Hybrid is as Hybrid does

[Barbee]

[HTML]And that's why not only am I OK with how "The Posse's" going about tomato breeding, but am an enthusiastic participant. Maybe the end result's not as good as it could have been, who knows? But we're having fun, getting our hands dirty, and eating things that we had enough passion not only to grow, but to create. And isn't that kind of the point?[/HTML]

I'm going to address this part of your post since you are asking for opinions

As someone who does not breed tomatoes I see no problem with what you're doing in sharing crosses with friends and discussing all the aspects of growing and breeding tomatoes. More power to ya ..and while it's not my cup of tea, I don't begrudge anyone enjoying a hobby.

Where things get sticky for me as a seed buyer is when you or anyone else sells me seed that is not stable. Since I do not breed tomatoes and have no desire to breed tomatoes, I don't want to pay my hard earned money to get 6 different tomatoes off 6 plants of the same seed. I want what is advertised so I can make an informed decision as to whether I like that variety or not.

Now mind you, I don't have a dog in this fight. I know from being a member of several boards and reading for many years several of the players in this fight.. but all I am concerned about is truth in advertising. I am putting total faith in the seed sellers I buy from that the seeds I purchase are as advertised. As I said earlier, I am not a breeder and have no desire to be a breeder, but I can just look at the photos through the eyes of an old lady that has been growing tomatoes for about 35 years that surf4girl posted and see there is a screw loose somewhere. Yes, you can get a couple of different shapes going on due to weather during a growing season, but different colors and shapes just dont cut the mustard for me.

If someone is trading seeds or sharing seeds with friends for a SASE and that kind of mess happens then its okay to say oops lets go back and try this again. If you are selling seed and the consumer gets a hot mess like that, then thats a whole different story.

[sicily]

PaddyMc,

Kudos to you. I just found this post and find it a bit caustic to say the least. You expressed exactly how I feel in a very eloquent way. I'm very happy to experiment with some of these crosses and feel very lucky and happy to do so. Bill Jeffers and Tom Wagner are my tomato heros. Big Cheef is my favorite tomato via Bill and Tom's creations never cease to amaze. I have the utmost respect for them both, and hope their creations will always be in my garden. I'm a gardener not a geneticist. I do enjoy tomatoes that are delicious, productive, disease resistant, and are exciting to look at. They produce tomatoes that do that for me, I'm very grateful. I've never met them but have conversed with them both and believe they are honest in how they represent their offerings. After growing Big Cheef, via SSE, I contacted Bill to see if he had any other tomatoes, it was the most delicious tomato I had ever tried. I certainly hope they both keep doing their research into giving us exceptional tomatoes, I hope I can be a part of it.

[PaddyMc]

Originally Posted by Barbee

[HTML]And that's why not only am I OK with how "The Posse's" going about tomato breeding, but am an enthusiastic participant. Maybe the end result's not as good as it could have been, who knows? But we're having fun, getting our hands dirty, and eating things that we had enough passion not only to grow, but to create. And isn't that kind of the point?[/HTML]

I'm going to address this part of your post since you are asking for opinions

As someone who does not breed tomatoes I see no problem with what you're doing in sharing crosses with friends and discussing all the aspects of growing and breeding tomatoes. More power to ya ..and while it's not my cup of tea, I don't begrudge anyone enjoying a hobby.

Where things get sticky for me as a seed buyer is when you or anyone else sells me seed that is not stable. Since I do not breed tomatoes and have no desire to breed tomatoes, I don't want to pay my hard earned money to get 6 different tomatoes off 6 plants of the same seed. I want what is advertised so I can make an informed decision as to whether I like that variety or not.

Now mind you, I don't have a dog in this fight. I know from being a member of several boards and reading for many years several of the players in this fight.. but all I am concerned about is truth in advertising. I am putting total faith in the seed sellers I buy from that the seeds I purchase are as advertised. As I said earlier, I am not a breeder and have no desire to be a breeder, but I can just look at the photos through the eyes of an old lady that has been growing tomatoes for about 35 years that surf4girl posted and see there is a screw loose somewhere. Yes, you can get a couple of different shapes going on due to weather during a growing season, but different colors and shapes just dont cut the mustard for me.

If someone is trading seeds or sharing seeds with friends for a SASE and that kind of mess happens then its okay to say oops lets go back and try this again. If you are selling seed and the consumer gets a hot mess like that, then thats a whole different story.

Cool. Glad for another voice in this conversation. To be clear, I agree with you about seed sellers having a responsibility to truth in advertising. What I disagree with is the asumption some people have made in this thread (which, to be frank, I suspect is based more on personal animosity rather than actual evidence) that it's impossible for some of these varieties to be stable.
I also agree with your last paragraph "If someone is trading seeds or sharing seeds with friends for a SASE and that kind of mess happens then its okay to say oops lets go back and try this again. If you are selling seed and the consumer gets a hot mess like that, then thats a whole different story."

If you carefully re-read this thread, you might note that Surf4grrl's Sweet Beverly were GIVEN to her. She didn't buy them. Which means they were probably simply a cross. It happens. If I were her, I'd personally be psched (for the reasons I outlined in my last post), I'd have three new tomatoes to play with. She wasn't psyched, which is ok for the same reason. But I think she's making a leap to assume that the Sweet Beverly coming from Marianna's, grown by Marianna, with an eye toward seed quality control rather than simply having seeds to give away or trade are necessilary unstable. For what it's worth the three Sweet Beverly plants I grew last year were all the same good tasting yellow pear/plums. Three plants isn't enough to definitivly say it's stable. Any more than four different plants obtained in a trade make it unstable. And as yellow cherry-types go, I liked Coyote better.
In the end, to me, we're all just growing tomatoes; and the animosity in this thread is hampering, rather than helping our little community. If you're still worried about what you're getting from the seller in question, buy somewhere else, those small sellers (also part of our community) need your $ too. For me, I've always been happy with what I've gotten there for my money and will continue as such.

[carolyn137]

Paddy, I have more to say and none of it is about jealousy or anything like that.

I posted above that I'd be back soon to post about some of your comments and intended to but my first priority right now is about my new 2013 varieties sent to me and getting issues straight with those who do seed production for me.

So here it is about 13:30 PM and I stil lhave lots to do with reopening envelopes and counting the seeds in the seed packs.

And I have a date with my TV to watch the men's semi final tennis matches from Indian Wells in CA. Now don't be jealous of my current priorities,, b/c personally for me they do take precedence over posting in this thread.

Once againI'm here to check things at thesite, but will be back when I can. The tennis is to run from 3 PM to 7 PM, but one never knows how long it takes, since someone can win in two sets and some in three and there's always a concern about injuries.

We'll see how I feel this evening, and I still have to make notes from your recent post to remind me what I want to post about more specifically.

Carolyn

[PaddyMc]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

Paddy, I have more to say and none of it is about jealousy or anything like that.

I posted above that I'd be back soon to post about some of your comments and intended to but my first priority right now is about my new 2013 varieties sent to me and getting issues straight with those who do seed production for me.

So here it is about 13:30 PM and I stil lhave lots to do with reopening envelopes and counting the seeds in the seed packs.

And I have a date with my TV to watch the men's semi final tennis matches from Indian Wells in CA. Now don't be jealous of my current priorities,, b/c personally for me they do take precedence over posting in this thread.

Once againI'm here to check things at thesite, but will be back when I can. The tennis is to run from 3 PM to 7 PM, but one never knows how long it takes, since someone can win in two sets and some in three and there's always a concern about injuries.

We'll see how I feel this evening, and I still have to make notes from your recent post to remind me what I want to post about more specifically.

Carolyn

Take your time, tennis matters! I've played my whole life, and I would watch the match first. I look forward to learning from you.

[greyghost]

Sicily, I agree whole heartedly with you; I'm a big fan of Bill Jeffers work
and Tom's varieties have certainly given a lot of enjoyment to those who
like to experiment with something new.

I think Big Cheef and the off-spring from Bill Jeffers Brandywine x Neves
Azorean Red (Dixiewine, which had been known as Narx and Ami's Brannar)are some of the best tomatoes I've grown. The Indian Stripe/possibly Daniels
(originally from Bill's garden-although an accidental cross) that I got from
Carolyn's 2012 seed offer was an excellent tomato. The status/name hasn't really been clarified yet so I've held off on sharing seed. I have some of Bill's
new crosses and it'll be exciting to see what comes from them. That said, I
grow a lot of well established heirloom/open-pollenated types also and I hope
to maintain the integrity of them.

[surf4grrl]

I never brought up anyone other than the person who gave me the seeds and sweet beverley very specifically. So please, don't bring me and another seed company up in the same sentence because that's a complete mis-attribution.

& yes, it doesn't matter if I was given them or bought them - because we all would be naming the same "out-crossing" the same thing - should we have 3 different sweet sharon's all by different names? Because that's what this is amounting to.

Lastly, I already stated I bought and will continue to buy crosses - I posted that awhile back. I mentioned Tom Wagner specifically.

This isn't about crosses, this is about integrity among "colleagues", among people who are doing the same work.

Please explain to me how it is possible I got a cross and all knowledge was disavowed of my cross. No one said "oh hey, a cross". What I was told to take a picture of it on the vine because......

Then 2 or 3 months later the cross comes out as another variety?

No one has answered that question and the truth and my words are being obfuscated.

I don't care if it was a cross, just be honest about it, instead of heralding another "new variety".

[surf4grrl]

For someone to answer the question as to how the "sweet beverly" I got in 2011 was absolutely not stable (a "cross") and one of those "crosses/hybrids" became "sweet sharon" (the white cherry) months later.

[GunnarSK]

Originally Posted by surf4grrl

I'm still waiting for someone to answer the question as to how the "sweet beverly" I got in 2011 was absolutely not stable (a "cross") and one of those "crosses/hybrids" became "sweet sharon" (the white cherry) months later.

As a member of the Depot I'm of course concerned about your trouble with "Sweet Beverley" and intend to grow the seeds I got in early 2010 (not from a later Depot member and from not later than the 2009 harvest) with potential instability in mind.

[Fat Charlie]

Originally Posted by surf4grrl

For someone to answer the question as to how the "sweet beverly" I got in 2011 was absolutely not stable (a "cross") and one of those "crosses/hybrids" became "sweet sharon" (the white cherry) months later.

My guess:

[PaddyMc]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

Paddy, I have more to say and none of it is about jealousy or anything like that.

I posted above that I'd be back soon to post about some of your comments and intended to but my first priority right now is about my new 2013 varieties sent to me and getting issues straight with those who do seed production for me.

So here it is about 13:30 PM and I stil lhave lots to do with reopening envelopes and counting the seeds in the seed packs.

And I have a date with my TV to watch the men's semi final tennis matches from Indian Wells in CA. Now don't be jealous of my current priorities,, b/c personally for me they do take precedence over posting in this thread.

Once againI'm here to check things at thesite, but will be back when I can. The tennis is to run from 3 PM to 7 PM, but one never knows how long it takes, since someone can win in two sets and some in three and there's always a concern about injuries.

We'll see how I feel this evening, and I still have to make notes from your recent post to remind me what I want to post about more specifically.

Carolyn

How's the tournament going? Still no big rush, but I'd still love to hear more about the selection strategy for OTV, and your other thoughts on my idea about general heirloom history.
Thanks!

[PaddyMc]

Originally Posted by surf4grrl

For someone to answer the question as to how the "sweet beverly" I got in 2011 was absolutely not stable (a "cross") and one of those "crosses/hybrids" became "sweet sharon" (the white cherry) months later.

Wait, I'm confused. Your white segregate became Sweet Sharon? You sent seeds from that one back to your seed source and that's how you know it's unstable?
If what you got in the seeds that were sent to you was an F2 from an accidental cross of Sweet Beverly x ?, that would suggest that the mystery parent was clear skinned and the F2's were segregating for that (the difference between a white tomato and a pale yellow being skin color). If you sent those back to your original seed source than they'd be at best F4 (sent back F3 seed, grown out to F4) and still unstable.

On the other hand, yellow to clear skin seems to be one of the more "common" mutations out there (see Dr. Carolyn/Green Doctors Frosted). I see it as totally plausible that Sweet Sharon is simply Sweet Sharon clear skin if that's what the original source got (not a segregate from you). I dropped 20 Sweet Sharon seeds yesterday (seeds from Marianna's). And will probably grow out at least 10. If they're all the same, that'll pretty well settle the debate for me. I'm doing that not because I need 10 more cherry tomato plants (I really don't), but because I believe that I'd rather know for myself, rather than just take what I hear on the Internet.

I almost didn't "re-ignite" this thread, because feeding into it wasn't helping anybody, but your post sat un-answered in a substantive way for days, and I thought you deserved the dignity of a meaningful response. I hope we can continue this conversation in a tone of mutual respect and honest sharing of experience and knowledge.

[GunnarSK]

I may have been the first to suggest that Green Doctors could be a cross rather than a mutation, and it was not inpired by Carolyn, rather by Keith Mueller's comment in Tania's database: "Seems odd to me to call it a sport when it has 2 supposed mutations occurring - green flesh and yellow skin - compared to it's supposed sib lines of Dr. Carolyn and Dr. Carolyn Pink which lack those genes."

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by GunnarSK

I may have been the first to suggest that Green Doctors could be a cross rather than a mutation, and it was not inpired by Carolyn, rather by Keith Mueller's comment in Tania's database: "Seems odd to me to call it a sport when it has 2 supposed mutations occurring - green flesh and yellow skin - compared to it's supposed sib lines of Dr. Carolyn and Dr. Carolyn Pink which lack those genes."

I lost my whole long post Gunnar and now I'm trying to remember what I said.

Yes, I saw Keith's quote at Tania's Green Doctors page and he hasn't been shy about saying how much he dislikes the taste, so be it.

Nothing surprises me about what might be thrown from the initial finding, by me, that saved seeds from Galina, bought from Bill McDorman off his website after he brought back many varieties from Siberia and sold them from the first time I saved seeds from that Galina. Craig L and I bought all of them and shared seed.

From that Galina from saved seed I got plants with different colored fruits, pink, salmon, red, yellow and the one with ivory colored fruits which had the best taste. At the time Steve Draper in Utah was also seeing the same thing from Galina, but didn't get the ivory colored one and asked me to send him seeds and it was he who named it Dr. Carolyn, not me.

And you also saw that Dr. Carolyn, the variety, not the human, which I still am, threw red fruited plants at first then settled down.

I never asked Amy if it was one plant with all GWRipe fruits, or a somatic mutation with just one fruit or a branch with the different fruits. But I was confused at that time that an ivory colored fruit could give rise to a GWRipe, so asked Keith about it when he used to be here at Tville. He wrote back a long PM which said yes, it could happen and I might still have that PM but how to find it, well, that's a problem, but I can try if you want me to.

OK, back to the lineage. Someone sent me what he called Dr. Carolyn Pink and as I noted everywhere I got plants with two different cherry sized fruits.

The change from GD to GD Frosted occurred independently by three folks, Jeff In Canada, Neil in Indiana, and it turns out Lee Goodwin's sister also found it with seeds for GD that I was listing in the SSE Yearbook.

Do I understand how all these changes occurred going back to my original saved seeds from Galina? No I don't and I don't think anyone does.

But I do think there's some kind of genetics going on between so called whites and GWRipes, and that's based on the year that I had three Cherokee Green plants out for seed production and two of them had the same sized and shaped fruits, but fruits were IVORY colored and were lousy tasting.

So there it was Cherokee Green to ivory colored and GD was ivory colored to GWripe.

GD was a cross you suggest? I think it was more the genetic instability at work from the get go with the original Galina seeds that both Steve Draper and I got from Bill McDorman.

Look at all the various varieties that arose from the original Cherokee Purple to Cherokee Chocolate to Cherokee Green and beyond.

Stuff happens and often none of us know why, in a genetic sense.

Carolyn

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by PaddyMc

How's the tournament going? Still no big rush, but I'd still love to hear more about the selection strategy for OTV, and your other thoughts on my idea about general heirloom history.
Thanks!

That tournament was the 1000 Masters tournament in Indian Wells, CA, and now it's the same with the Sony one in Miami, but I've had no time to even watch that one.

Paddy, you can help by getting youtrself to my home and helping me get all these new varieties sorted out. I let the four folks helping me with seed production make their own choices off the list I sent, I rotate who goes first each year, to be fair.

Some wanted the same varieties, so now I have to count seeds to see if there's enough seeds for both and for some enough seeds to send to Craig in Raleigh who raises my plants for me.

And I'm still waiting for some new seeds to arrive. Yesterday two new ones from Clara (Germany)came, she'd sent some great ones earlier, I love the name of one that came yesterday called Heartbreaker in translation, waiting for some seeds from Fred Hempel, and still waiting for seeds from Marina in Russia. She got mine, and we sent each other seeds just one day apart, but mine aren't here yet.

You're not going anywhere, nor am I so when things calm down I'll get back to you, I will, on some of what you said in your original post, with which I don't agree.

Do I donothng other than fool around with seeds every day and night? No way, I have other responsibilities and things I want/need to do as well.
But quickly, my selection for what Craig and I named OTV Brandywine was based on the picture that was sent back to Craig L, who had sent seeds of Yellow Brandywine to this person and the picture and F2 seeds were sent back to Craig.

So I tried to select for a large red beefsteak on a plant with PL foliage as was shown in the picture from the F2 seeds sent back.

And it took me out to the F5 or F6, I can't remember right now, before I had it and it was stable. And that's growing out and making selections each summer. No greenhouse growing, just 5-6 long years making selections each summer.

Carolyn