What traits would you breed into future OP varieties?

[b54red]

Originally Posted by bigbubbacain

Maybe I'm getting caught up in the semantics here, but I personally look at this from the perspective of looking for disease tolerance and heat tolerance. I think diseases and heat issue are always going to a constant part of gardening in my area. I'm willing to grow a prolific variety that has beautiful flavorful fruit, even if it is weaker than others in the face of diseases. I've given up on finding disease resistant types because I've never found one I liked that's resistant to every disease in my area. There always seems to be a pathogen waiting for us tomato growers to discover.

My favorites for flavor and appearance don't come without a sacrifice, and it's usually in regard to plant health. For example, my Golden Ponderosa got loaded down with about 10 beefsteaks before the Fusarium Wilt set in. I had allowed it to produce 2 main stems and all of my fruits are on the healthy stem. Every day it looks a little sicker and sicker but the fruits are still ripening. This is my idea of disease tolerance, compared to varieties that would stop growing altogether when a disease sets in. I know every time I grow GP it's going to look awful and die, but it's still worth it to me because I'll be rewarded with late production of beautiful yellow beefsteaks that set surprisingly well in the heat. It always dies on me, but it "goes down swingin", so to speak. I'm growing it again for the first time in 3 years because I finally just shrugged and said "oh well, I just gotta have it".

I'm in the same boat Bubba, and will keep growing the ones that can hang on long enough to produce those terrific tasting tomatoes for even a short while. Fusarium has hit me rather hard this year. I've had a couple hang on long enough to produce a decent crop. Blights are a constant but don't usually kill unless aphids and spider mites give it a hand.
The one that really hurts the most is TSWV. It kills so devastatingly fast that if the fruit is not to the blush stage you rarely ever get anything off of a plant infected with it. I was doing a little tying up yesterday and found my second and only Wes infected. Naturally the plant was 6 ft tall with nice little green toms. It was at the very top of the plant starting on one sucker and just beginning to spread so I went down to the first fork near the base and cut off that entire main stem in the hope that it hadn't spread that far. Now I have just half a plant with little hope it will be disease free.
So to get to the question, I would like to see some varieties that are TSWV tolerant that actually taste good and aren't hard as rocks.

[travis]

Originally Posted by b54red

So to get to the question, I would like to see some varieties that are TSWV tolerant that actually taste good and aren't hard as rocks.

Try using Bolseno or Sophya in crosses with large fruited, tasty heirlooms. Each is TSWV tolerant, large red fruit, indeterminate and heathy growers in the heat. Their flavor is acceptable, even quite good under the right conditions. They will impart TSWV tolerance in 1/4 of the F2 plants and you may be able to capture the trait.

Originally Posted by Lee

The Sleepy, Sneezy, Witty, and Happy dwarf lines have all
produced very good to "knock your socks off" fantastic tasting
varieties. Summertime Gold is one of the dwarf varieties that
will easily take on the best tasting indeterminates out there!

As for other traits I would like to see.... I'm thinking a variety with deer tolerance would be nice!

Lee

Are most of the "dwarf" lines cherry tomatoes or simply small tomatoes. Other than the great taste you described, what are some of the fruit traits of those lines?

Deer tolerance, hmmmmmmm. I think I have that figured out. I love the taste of venison.

Ted

[Vince]

"Dwarf plants with great tasting tomatoes is a real challenge"

Think we have come past this point in the Dwarf Project. Maybe the best tomatoes I have ever tasted came off some of the Dwarfs.


"due to the genetic drag inherent in dwarves against flavor."
Whats This?

[travis]

Originally Posted by Vince

"due to the genetic drag inherent in dwarves against flavor." Whats This?

Basic fact.

But I'm encouraged when I hear that genetic drag relative to low level of flavor has been overcome with some of the dwarf varieties coming out of your Project.

Did anyone in the Project notice the genetic drag I'm referring to along the way?

[Lee]

Did anyone in the Project notice the genetic drag I'm referring to along the way?

Not sure I know how to qualify this one. I've never heard of
it before.

But to answer your question another way perhaps... yes there were some major spitters that came out. However,
there are some major spitters in the indeterminate world as
well, so I don't think it is unique to the dwarves.

The other fruit traits we started selecting for are size and color. We now have large (10~18oz.) fruit of just about every color available. The Summertime Gold I described above put out an 18oz fruit last year for me and produced
almost 11 pounds of fruit on a 3' tall plant! The only other plant that exceeded that total was a hybrid that gave me 18 pounds... which was a new dwarf cross! Can't wait for the F2s on that one.

Lee

[Vince]

Ok-We are kind of hijacking this thread

Travis-I'll give you an obvious example of where I have observed NO "genetic Drag"(if I understand correctly-being a lay man) with the Dwarfs. Last Fall I grew out the first generation of frosty F2 Dwarfs. All tasted phenomenal, and some could arguably put a good Indian stripe on the shelf as far as flavor is concerned. However, I grew some happy(F2 or F3, and Dopey F2 or F3) plants a ways back and they were really spitters. As Lee pointed out Spitters can also arise from non-dwarf crosses. My opinion is the following... if you cross two extremely flavorful cultivars you are bound to get something very good to superb. If you cross a great tasting variety with an average one, you are not sure what you are going to get, although you may find a few tasty segregates even if the F1 is bad. If you cross two spitters, your unlikely to get a tasty tomato. JMHO.

"Ok-We are kind of hijacking this thread"

I started the thread and I don't care if it is hijacked. I'm enjoying the conversation. I do have a question though. Since the subject has changed to the dwarf tomatoes, will the fact that they are dwarf varieties mean that they are also determinate. Is it possible to have a dwarf variety of indeterminate?

Ted

[Vince]

Actually most are indeterminant(I think), meaning they continuously set fruit until disease prevents or death. Craig should probably chime in to confirm, but all that I have grown have displayed this growth habit.

[dice]

[Dwarf vs determinate-indeterminate]

Craig has a good description of "dwarf type" on this page:
http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/t/778581/

Russian Red is a plant of that type developed in the 1940s
in New Zealand that has excellent, sweet flavor in fairly small,
round fruit. It could be earlier, for my climate.

A perennial Earl's Faux that ripens first fruit in 60 days would
be good.

[Vince]

Thanks for the link dice. Now that we are seeing a wide variety of different segregates in the dwarf project, some of which appear not to have rugose foliage(Wispy Dwarfs), we probably could broaden Craigs description of Dwarf foliage to include these.

[travis]

Originally Posted by Vince

"Dwarf plants with great tasting tomatoes is a real challenge"

Think we have come past this point in the Dwarf Project. Maybe the best tomatoes I have ever tasted came off some of the Dwarfs.


"due to the genetic drag inherent in dwarves against flavor."
Whats This?

Maybe genetic drag isn't the correct term.

What I'm referring to is described in the last sentence of post #4 in this thread: http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=14696 and relates to the fruit to leaf ratio on dwarf plants, especially those with heavy fruit loads and shorter bush or bird nest growth habits whether determinate or indeterminate dwarf plants. Because even indeterminate dwarf types can have a lopsided fruit to leaf ratio.

But again I am encouraged to learn that some of the Project varieties have overcome this "drag" as I called it earlier.

[dhrtx]

I would echo the calls for disease resistance and heat tolerance. Early maturity would enhance these qualities.

This would be a huge project, probably more complicated than the Dwarf project. Crosses made with disease resistant hybrids x tasty heirlooms would have to be made in relatively disease free areas, and it would probably help to do the F1 growouts in the same areas. F2 would need to be done in areas where disease is almost certain, I'm thinking Florida for some reason. Later selections could probably be made in intermediate areas, like mine.

Another approach could be selections from self fertilized disease resistant hybrids. Most disease resistances seem to be recessive, and should be easy to retain if there are no crosses. I have heard that a poor tasting hybrid can result in good tasting tomatoes in some of the segregations, so there is a chance that something very special might be found.

Has anyone grown Bella Rosa?

Originally Posted by dhrtx

I would echo the calls for disease resistance and heat tolerance. Early maturity would enhance these qualities.

This would be a huge project, probably more complicated than the Dwarf project. Crosses made with disease resistant hybrids x tasty heirlooms would have to be made in relatively disease free areas, and it would probably help to do the F1 growouts in the same areas. F2 would need to be done in areas where disease is almost certain, I'm thinking Florida for some reason. Later selections could probably be made in intermediate areas, like mine.

Another approach could be selections from self fertilized disease resistant hybrids. Most disease resistances seem to be recessive, and should be easy to retain if there are no crosses. I have heard that a poor tasting hybrid can result in good tasting tomatoes in some of the segregations, so there is a chance that something very special might be found.

Has anyone grown Bella Rosa?

Couldn't all the grow outs be done in a single large commercial type green house. The diseases can be introduced and the facility can be sterilized between grow outs. It would also allow climate control and multiple grow outs in a single year. That should cost less than moving the project to different environments.

Ted

[Vince]

Don't want to be to argumentative, but I really don't want onlookers to be turned off to dwarfs by misunderstandings.

so Travis-"What I'm referring to is described in the last sentence of post #4 in this thread: http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=14696 and relates to the fruit to leaf ratio on dwarf plants."

If you read the last sentance of post 4 (Craigs), it does not relate to dwarfs at all. It is about determinates. I don't believe Craig was lumping dwarf in this category.

Dwarfs CAN HAVE an equal or maybe greater Leaf to fruit ratio than normal indeterminates. Take a look at some of these photos of Dwarf Wild Fred F6 (CARBONXNew Big Dwarf) from tonight.



Front side


Back side

This variety is an 8.5+ in flavor and throws out some big ones(over1lb). If you count the leaves per fruit, I am guestemating you are going to have more than 100 leaves for 8 fruit. Large indeterminates likely have similar or MAYBE? less.

So is the Dwarf lag effect or whatever it is called, myth or reality?

The counter argument is ...OK if they have more leaves per fruit than normal indets, how many of the leaves actually get usable light-since they're so compact? this is a good question.