seed saving in a tight garden- will OP progeny be true?

kerns125 · January 18, 2015

I am relatively new to tomato-growing and have a very small yard. I grow 12 tomato plants (each one different) in two 6x3 raised gardens and have another 4 earthboxes with 2 tomato plants each. So, 20 different varieties in a very tight space. I had thought that with open-pollinated varieties, that one could save the seeds from these tomatoes and get the same tomatoes again next year, regardless of the bees. But now that I've been reading more, e.g. like about Lucky Cross being the unexpected progeny of brandywine plus an unknown, I'm concerned that my OP seeds might not be true to the original tomato. This would primarily be a problem in that I offer my seeds to others, and I don't want to do that anymore if my seeds might not grow fruit that are true to the variety that I'm calling them! Hoping someone here with more knowledge and experience can give me advice about this....
Jen

Cole_Robbie · January 18, 2015

Drawing from previous discussions here, you best bet for true seed, other than bagging blossoms, and provided you live in a temperate climate that is cool in the spring, is to select the earliest fruit from your plant for seed-saving, because the fruit were likely to have set early in the season, before insect pollinators were very active.

For someone in, say, Florida or Hawaii, that rule would be less important, because they don't have as cool of a spring.

Most of the plants I sell in the spring come from purchased seed, but I do let some customers pick out plants from seeds I got in swaps, my extras. Last spring, a returning greenhouse customer told me he got cherry tomatoes from something I told him was going to be a slicer variety.

I said "sorry. Are you mad?"

He said, "well, I was. But then I tried them and they were the best cherry tomatoes I ever had. It was hard to stay mad for very long."

**carolyn137** · January 18, 2015

http://faq.gardenweb.com/faq/lists/t...852004159.html

I think the above link might very useful for you.

And it's also good to remember that if you decide not to bag blossoms, which I do suggest given the limited space you have, that the most pollinators for some folks occurs in the Spring and for others later in the season. Which is why where I am I only saved seeds from the latest of fruits.

At the time I was growing many hundreds of plants and varieties each season and there was no way I could bag blossoms or use geographic isolation

Carolyn

Cole_Robbie · January 18, 2015

I've thought it would be neat to build screen houses for individual plants. They could be framed out of 2x2s.

How do the people who have home-based seed companies do it?

**Lee** · January 19, 2015

Jen,

Observe your garden to decide. If you have pollinators, then you might want to take the extra step to bag blossoms.
If you don't, then no need to waste time/money/energy protecting against cross pollination which won't happen.

For me, bees arrive later to the garden, so I save the earliest fruits.
For you/others, suggested above, it may be different so you need to adjust accordingly.

Good luck!

Lee

kerns125 · January 19, 2015

Oh my. Thank goodness for you generous Tomatovillians and your knowledge!! I definitely have pollinators galore beginning in early spring (before tomatoes are setting fruit) and I caught my last carpenter bee in a trap in November, so I will definitely bag blossoms from now on. I had never heard of this and none of the basic websites describing fermenting/seed-saving mention this, and I had just assumed that "open pollinated" meant that they would be genetically stable even when "open pollinated!" Ha. Carolyn, thanks for that link to Gardenweb with bagging details.

Now I have to email the individual people whom I sent seeds to this year to let them know that they were all truly open-pollinated, just in case they grow something different than expected! Oops!!!

Jen

kerns125 · January 19, 2015

P.S. -- so then why can't I save the seeds from a hybrid like Sun Gold (if I bag the blossoms) and grow the same tomatoes in the F2 generation? Wouldn't all the seeds carry the same genes as the original fruit if I ensure self-pollination?

Jen

jmsieglaff · January 19, 2015

Jen,

I think this link will explain why the F2 and subsequent generations of seeds saved from an F1 cross (e.g., Sungold F1) will not be identical. The first time you read about gene segregation it can be a little confusing, but read it again and it becomes clearer.

http://kdcomm.net/~tomato/gene/genes2.html

Justin

Tormato · January 20, 2015

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerns125

I am relatively new to tomato-growing and have a very small yard. I grow 12 tomato plants (each one different) in two 6x3 raised gardens and have another 4 earthboxes with 2 tomato plants each. So, 20 different varieties in a very tight space. I had thought that with open-pollinated varieties, that one could save the seeds from these tomatoes and get the same tomatoes again next year, regardless of the bees. But now that I've been reading more, e.g. like about Lucky Cross being the unexpected progeny of brandywine plus an unknown, I'm concerned that my OP seeds might not be true to the original tomato. This would primarily be a problem in that I offer my seeds to others, and I don't want to do that anymore if my seeds might not grow fruit that are true to the variety that I'm calling them! Hoping someone here with more knowledge and experience can give me advice about this....
Jen

20 different varieties means you may have on average 1 that would cross. In order to try to keep your stock pure, save seed from two tomatoes and do not mix the seeds together. The odds of both being crossed are now 1 in about 400, instead of 1 in 20 with saving from just one fruit. Next year, start seed from both if you have room for two plants. If not, start one... if it's true save those seeds and maybe dump the others. Room for three plants, save from three tomatoes, with odds of about 1 in 8000 of all three being crossed.

The MMMM swap is mostly unbagged seed, so for starters you may have a cross before even starting. It's never bothered me. I expect seeds to be ~96% pure no matter the source, commercial or home grown. I'm guessing all of my favorite tomatoes started at one time as a natural cross.

Gary

joseph · January 20, 2015

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tormato

20 different varieties means you may have on average 1 that would cross.

Or does it mean that on average 5% of the seed however collected from whatever fruit will be a hybrid?

Tormato · January 21, 2015

Collecting many, many fruit from each plant would give that 5% chance from each plant. Collecting just one fruit from each plant would likely be about 1 in 20 plants having saved seed that is crossed. Thanks for helping me clarify the difference.

joseph · January 21, 2015

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tormato

Collecting many, many fruit from each plant would give that 5% chance from each plant. Collecting just one fruit from each plant would likely be about 1 in 20 plants having saved seed that is crossed. Thanks for helping me clarify the difference.

Biologically and mathematically it doesn't make sense to me to say that only one fruit in 20 will have crossed seed in it. How is that math supposed to work out? One fruit in 20 is 100% crosssed? Thus leading to the average (observed) cross pollination rate of about 5% on unbagged tomatoes.

Biologically, it seems like non-bagged fruits would tend to have a small percentage of cross pollination spread across all fruits in the field. Not that one fruit will get all the cross pollination and other fruits will not get any.

Pollination is not about one grain of pollen fertilizing hundreds of ova. It is about hundreds of grains of pollen fertilizing hundreds of ova. Mathematically that makes it much more likely for each fruit to have some low level of cross pollination.

I know that there are traditional stories in the tomato world. And since I am an outsider I don't know the stories.... But this particular story has driven me batty ever since I heard it for the first time. I've been told it's a short drive.

jmsieglaff · January 21, 2015

Quote:

Originally Posted by joseph

Biologically, it seems like non-bagged fruits would tend to have a small percentage of cross pollination spread across all fruits in the field. Not that one fruit will get all the cross pollination and other fruits will not get any.

Pollination is not about one grain of pollen fertilizing hundreds of ova. It is about hundreds of grains of pollen fertilizing hundreds of ova. Mathematically that makes it much more likely for each fruit to have some low level of cross pollination.

That makes most sense to me. A flower begins to self-pollinate as or maybe a bit before it begins to open. As it opens more and more self-pollination occurs. Maybe a bumblebee stops by and a few of the unpollinated ova are pollinated with a foreign pollen and a few of the seeds in a given tomato are crossed.

rsg2001 · January 24, 2015

I have tempted fate on crosses. In more than 20 years of growing tomatoes in fairly tight-space conditions, I have only seen one unintended cross, and because of my garden records I think I figured it out. It occurred in my Queens NY (former) garden, evidently. (Now living n the Hudson Valley.) I had saved seeds late in the season from a Cherokee Purple from 2011 that was in a 3 foot x 3 foot container along with Costoluto Genovese and a yellow variety. I planted seeds from in in my 2013 garden upstate and one of the plants generated something I hadn't planted before. It looked like a cross between Costoluto and Cherokee Purple. It was shaped and sized like CP, with regular leaves, but had ribbing on the top resembling Costoluto which of course is red, and was kind of an orangey-brown color. I saved quite a few seeds from that (and still have a lot of the 2011 ones)but didn't grow it last year. Now I have a lot more space in raised beds in the new place to plant, and also rented a small plot in a community garden and plan to try the original F1s again, as well as the F2s, to see what comes out.

January 18, 2015	#1
kerns125 Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Jan 2013 Location: 22301 Posts: 92	seed saving in a tight garden- will OP progeny be true? I am relatively new to tomato-growing and have a very small yard. I grow 12 tomato plants (each one different) in two 6x3 raised gardens and have another 4 earthboxes with 2 tomato plants each. So, 20 different varieties in a very tight space. I had thought that with open-pollinated varieties, that one could save the seeds from these tomatoes and get the same tomatoes again next year, regardless of the bees. But now that I've been reading more, e.g. like about Lucky Cross being the unexpected progeny of brandywine plus an unknown, I'm concerned that my OP seeds might not be true to the original tomato. This would primarily be a problem in that I offer my seeds to others, and I don't want to do that anymore if my seeds might not grow fruit that are true to the variety that I'm calling them! Hoping someone here with more knowledge and experience can give me advice about this.... Jen

January 18, 2015	#3
carolyn137 Moderator Emeritus Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Upstate NY, zone 4b/5a Posts: 21,169	http://faq.gardenweb.com/faq/lists/t...852004159.html I think the above link might very useful for you. And it's also good to remember that if you decide not to bag blossoms, which I do suggest given the limited space you have, that the most pollinators for some folks occurs in the Spring and for others later in the season. Which is why where I am I only saved seeds from the latest of fruits. At the time I was growing many hundreds of plants and varieties each season and there was no way I could bag blossoms or use geographic isolation Carolyn __________________ Carolyn

January 19, 2015	#5
Lee Tomatopalooza™ Moderator Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: NC-Zone 7 Posts: 2,188	Jen, Observe your garden to decide. If you have pollinators, then you might want to take the extra step to bag blossoms. If you don't, then no need to waste time/money/energy protecting against cross pollination which won't happen. For me, bees arrive later to the garden, so I save the earliest fruits. For you/others, suggested above, it may be different so you need to adjust accordingly. Good luck! Lee __________________ Intelligence is knowing a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is knowing not to put one in a fruit salad. Cuostralee - The best thing on sliced bread.

January 18, 2015	#2
Cole_Robbie Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Jun 2012 Location: Illinois, zone 6 Posts: 8,407	Drawing from previous discussions here, you best bet for true seed, other than bagging blossoms, and provided you live in a temperate climate that is cool in the spring, is to select the earliest fruit from your plant for seed-saving, because the fruit were likely to have set early in the season, before insect pollinators were very active. For someone in, say, Florida or Hawaii, that rule would be less important, because they don't have as cool of a spring. Most of the plants I sell in the spring come from purchased seed, but I do let some customers pick out plants from seeds I got in swaps, my extras. Last spring, a returning greenhouse customer told me he got cherry tomatoes from something I told him was going to be a slicer variety. I said "sorry. Are you mad?" He said, "well, I was. But then I tried them and they were the best cherry tomatoes I ever had. It was hard to stay mad for very long."

January 19, 2015	#8
jmsieglaff Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Jan 2014 Location: Southern WI Posts: 2,742	Jen, I think this link will explain why the F2 and subsequent generations of seeds saved from an F1 cross (e.g., Sungold F1) will not be identical. The first time you read about gene segregation it can be a little confusing, but read it again and it becomes clearer. http://kdcomm.net/~tomato/gene/genes2.html Justin

January 21, 2015	#11
Tormato Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Feb 2006 Location: MA Posts: 4,971	Collecting many, many fruit from each plant would give that 5% chance from each plant. Collecting just one fruit from each plant would likely be about 1 in 20 plants having saved seed that is crossed. Thanks for helping me clarify the difference.

January 24, 2015	#14
rsg2001 Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: New York Zone 6 Posts: 479	I have tempted fate on crosses. In more than 20 years of growing tomatoes in fairly tight-space conditions, I have only seen one unintended cross, and because of my garden records I think I figured it out. It occurred in my Queens NY (former) garden, evidently. (Now living n the Hudson Valley.) I had saved seeds late in the season from a Cherokee Purple from 2011 that was in a 3 foot x 3 foot container along with Costoluto Genovese and a yellow variety. I planted seeds from in in my 2013 garden upstate and one of the plants generated something I hadn't planted before. It looked like a cross between Costoluto and Cherokee Purple. It was shaped and sized like CP, with regular leaves, but had ribbing on the top resembling Costoluto which of course is red, and was kind of an orangey-brown color. I saved quite a few seeds from that (and still have a lot of the 2011 ones)but didn't grow it last year. Now I have a lot more space in raised beds in the new place to plant, and also rented a small plot in a community garden and plan to try the original F1s again, as well as the F2s, to see what comes out.