Hearts

[Ruth_10]

Wes and Brad's Black Heart have had heavy foliage for me, in comparison to, let's see, Kosovo, Monomakh's Hat, Anna Russian, Mrs. Houseworth, Berkshire Polish, German Red Strawberry, Shilling Giant, Tsar-Kolokol, Yasha Yugoslavian.

To prevent sunscald, I will occasionally pin up a piece of floating row cover (Remay or something of that sort) on the west-facing side of the tomato cage for shade. I use clothes pins to clip the fabric to the cage.

[tyrupp]

Originally Posted by Ruth_10

Wes and Brad's Black Heart have had heavy foliage for me, in comparison to, let's see, Kosovo, Monomakh's Hat, Anna Russian, Mrs. Houseworth, Berkshire Polish, German Red Strawberry, Shilling Giant, Tsar-Kolokol, Yasha Yugoslavian.

To prevent sunscald, I will occasionally pin up a piece of floating row cover (Remay or something of that sort) on the west-facing side of the tomato cage for shade. I use clothes pins to clip the fabric to the cage.

Thanks for your help, I have wes ordered and have Kosovo due to kind member, but I don't have Kuklas Portugese heart (hint Carolyn) I have lots of space, let me grow some for you

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by tyrupp

Thanks for your help, I have wes ordered and have Kosovo due to kind member, but I don't have Kuklas Portugese heart (hint Carolyn) I have lots of space, let me grow some for you

I hear you, I do, but as I explained above, I don't have enough seeds to SSE list it and I don't even have enough seeds of it to list it in my free seed offer here at Tville.

And thanks for your kind offer to grow it out and do some seed production but that's already been taken care of. The person who was doing the major seed for all three of the Kukla varieties lost the plants with TSWV.

I grow all of the varieties here at home so I can see what they look like and be able to taste them myself although major seed production is done by three other folks. So all I have is a few seeds of the paste, which I may be able to offer here, even fewer seeds of the heart, and no seeds of the beefsteak one.

it was a lousy year here as well and I didn't get fruits off of about half of the varieties I was growing.

So......hopefully by next Fall seeds for the heart and paste and beefsteak Kukla's will be available. And I also said that you may see it on a few folks growout lsits, I'm not sure about that, but I do intend to send a few seeds to those few commercial places where I send seeds for trial so they can offer it as well next Fall. That would mean those who do their own seed production which would mean Sandhill, Glecklers, TGS takes much longer and Linda has a huge backlog as it is, possibly Tania and also Mike at Victory Seeds .

I just checked my seed list numbers and I have only 20 seeds of the paste so that won't be sent anywhere other than to the person who was doing the seed production for it initially, and I have only 75 seeds of the heart and most places want 20-25 seeds for seed production, some less, so it looks like I won't even be able to send much out for trial.

[Fusion_power]

Tastiheart. http://www.selectedplants.com/garden...eartsliced.jpg

Carolyn should remember it. It came out of a cross of Large Pink Bulgarian with an unknown heart grown from seed I got from Chuck Wyatt in 2002. Nice tomato. Heavy foliage. Pretty darn good flavor too. As an interesting side trait, it was accidentally selected for outstanding cold tolerance. I've had temps as low as 22 degrees with no damage to the foliage.

DarJones

[tjg911]

both wes and kosovo have a lot of foliage for me.

[RinTinTin]

22 Degrees w/o foliage damage? Maybe it should be renamed "SeasonXtender". WOW!

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by Fusion_power

Tastiheart. http://www.selectedplants.com/garden...eartsliced.jpg

Carolyn should remember it. It came out of a cross of Large Pink Bulgarian with an unknown heart grown from seed I got from Chuck Wyatt in 2002. Nice tomato. Heavy foliage. Pretty darn good flavor too. As an interesting side trait, it was accidentally selected for outstanding cold tolerance. I've had temps as low as 22 degrees with no damage to the foliage.

DarJones

I do Darrel. But a couple of questions.

As you know Chuck was a friend of mine and asked me to send him all the varieties in my book that he didn't have, as did Glenn at Sandhill. Chuck was not a well man and for several years before he died in June of 2002 I think it's iffy to assume that every variety that was sent out was what it should be.

You might remember that at that time I was also doing those wrong varieties threads at GW and one person alone listed 27 varieties she got that were wrong.

So my questions are:

What was the source of your LPB? Chuck's initial source of LPB was me.

What was the variety that you requested from Chuak that you ended up giving you an unnamed heart and did other seeds from that same pack also give you hearts, which to me means what you requested wasn't a heart.

Finally, that plant is unaware of the laws of physics and the temp at which ice xstals form inside cells and destroy them. If that kind of cold tolerance exists all the time with that variety alone you ought to think about doing something about the gene or genes that are involved in terms of patenting that variety and then cut a deal with someone to do some crosses and DNA sequencing to find that gene (s).

All to say that I've never heard of any tomato plant that wasn't killed with a hard freeze, which 22 F is. And those folks in the short season zones could sure use a variety that isn't killed, with no protection, after a hard freeze.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by beefyboy

I am growing Kosovo,Sylvan Gaume, orange strawberry, Anna Russian, Prue, and all are cranking out tomatoes as I write this. My surprise had been Sylvan which is put out the first tom. of the yr. and beat out even Stupice in setting fruit. I am amazed by the vigor of this plant as am Orange Strawberry. My Kosovo and Anna Russian production are doing very well also and this is going to be a fantastic yr. My Sudduth is the biggest plant I have and seems to love earthboxes along with Earls Faux. Most productive in my garden is by far Bills Berkely wich I got from B54red! On one plant have over 35 fruit and it is only beginning! Sorry I am rambling on here!, and more to come.

Beefyboy, keep me posted by PM on the Bill's Berkley Pink. You will be the first to grow it out as far as I know. As soon as you get a good set of fruit that are starting to get ripe try to post a photo so I can compare it to the original that I got them from. If you can photograph a ripe one close up that would be great. I've got my fingers crossed that it will grow true because it was an exceptional plant with the highest production I have seen in all my years of gardening.

[Fusion_power]

Carolyn,

I got the original seed from Chuck in 2002. The rest of the seed in that pack produced a mix of regular Large Pink Bulgarian tomatoes with just a few plants that produced off types. All of the plants were regular leaf. One of the plants produced Stupice sized fruit and another produced these large lumpy red tomatoes that were half way between a beefsteak and a heart. That large lumpy tomato gave seedlings in 2003 that were 1/4 potato leaf. I saved some of the potato leaf plants and grew them in my garden that year. Some of the PL plants produced beefsteak tomatoes but two of them produced hearts. The next years growout result was the tomato in the photo.
http://www.selectedplants.com/garden...peLPBheart.jpg

I then sent seed out to a few dozen people in 2005 who grew them and sent seed back to me. Two growers reported better than average production and flavor. I grew out their seed and selected one of them as the best of the two overall. Since then, I've grown them just about every year because they are a reliable producer comparable to Kosovo in my garden but with red fruit and potato leaves. Please call to memory that I described the leaves of the plants as having the wilty trait typical of many heart tomatoes but because they are potato leaved, all the leaves do is twist sideways.

As for living through 22 degrees, I can assure you that these plants did. I had them outdoors under a tree on April 7th 2007 when we had a 22 degree freeze here at my home. I lost several thousand plants in the greenhouse because the heat failed. I have very good reason to remember that freeze. From the cup of Tastiheart seedlings, over 3/4 were killed. All other seedlings, several thousands in number of about 200 varieties, that were sitting beside them were killed. These were all excess plants above and beyond what was in the greenhouse and not needed at the time which is why I had left them outdoors. About 1/4 of the Tastiheart seedlings survived. I grew out several of the resulting seedlings and they have consistently been the most cold tolerant tomatoes I've grown.

DarJones

[carolyn137]

I grew out several of the resulting seedlings and they have consistently been the most cold tolerant tomatoes I've grown.

*****

As I said above, if you've got a tomato variety that can live through a hard freeze at 22 F then you've got something unique as far as I know.

So DO something about it.

Some season I'd like to compare your PL red heart ( Tastiheart) with my Kukla's Portuguese Heart ( PL) which came to me as a family heirloom.

I guess I wasn't one of the few dozen people you gifted with the seeds for this variety in 2005, but no matter really, because post Dec 12th when I fell I no longer could do the large growouts needed to look at anything that was still segregating. But I might have gotten a single PL red heart which would have been lovely.

Statistics. That's what we deal with in such situations.

I'm still remembering the three way cross that Tad Smith sent me seeds for, told me what he was looking for in great detail, told me there was a 1/64 chance of finding it and I planned on growing out maybe 12 plants each season, put out 12 plants the first season and got what he was looking for.

Gotta love statistics.

[Tormato]

Darrel,

So, Tastiheart is a red.

Would you know what color Heshpole is? Hopefully eyolf will read this thread and can chime in here with some info. I think he mentioned his PL heart, from your seeds, had blossoms pollinating at 52 degrees.

Carolyn, perhaps my pink PL heart was not mislabeled.

Gary

[ddsack]

Darrel, will you be offering Tastiheart plants this spring through your website? I'm standing in line now.

[eyolf]

I WAS one of those graced with seeds from Fusion's heart-shaped potato leaf discovery; the variety wasn't completely stable yet, and I selected from the succeeding generations for a variety that pleased ME.

The tomatoes I liked best had even fewer seeds than the tomatoe in Darryl's link, and all the seeds are carried in small sinuses in the top 1/4 of the tomato. AS it tends towards green shoulders, and cracks, its easy to slice much of the seeds away when preparing for the table...making a significant portion of the rest seedless.

On the downside it inherits thin skin and poor storage qualities; if grown as a canner, one should grow a dozen or more plants to be sure of enough fruit at once. It makes wonderful canned tomatoes if you enjoy eating them from the jar but not drinking the clear tangy juice; they are sweeter and more complex than plums and romas but nearly as dry.

I don't believe any of mine are frost tolerant, but haven't been tested...no point in setting tomatoes out before the soil is warm enough for growth (late May here) and by that time frost date is past. The final selection (distributed on SSE last year) does exhibit a remarkable ability to set fruit in cool weather, and is often very very early for a large tomato. I have had ripe fruits within a few days of Kotlas/Kimberly/Stupice! Foliage is sparse, like some PL's and many hearts, but not as thin as some. I have shared locally, and most experienced gardeners here liked it.

Because I believe there are some differences between Darryl's selections ( he had more than one) and mine, I gave mine a unique name: Heshpole, a sort of acronym of HEart-SHaped POtatoe LEaf. I elected NOT to relist them in the SSE book again this year; I wanted to see if any others that tried them would re-offer. If anyone wants to try them, message me here; I will eventually get some to you. I'm especially glad to share them with other northern gardeners and learn if anyone else enjoys them.

Edit: Heshpole is pink. I believe the pink, potatoe leaf, and heart-shaped is an uncommon combination; that was my first reason to beg seeds from Darryl.

[Fusion_power]

The original plants carried pink from Large Pink Bulgarian so I'm not surprised that someone wound up with a pink version. You could have named it Heshpipole!

I have a few seed of Tastiheart and will grow it this spring. Sorry, I don't have enough seed to offer it here.

On a side note, I notice that neither Heshpole nor Tastiheart is listed in Tatiana's tomatobase.

Has anyone else grown Wanda's Potato Top?

DarJones

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by Fusion_power

The original plants carried pink from Large Pink Bulgarian so I'm not surprised that someone wound up with a pink version. You could have named it Heshpipole!

I have a few seed of Tastiheart and will grow it this spring. Sorry, I don't have enough seed to offer it here.

On a side note, I notice that neither Heshpole nor Tastiheart is listed in Tatiana's tomatobase.

Has anyone else grown Wanda's Potato Top?

DarJones

Darrel, I think maybe Tania prefers to post varieties that are genetically stable when she can. Are both of those stable now and I ask b/c of the above posts that indicated perhaps not. And she also scans Yearbook listings as well as other websites added to her own personal experience if she's grown it. yes, there are some varieties she lists there with no information at all, or says private, no distribution, but those are very very few amongst the plus 3,000 varieties she has pages for. I also think she likes to indicate what the commercial seed sources are for a variety and not just b'c she also sells tomato seed.

There's a list of varieties that I can think of, mainly ones that were the result of natural crosses and selections made with lots of those selections still not stabilized but bearing the same name, as well as many varieties that were deliberately bred and selections made and selections still not genetically stable.

I applaud Tania for her wonderful website and there's no way she can be up to the minute on every variety, even in terms of commercial seed sources. After all, she does have a full time job as well. ( smile)

Yes, I grew Wanda's Potato Top many years ago, i think Pinetree used to list it and I didn't take the time to see if they still do.

I remember a pink PL beefsteak and that's about it. I didn't even save seeds from it.

I looked in some YEarbooks and find only Tania lists it in the 2010 and says pink PL beefsteak as well. So I checked her page at her website and same story.

In some back yearbooks several folks posted it in the red sction but described it as pink and Tania also notes that on her page for Wanda's Potato Top.

So then I Googled it and same story there at DG PLant files and at Marianne Jones website as well.

But as I was scrolling at Marianne's site I went past Omar's Lebanese and she'd said what a weird name. If I ever meet again Omar Saab who brought me the seeds from Lebanon I'll tell him it's a weird name.

I just checked Pinetree and they no longer list it. But it's funny b'c I can still see that page, it was a right hand page. at the right top was Wanda's Potato Top and on the left column down lower was Prudens Purple which was described as an early Brandywine for so many years and confused so many folks.