Heinz 2653?

[jeffinjonestown]

I received seeds for Heinz 2653, which is supposed to be a roma type, from Territorial Seed Company. They list it as an OP variety. I cannot find much more information about these, and most of what Heinz currently offers directly appears to be hybrids. Can anyone confirm that these are, in fact, open pollinated? Has anyone been particularly impressed/unimpressed with these?

[Wi-sunflower]

I still have a few original seeds for Heinz 2653 that I got from Johnny's. This was one of the few times a company gave us an advance notice that the seeds were being discontinued so I bought a big pack, 1/2 oz. The germ test date is Jan 91.

I attached a scan from the Johnny's catalog of the year offered and neither it or the pack indicated it's a hybrid, tho at the time I thought it was.

Anyway, I've been growing it for all these years and for many years I was the only company I knew of that was offering seeds for sale. About 5 years ago +- Territorial started offering it too. I don't know if they got it from me or from someone that offered it in the SSE yearbook as it is there too, tho I don't know how long it's been there.

It's a nice normal sized roma. Produces a lot of tomatoes in 2 or 3 flushes then croaks since it is determinate. It's not a bad roma if you want to do your canning all at once but if you want a bigger roma that's indeterminate, there are a lot of good heirloom romas offered here and on sites like mine.

Carol

[puttgirl]

Thanks for the info Carol, I think I may have a few of these and I had no idea they were a roma.

[jeffinjonestown]

Thanks, Carol. That sheds some light. I will say this much: the seedlings germinated at a nearly 100% rate within 3 or 4 days, and they are ahead of my rutgers and ramapos planted at the same time.

A canning, all at once determinate roma is what my wife was after, so I guess this might work. Giving her roma type and pepper seedlings is the price of getting the rest of the yard for my maters, eggplant, zukes, apples, and raspberries. Small price to pay.

[carolyn137]

You might want to check out this thread from the Legacy Forum about the older OP Heinz varieties:

http://tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=16382

There's also a thread there about older Campbell varieties as well.

[jeffinjonestown]

Wow. I'm glad you didn't point me to that thread and the links in it until after seedling time. I really want to concentrate on the OP ramapo and rutgers indet this year, and you know what a sucker I am for wanting to try everything. The ramapo seeds are from 2007, so I want to keep them pure and save a lot of seeds.