Dr. Carolyn's Pink

[MikeInCypress]

As I understand it this variety is still a bit unstable with 2 different fruit types. One is a pink cherry with excellent taste and the other is a pink golf ball sized globe with average taste. My question is: I have grown one plant from my seed source and it was the "off" strain. What are the chances that all the seeds in the pack are the "off" type? Or should I scratch it from my list for this year? If so what would be a good pink cherry? Thanks

MikeInCypress

"Growing older, not up"

[carolyn137]

Mike, there are folks who like both of the cherries, the one the size of Dr Carolyn,and the other one a bit bigger.

I'm the one who has been saying that I think the smaller one is the better tasting of the two.

When I save seeds from the smaller one I get both types and when I save seeds from the larger one I get both types, so there's no way to predict what the rest of the seeds in the pack will give you if you plant just one plant.

And maybe you'll like the taste of both types, but you won't know until you taste them.

This whole business with Dr, Carolyn ( the tomato, not the person, ) has been confusing from the get go after planting out saved seeds from Galina's Yellow and getting an array of plant and fruit types and leaf forms and colors, but always cherries. From a genetic point of view I've never understood it.

And for quite a while Dr Carolyn was throwing some red plants and then this pink one was sent to me by an SSE member and while it's never shown red or ivory it has consistently shown the two sized cherries.

[travis]

This whole business with Dr, Carolyn ( the tomato, not the person, ) has been confusing from the get go after planting out saved seeds from Galina's Yellow and getting an array of plant and fruit types and leaf forms and colors, but always cherries. From a genetic point of view I've never understood it.

Carolyn,

Do you mean that you get a variety of stuff out of regular Galina's seeds or out of Dr. Carolyn seeds?

If Galina's throws a variety of stuff, is that consistent from all sources or just from a few seed sources?

If just from a few seed sources ... which ones?

I was planning on planting Galina's yellow this year and just wondered how many seedlings I should keep in anticipation of what I might expect.

PV

[carolyn137]

PV, the second time I grew Galina's Yellow, same original seeds from High Altitude b/c Bill McDorman had just started bringing back all these varieties from Siberia, I saved seeds and planted out the next year.

I got both PL anmd RL plants, aways cherries, and in colors such as yellow, not deep gold, pink, red, salmon and the ivory one.

At the same time in Utah Steve Draper had had the same problem and asked if I would send to him some of my growouts, b'c I saved seeds from a few of those and even then the ivory one, which I dubbed Ivory Mutant at the time, was the star of the bunch.

Steve loved the Ivory one and then named it Dr Carolyn and first listed it in the SSE Yearbook.

So I know that Steve and I both had problems, I don't know the source of his Galina seeds and I can't remember if I grew Galina's Yellow again.

It wasn't a cross b'c for both of us only cherries appeared and I finally decided it was some kind of genetic instability.

I haven't heard of anyone else experiencing this, and that was in the early 90's, as I say, from original High Altitude Seeds seeds.

And yes, Dr. Carolyn was also initially unstable and several folks got red fruited plants from it. I haven' heard of that happening lately either. And some folks also got pink fruited plants from Dr. Carolyn and the one that was sent to me by that SSE member had already been named Dr. Carolyn Pink.

As I said, I haven' t seen Dr. Carolyn Pink throw another color, but those two different sizes are there.

If I were you I don't think I'd worry that much about your current day Galina's doing anything strange b/c plenty of other folks have grown Galina's of late and no one has reported what Steve and I experienced.

[travis]

That's very interesting. Thanks.

The Galina's I have are from Bully in 2005. I'm gonna grow them out this spring and after reading your first message was just wondering whether to expect anything other than PL yellow cherries.

Now I think I'll get some Dr. Carolyn Pinks for next year so I can see these two different sizes ... hopefully ... and some DC creams too since everyone seems to love their flavor.

Really, I'm looking for some more good cherry tomatoes ... everyone loves'm and always asks "do you have any cherry tomato seedlings?" I'd like to give'm something very good but a little different.

PV