StrongPlant-Breeding for the future

[Country Breeze]

Glad to see you back StrongPlant. Your posts in this thread are very fascinating. I'm looking forward to following your progress this year.

[StrongPlant]

Here are examples of moderately compound inflorescences in an F1 where one parent has multiflora(s) mutation,the number of flowers is clearly increased because of branching:



The branching occurs in most trusses,but it is unpredictable,sometimes it splits just once(picture 3) sometimes multiple times.Will the upper trusses towards the end of the seaseon also branch like this remains to be seen.

[StrongPlant]

Here is the monster cherry,now approaching 2m in height.Right next to it is another hybrid that is slightly shorter.


It also ripened before all other varieties,100~ days from sowing,I already picked 4 fruits:


I assume this vigour came from the fact that the PL used as a parent had almost none or none of pimpinellifolium genes,so the genetic divergence was high.I'd say most of the PL large-fruited varieties are pure or close to pure S.Esculentum.

Here is 2 rows of F2 segregation of DCS:


Some are showing symptoms of foliage disease and 1 is quite stunted and sickly.These will be left growing.I'm intentionally leaving them for disease to spread and wreck havoc,this way the most resistant plants will be exposed.I'm kinda hoping most will survive long enough so I can also harvest some tomatoes.So far most are very vigorous and healthy.

[StrongPlant]

Every s.pimpinellifoloum x s.lycopersicum cross has been amazingly vigorous,but the cross with an unkown potato leaved variety yielded most amazing results so far,with a plant reaching record height and health of all crosses ever,and producing lots of very tasty 18g tomatoes.F1 crosses have surpassed all pure lines in every trait.

The monster:


I've left a sucker that appeared growing at the base of the plant.About a month later it grew over 2m tall and the first tomatoes started ripening already:




The pimp. tomato I've been using is a spindly-growing variety called "sweet pea" and has very small fruits that pop in the mouth,stems with no hairs,small leaves and suckers insanely.

[StrongPlant]

It is already known that F1 tomato hybrids ussualy have increased leaf size in comparison to both parents but it was really interesting to see that in person,and,with hybrids I corssed myself:

Hybrids leaves are in the middle,pure lines used are unkown PL variety I simply labeled as "PL",a stabilized line of some unkown comercial variety I label as "J",hairless solanum pimpinellifolioum strain called "sweet pea",san marzano(SM),indigo rose(IN) and Ildi(multifloral-s).

IN-F1-J


J-F1-SM


S.Pimp.-F1-PL


And the most dramatic example,a cross of a domestic Ildi with the wild tomato solanum neorickii

Ildi-F1-S.Neorickii


It has got to be that this increased leaf area is a huge factor in explaining hybrid vigour,of course not the only factor but still these hybrids have definitely increased biomass acumulation,and totall biomass of hybrids while I can't measure precisely,is obviously way higher than parent plants,one only needs to look at the plants to conclude this,but more on that later

[StrongPlant]

Remember that F1 of Ildi which is multiflora and s.pimp? Well this is how that plant looks like and is over 6m in length,grown as single stem:


And yes,all these red lilttle cherries are from single plant.It appears inflorescense branching is not that random,but instead,plant branches them according to how well it's doing,which makes sense.Some trusses have well over 100 tomatoes,although they are very small,exactly the size of sour cherries in fact.

So,if crossing a multiflora with a regular truss tomato yields a hybrid that has increased incidence of inflorescence branching,what happens when you cross a multiflora with a variety that isn't one but has moderately branched inflorescense? What I hope for is balanced number of flowers,the maximum that the plant can support.

[StrongPlant]

It is not uncommon to find trusses like these in the Ildi(multiflora)xS.Pimpinellifolium:


Over 1m long (~39 inch) truss with multiple branching spots.