from the corporate perspective years ago) Other breeders would actually find it financially beneficial to develop a "NEW" variety and patent it instead of simply improving an old variety. But if there is a contract to provide specifically "Rutgers" then that's what you had to do.

Well, back in the day in Indiana they had just such a group of commercial growers. That's why there was a very vigorous "Indiana" strain of true Rutgers that was also at the same time more disease resistant and productive than the original Rutgers strain developed at Rutgers University. There may have been some jealousy between Rutgers and Purdue Universities which might explain why Rutgers University refuses to acknowledge any "Indiana" strains as "true" Rutgers. In fact, Rutgers University claims Rutgers is an extinct variety now.

All I am looking for is that Indiana strain that was properly bred and maintained for the commercial growers, before the commercial market for Rutgers collapsed. I am probably crazy for hoping it still exists. But who knows? I will try your suggestions though and thanks very much.

PS. If you want to attach this thread to the old Rutgers thread, by all means. I am sorry for making a new thread from an old topic. My only excuse is I am new here.

[Longlake]

Redbaron - If you are able to track down seeds or a source, please let me know. I, too, grew up with a dad that had to have his Rutgers...and I'd love to find seeds that produce plants/fruit like those we grew in the mid/late 70s. The various Rutgers that you find on store shelves just aren't the same.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by Longlake

Redbaron - If you are able to track down seeds or a source, please let me know. I, too, grew up with a dad that had to have his Rutgers...and I'd love to find seeds that produce plants/fruit like those we grew in the mid/late 70s. The various Rutgers that you find on store shelves just aren't the same.

I don't know about the store shelves, but I grew up on a farm and we were growing Rutgers back in 50's and 60's and as I posted in the link above there are several strains of them but just a couple are more popular and available than others and if you go to Tania's Website you'll read about some of them.

There are many places that sell seed for Rutgers, TGS is one, Sandhill Preservation is another.

http://t.tatianastomatobase.com/wiki/Rutgers

Above is a link to the Rutgers page at her website and see all the other strains of Rutgers as well.

You can click on those to see seed sources, just as you can see seed sources on the page I linked to for standadr Rutgers.

Hope that helps.

[JLJ_]

Originally Posted by Redbaron

It is called "semi-determinate" but technically it was a determinant that just happened to grow 6 feet + because it was so vigorous. Without staking they always were almost chest high and bushy. This particular strain was never offered in any seed catalogue as far as I know. My Dad got them in bare root bundles of 50 or 100 (can't remember) wrapped with brown paper and a rubber band. We would throw them in the refrigerator for a week or more until the weather cooperated for us to set them in the ground.

At the time it actually used to kinda tick me off. Because no matter what fancy hybrid tomato I grew from seed or bought plants, those abused bare root bundles Dad brought home for $5 ALWAYS did better.

I hope you will keep posting about your quest for this quality Rutgers. To me, Rutgers is mainly one of the many good offspring of Marglobe -- but I have often suspected, when I compared Rutgers to Marglobes, that the Rutgers strain I had wasn't the quality of Rutgers in days past. It would be great if you, who can remember those, could find and identify that strain.

Please keep reporting on your progress!

[coloken]

I have no idea what they are, but I had a couple of packets of Rutgers.
Greene Valley seeds.
Packed for 1992, run No. 19
Two or 3 years ago i had no problem germinating from these. But I don;t remember at all how they acted. Nice if you could tell me.
If these would do you any good i will mail you some. No postage or anything else needed.
KennyP

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by coloken

I have no idea what they are, but I had a couple of packets of Rutgers.
Greene Valley seeds.
Packed for 1992, run No. 19
Two or 3 years ago i had no problem germinating from these. But I don;t remember at all how they acted. Nice if you could tell me.
If these would do you any good i will mail you some. No postage or anything else needed.
KennyP

Thanks! I will try them to see. Who knows? I'll PM you with an address.

The description is a semi determinant with very strong vigor and huge regular green leaves. (Not the dark blue green as some varieties) Some of the leaves alone would get 2+ feet long during the peak growing season. The plants were bushy and it would grow 3 to 4 feet tall without staking just because of the many vigorous intertwined branches. (the main vine seldom got more than 4-6 feet long max but would partially lay over since we usually didn't stake them) Some of that vigor probably was the chicken manure and sheet mulching, but we grew other varieties too and the Rutgers always were more vigorous, even more than the hybrids. (Though not as long a main vine as the indeterminant type Rutgers)

The tomatoes themselves were medium and red with typically 3 or 4 per cluster. They were very juicy and had lots of seeds, so not meaty, but the flavor was fantastic. Skin was thin though, and if we had a dry spell followed by a heavy rain we always had some cracking issues. Mom actually liked the thin skins, because it made canning easy.

Yield was very good with each plant ripening several tomatoes every few days all summer long right up to frost. But they seemed to ripen in "batches". This variety ripens from the inside out. So our fried green tomatoes were always pink in the middle. I wouldn't keep track of yield on individual plants, but every week or so we would get 20 buckets instead of the typical 1 or 2 buckets we got daily.

I never once had an issue with any bug besides tomato hornworm or occasionally bugs when the fruit touched the mulch, and never once had any disease on any of them and we grew them for years. But that might have been more due to growing conditions, rather than variety.

[coloken]

Redbaron, I will send the seeds off to you in a few days. I will PM you when i do.
Quote:
The description is a semi determinant with very strong vigor and huge regular green leaves. (Not the dark blue green as some varieties) Some of the leaves alone would get 2+ feet long during the peak growing season. The plants were bushy and it would grow 3 to 4 feet tall without staking just because of the many vigorous intertwined branches. (the main vine seldom got more than 4-6 feet long max but would partially lay over since we usually didn't stake them) Some of that vigor probably was the chicken manure and sheet mulching, but we grew other varieties too and the Rutgers always were more vigorous, even more than the hybrids. (Though not as long a main vine as the indeterminant type Rutgers)
I'd like to see one of those. I hope you can find them. My age and small space just about puts me out of the tomato tests any more but would like to grow one. .
KennyP

[Redbaron]

Thanks so much and if they or any of the others I will try next year turn out to be that Indiana strain that came out of Purdue, be sure I will be hooking you up!

[JLJ_]

Originally Posted by Redbaron

Does anyone have any of the real commercial grade Improved Rutgers semi-determinate Indiana strain seeds developed by Purdue University in the late 1970's?

I wonder if it would help if you contacted the Purdue alumni assn -- surely they have one? If they would mention your quest in whatever form of newsletter they use, perhaps it might stir up some seeds or rumors of seeds?

You seem to have quite a bit of data on earlier Rutgers, perhaps you could write up a short piece on those tomatoes and their properties, leading up to the Search for the Purdue Super Rutgers of the Seventies? It does seem the sort of thing that some alumni might remember, even if only via some distant informal contact with the project or its personnel.

Of course, there is always the age factor in memories. A few years ago I was with my mother at her family's old ranch homestead site, and she said, "And right along here Mother had raspberries -- not like the raspberries we have now, these were big strong bushes, higher than your head!"

"Mom," I said, "How old were you when you picked berries from those bushes?"

"Hmmm, about six I guess, I suppose my head wasn't as high as it is now."

[Redbaron]

hahaha yes! There is the age factor! Memories do have a tendency to "evolve"! And I am 50! Yet I am very certain of the specific strain. I am also certain it isn't the same as was offered in major seed catalogues like Burpee. That I know because I grew them side by side one year.

I grew Rutgers seedlings in pots thinking maybe if they were not "shocked" so badly by their rough treatment they might produce a week or two earlier and Dad brought home some bare rooted commercial Rutgers seedlings anyway, without asking me and without even telling me he was going to do it! I could never forget all the extra work involved in expanding the garden that year. They definitely were different. That's how I found out about it. A little investigation and I found out Dad's secret. They were specifically breed and started for the commercial growers in Indiana at the time. It also is what got me to thinking there MUST be an easier way to start a garden in virgin sod besides a shovel, a tiller, and a whole lot of sweat! I have perfected that never till method now.

Turned out my seedlings did do better at start. No heavy wilting or loss of leaves like the bare root from the fridge commercial ones. But by mid season those bare root commercial Indiana strain plants had caught up and passed my seedlings by a significant amount. Side by side, so I am sure. Taste was so similar there was no real difference, but productivity was very much increased.

At the time I was actually somewhat annoyed with my Dad. He seemed to get a kick out of proving all my efforts to find a superior all purpose tomato were to no avail. He had a way of kinda rubbing it in. It was always in good humor, but still ... I always was pretty competitive by nature.

I wish Tomatoville existed back then. Surely I would have found a good one to beat Dad with all the varieties and resources for growing techniques found here!

[carolyn137]

JLJ, I've done quite a bit of searching for the specific strain of Rutgers that Red Baron is looking for and in one of the earliest posts here I suggested that he contact Gleckler Seedmen in OH b'c they were the last to list it many many years ago and the hope is that Adam's father George might still have some in storage.

Just my opinion but I don't think it will be possible to ID this specific Purdue one just by growing out Rutgers seeds that are not known to be the Purdue one and making a decision based on visual perception alone. Too much time and distance from when they were grown as was noted above.

[JLJ_]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

JLJ, I've done quite a bit of searching for the specific strain of Rutgers that Red Baron is looking for and in one of the earliest posts here I suggested that he contact Gleckler Seedmen in OH b'c they were the last to list it many many years ago and the hope is that Adam's father George might still have some in storage.

Just my opinion but I don't think it will be possible to ID this specific Purdue one just by growing out Rutgers seeds that are not known to be the Purdue one and making a decision based on visual perception alone. Too much time and distance from when they were grown as was noted above.

Well, there is science, and there is Don Quixote's theme song, which is valuable, too.

If I read your post correctly, you said Gleckler had listed the Purdue strain from the '50s -- which I believe Red Baron has already located -- and he is searching for a different Purdue strain from the '70s. Which of course doesn't mean Glecklers might not be a great place to check for info on the later strain -- but it doesn't appear that they listed it?

You're probably right about it being difficult to ID by collecting and observing Rutgers strains, but as to impossible, if his memory is correct, this 70's Rutger's commercial strain seems to have been an incredibly rugged Rutgers and might be identifiable by that . . . particularly to someone who has been growing other Rutgers and who has some specific data based memories of the behavior of the 70's strain. And as he asked for even rumors -- Purdue alumni would seem to be a place they might be found -- and might include some who are still growing that variety personally -- or who know where its records and seeds are buried.

To me, what he describes -- refrigerated bare root bundles that drooped and lost leaves when planted, then revived and presently grew much more vigorously and productively than other tomatoes grown nearby -- suggests more than just a memory of a good ol' tomato, but the possibility of a strain that had much more robust root and/or foliage development capacity than other Rutgers -- maybe even something almost as tough as a Marglobe.

Seems worth continuing the quest, surely?

[Redbaron]

Kenny,
I got the seeds today! Thanks so much. I am really excited to try and get a couple of those old seeds to germinate for comparison.