Sungold Replacement

[Fred Hempel]

Do you think you will get inferior seed for these hybrid varieties from Thompson and Morgan?

Do you consider Thompson and Morgan a crap seed company, with lousy seed?

It sells in Europe.

Originally Posted by NarnianGarden

Of course. But the hybrid varieties are not available without commercial companies here where I live. That's my beef - OP seeds can be swapped with other passionate ethical home gardeners, hybrids come from giants that are not always careful with their products.

[NarnianGarden]

Sadly, my experience with them has been very bad... yes, if you insist: the T&M seeds sold here have been known for low seed counts, low germination etc... and I'm not the only home gardener with that experience.
The same for another gardening giant (begins with N) - their Physalis seeds absolutely did not produce. (The ones I ordered from Baker Creek went wild and produced a jungle!)

The Pink Baby F1 was not from T&M or N, but another known company... lesson learned.

Edit. I must add that the seeds sold by the German retail chain Lidl (the maligned 'unethical' company) have all grown well and they have excellent reputation among customers - all brassicas, parsleys etc have germinated and produced wonderfully.Too bad their tomato assortment available here is quite small.

[RJGlew]

Originally Posted by Fred Hempel

Do you think you will get inferior seed for these hybrid varieties from Thompson and Morgan?

My experience with T&M seed has been very good. My last with tomatoes was a package of Sun Gold F1 I used over 3 seasons - 100% germination from start to finish.

[sjamesNorway]

I'm removing my question, which was answered 14 hours ago. Guess I didn't look at the last pages.

[Greatgardens]

Bump... How did other Sungold comparisons come out? How many "votes" for Ambrosia Gold?

I gave up on Sungold maybe 10 years ago -- the splitting issue, of course. My wife thinks that Esterina tastes better than Sungold. (?) I'm also going to grow Sunchocola next season. A member here kindly sent me a few seeds to try. I envision Sungold + Chocolate Cherry. Hope I'm halfway close to being correct.

And I should add that one of the F4 19X from DFollett/KarenO was spectacular! These are small plants at a max of 2-ft. but still a big producer for the size of the plant. Mine did best in a 12" basket. The trick is waiting until they are of the correct ripeness to get a really sweet, fruity taste. It is quite unique! This one is a keeper!

-GG

[Cole_Robbie]

I thought Ambrosia Orange beat Sun Gold on flavor. I didn't grow them side by side, but I think it is probably slightly later and lower-yielding. Early fruit were excellent, but later fruit got tough skins, probably from too much sun in hot dry weather. My white flies have a sweet tooth - they are always noticeably thicker on sweet varieties. Ambrosia Orange was a white fly favorite.

I actually like Ambrosia Blue the best, mostly because the fruit are much larger:

[AlittleSalt]

Originally Posted by AlittleSalt

I have two plants growing that I got from the MMMM called, WOW. It's supposed to taste as good as Sungold and is an OP. I also have Ambrosia gold and Sungold F1, and F3 growing. We'll see when they are all producing.

Originally Posted by heirloomtomaguy

Let me know how WOW cherry does for you. If it does well I may have to plant it for a fall crop.

Well, a year later - WOW, for us, grew a tall vining plant (Not bushy). It's on the sweet side of balanced. Tastes nothing like Sungold, but we liked them better. WOW would be a good cherry tomato plant to grow on a tall trellis/fence.

[Pamela58]

SunSugar is pretty awesome!

[heirloomtomaguy]

Originally Posted by AlittleSalt

Well, a year later - WOW, for us, grew a tall vining plant (Not bushy). It's on the sweet side of balanced. Tastes nothing like Sungold, but we liked them better. WOW would be a good cherry tomato plant to grow on a tall trellis/fence.

Looks like i need to plant these sooner than later. Thanks for the review.

[NewWestGardener]

How big is everybody's Sungold F1 fruit? I got one plant with all large fruit last year, as wide as 2" across as I remember, similiar to Mountain Magic, wonderful flavour. So I saved seeds and planted a couple of F2s this year, got the same large fruit that taste as good as any regular Sungold F1s. I will keep growing this next year again. The original seeds are from a trade labelled as F1, all grew true. I grew Sungolds from Johnny's for a few years before, so I am familiar with the variety, just never got the bigger fruit.
Here's a picture of the large ones vs. regular sized ones . The reference coin is a Canadian Toonie(1.1"). Or the large one is regular and I've been growing the off type smaller ones all these years and didn't know it?!

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by heirloomtomaguy

Looks like i need to plant these sooner than later. Thanks for the review.

Wow was in my garden last season. Grew as Salt described. Very tasty but every one of them split terribly. For this reason, I won't grow again.

[Barbee]

Pink Princess replaced Sungold in my garden. Its just as sweet to my taste buds.

[ddsack]

Originally Posted by NewWestGardener

How big is everybody's Sungold F1 fruit? I got one plant with all large fruit last year, as wide as 2" across as I remember, similiar to Mountain Magic, wonderful flavour. So I saved seeds and planted a couple of F2s this year, got the same large fruit that taste as good as any regular Sungold F1s. I will keep growing this next year again. The original seeds are from a trade labelled as F1, all grew true. I grew Sungolds from Johnny's for a few years before, so I am familiar with the variety, just never got the bigger fruit.
Here's a picture of the large ones vs. regular sized ones . The reference coin is a Canadian Toonie(1.1"). Or the large one is regular and I've been growing the off type smaller ones all these years and didn't know it?!

I've never gotten a large sized cherry from Sungold F1, in fact most tend to be smaller than other standard cherries like Snow White and Black Cherry. Did your F2 Sungold have the same fruity taste of the smaller ones? If so, that is a real find and please keep saving seeds!

I still have not found any cherry that I like as well as Sungold, cracks and all. It's not the sweetness that impresses me, but the fruity acid zing that it has at the ripeness stage I like best. All other sweet cherry tomatoes just taste blandly sweet to me.

[oakley]

I'm not a SunGold cheerleader, but I do grow it every year.
It is early and dependable. I don't ever get cracking/splitting
unless I miss a few and they over-ripen on the vine.

It does so well for so many in different climates.

I grow many other cherries for the 'cherry bowl' but never have
looked to replace SunGold. Rare that another grows as well every
year despite the whirly-gig unpredictable conditions.

If a new gardener asked for a top ten tomato list, it would be on
it just for dependability alone. I want a new gardener to succeed.
Sure we like others we have grown
better, but it has such good qualities and often the bulk of the
'bowl' early on and all season right through October. This year
seems to be including November.

[NewWestGardener]

For the same reason, I don't think I'll replace Sungold with anything else, that fruity taste.
The large F2s are identical to the F1s I saved seeds from, same taste, and with abundant flowering and clusters. So on to F3 next year. I harvested lots of seeds from both generations, and will grow both again next year. I did not grow any other orange cherries last year, so no mixups.

A real wonderful red cherry was Nectar F1 last year, but not a replacement for Sungold.
Isis Candy is another good one.



,

Originally Posted by ddsack

I've never gotten a large sized cherry from Sungold F1, in fact most tend to be smaller than other standard cherries like Snow White and Black Cherry. Did your F2 Sungold have the same fruity taste of the smaller ones? If so, that is a real find and please keep saving seeds!

I still have not found any cherry that I like as well as Sungold, cracks and all. It's not the sweetness that impresses me, but the fruity acid zing that it has at the ripeness stage I like best. All other sweet cherry tomatoes just taste blandly sweet to me.