Experiences with F2 Kumato

[NicolasGarcia]

Originally Posted by Nan_PA_6b

Nicolas, I received some Kumato seeds from Baikal one year ago. Are they F3? F4?

Hi, if they were from a year ago, they are f3.
What result did you have of those f3?

[Nan_PA_6b]

Nicolas, I will grow those seeds in 2019.

[NicolasGarcia]

Originally Posted by Nan_PA_6b

Nicolas, I will grow those seeds in 2019.

Perfect, I hope you like Kumato, for me it is a very good tomato of flavor, the plant very resistant to diseases, productive and endures well after its collection, although for my taste there are many Spanish varieties that I like more.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by NicolasGarcia

The curious thing is that there is no tomato variety registered as Kumato®. So how has Syngenta appropriated this right? Here begins to reveal, in part, the myth of Kumato®. In the middle of the last decade, large seed corporations began to worry about the appearance in the markets of competitors that were depleting their monopoly on vegetable seeds. Small companies and individuals were able to offer flavored tomatoes, using traditional varieties or even rescuing some variety that had been originally discarded by corporations, as happened with the Raf tomato in Almeria.

The demand for flavored tomatoes was unstoppable, so they gave guidance to their technicians to find some variety that could compete. In the case of Syngenta they finally got a small, dark-skinned tomato. This variety was duly registered in Spain and Holland under the commercial name of Olmeca.

graphic kumato
A part of the business had been saved and farmers could now be offered a flavor variety to put on the market. But the response was not as massive as expected by the multinational and in the field continued to prefer the cultivation of other flavored varieties that were well suited to the greenhouse and that already had good reputation among consumers. Above all, one of them, the Raf tomato mentioned above, that had been ingeniously renamed "Tomato pata negra" and that also has the advantage of not being a hybrid variety, so the seed can easily multiply.

Faced with this adversity, Syngenta, far from being demoralized, devised a strategy based on what is known as the "Variety Club", a sibylline and refined way of keeping tied by production contracts to farmers and deriving most of the benefits. of the cultivation towards the coffers of the corporations.

The first thing that variety clubs need is to get a high reputation among the public. Hence the invention of the word Kumato® which is not a variety of tomato, but simply the registered trademark with which Olmeca tomatoes are labeled when they are released on the market. The launch of Kumato® was initially carried out in the United Kingdom through a large deployment in the media, endorsed by journalists with prestige in the "gourmet" world and in healthy food. A success that made the doors of the European market open to him.

BINGO Nico,you've got that right.

Congratulations.

Carolyn

[MrBig46]

Originally Posted by NicolasGarcia

Is there a possibility that you have been crossed?

Nico,
I got the seeds of Kumato from Baikal in 2013. They could not have been your seeds. Baikal when sending seed of an F1 variety notifies me that the seeds have been removed from the fruit. Because I was interested in comparing F2 and F3, I put the bags in blossoms in 2014 so they can not be pollinated by unwanted poles. In 2015, I cultivated two F2 plants and two F3 plants spaced apart by only half a meter. Those photos are from 2015.
Vladimír

[NicolasGarcia]

ok Vladimir, then I do not understand anything .....
Supposedly in the f2 is where there is more diversity of size, color and flavor, no? Then why are all tomatoes the same?

[NicolasGarcia]

I live in the Iberian Peninsula and Baikal in Mallorca, I think that a supposedly kumato tomato is not the same in Mallorca as in Jaen than in another area of Spain, as indicated in the previous link kumato as such does not exist. In any case what is important is to have a tomato that you like whatever it is and whatever it is called, as indicated in the previous link I go by f4 and I can not find my photos, this year I will plant f5 and I will show that they are the same as f2 tomatoes next season

[Fred Hempel]

In my experience, presumed F2 seed that I grew (from branded store bought Kumato tomatoes) showed segregation for a number plant and fruit traits. Although F2 fruits were all brown.

As has been pointed out in numerous Tomatoville threads. Just because you can't see dramatic segregation does not mean that the F2 tomatoes are "all the same". And even if the fruits are very similar, the segregation of other plant traits (even subtle ones) can be important.

The other thing to be wary of is that any bona fide F2 plant will be heterozygous at a number of loci, and the performance that you see in the F2 can disappear in subsequent generations when more and more loci become fixed as homozygous.

[RandyG]

The two parents for Kumato are probably very similar in plant growth habit and fruit traits but may differ in disease resistance genes. Testing different F2 plants with molecular markers available for various disease resistance genes would show if the F2 plants are segregating for these genes. Kumato is like other brown tomatoes from the standpoint of having the genes for red flesh and green when ripe both present and giving the reddish brown color of the flesh from mixing of the two different colors. The brown exterior color results from the fruit having yellow skin color. If the skin color were clear, the exterior color would appear purple. However, Kumato does have some other gene that makes the shoulder color very dark green in immature fruit and remain dark color as the fruit ripens. I think Kumato is probably an F1 hybrid developed from some op variety by backcrossing disease resistance genes needed for greenhouse production into similar parent lines, one with one set of disease resistance genes and the other parent with some different disease resistance genes. Kumato is not a variety name but a trademarked brand name and now in additon to the larger fruited Kumatos there are now smaller fruited cherry and grape Kumatos with the same brown color and the dark green shoulder color. Personally, I am not thrilled with the flavor of Kumato. One small brown-fruited hybrid that I really like the flavor, plant type, productivity, and disease tolerance is 'Chocolate Sprinkles'. It does not segregate greatly in the F2 generation for plant and fruit type either but does segregate for disease resistance genes.

[Greatgardens]

Disease resistance segregation might explain what I observed in my plants last season. So all I can do is hope that I get a better roll of the dice this time with these F2. I have about 50 seeds processed now, so I'm ready to start some as soon as we get to late March or so.

I'm really not all that enamored with the taste of Kumato, but it is a good combination of flavor and shelf life. I much prefer the flavor of grocery store Campari, but for me it's shelf life is not too good. Last season, Burpee's Orange Wellington was my "shelf life champion." They lasted a month after picking in October. So I'm hoping to better that this fall with Kumato.

[Solanum315]

Kumato are hybrid. This is the result of F7 seeds. There were a few variations along the way as well but I decided to save seeds from this line.

[ilex]

Originally Posted by RandyG

The two parents for Kumato are probably very similar in plant growth habit and fruit traits but may differ in disease resistance genes. Testing different F2 plants with molecular markers available for various disease resistance genes would show if the F2 plants are segregating for these genes. Kumato is like other brown tomatoes from the standpoint of having the genes for red flesh and green when ripe both present and giving the reddish brown color of the flesh from mixing of the two different colors. The brown exterior color results from the fruit having yellow skin color. If the skin color were clear, the exterior color would appear purple. However, Kumato does have some other gene that makes the shoulder color very dark green in immature fruit and remain dark color as the fruit ripens. I think Kumato is probably an F1 hybrid developed from some op variety by backcrossing disease resistance genes needed for greenhouse production into similar parent lines, one with one set of disease resistance genes and the other parent with some different disease resistance genes. Kumato is not a variety name but a trademarked brand name and now in additon to the larger fruited Kumatos there are now smaller fruited cherry and grape Kumatos with the same brown color and the dark green shoulder color. Personally, I am not thrilled with the flavor of Kumato. One small brown-fruited hybrid that I really like the flavor, plant type, productivity, and disease tolerance is 'Chocolate Sprinkles'. It does not segregate greatly in the F2 generation for plant and fruit type either but does segregate for disease resistance genes.

I agree, it does look like an OP variety with disease resistance genes "added". Negro de Olmeda is a good starting point.

I'm not sure all kumatos are the same line. There are probably a few things sold under that brand.