Need help from the Pros here...

[bigcheef]

Gimme and I have been discussin a particular variety that appears to Spontaneously throw both RL and PL seedlings.

The original Polish C seed was acquired from Sand Hill and is described as having PL foliage. I had forgotten this when I planted the seed last year and thought nothing of having all RL seedlings (approximately 10).

After saving seed from the RL plant, which happened to be one of the largest and most productive plants from last year, shared seed has turned out 5 PL seedlings out of 8 for Gimme. Mine are still 2-3 weeks from true leaves so I decided to call Sand Hill.

After speaking to Linda and Glen, I understand that Carolyn’s book mentions that this RL / PL tendency is common with Polish C. (as she experienced in her garden)

I know the story on so called “Polish” varieties is similar- “Large pink beefsteaks, PL foliage:”

So what do y’all think?

No need to be a “Pro” to respond…..8)

BTW, I plan to sew several seeds from the original pack as a control.

RIK

[nctomatoman]

My take on this - I just don't buy that certain varieties have a tendency to flip PL/RL and vice versa. My view is that it is just that there is segregation going on, perhaps from some crossing a few generations back. I have a variety called Taps that had a reputation for going back and forth - I worked on it, grew PL seedlings and RL seedlings and saved seed separately from each, and within a few seasons got it worked out that the leaf shape comes true each season.

My other data point is that after growing out thousands of seedlings of various varieties over the past 10 years, unless crossing occurs, varieties come pretty much 100% to their expected leaf shape. If you do see something unexpected, it is typically a cross or stray seed.

So, a good test - grow out a plant of each, save seeds separately, and see if after a few seasons you don't get it consistent with respec to leaf shape.

Just my two cents!

[Grub]

I'm hearing Craig's view a lot more from other pros, so that's the line I'm taking, too. As in, cross.

[bigcheef]

Sounds good to me guys. I don't bag blossoms, so I'm sure it could have been crossed in my garden last year.

I just thought it was strange to have all RL the first year when the description was PL to begin with. Either way, it will be interesting to see what we have this year compared to seeds from the original packet.

This was a great variety and I've shared seed with several T-villians so keep me posted of your results and hopefully we'll figure it out.

RIK

[carolyn137]

I have a different view here and want to introduce the concept of jumping genes.

I grew Polish C for years and it was always PL from saved seeds. Then one year I got two RL plants instead of PL's. I saved seed. B/c folks nagged me I offered that RL Polish C seed at one of my seed offers at GW, so that seed is out there. And all that's different with that is the leaf form; all else being the same.

Glenn at Sandhill requested seed for all of the varieties in my book that he didn't already have when the book was published, and the Polish C sent to him was PL.

As for Taps, I hear what Craig says, and I don't think I'm any less of a so called "pro" than anyone else, and I could not get it to be stable.

Save seeds from PL's, regrow and get both. Save seeds from RL plants, save seeds and get both. For several years in a row. So I gave up and just left it there. Had it been a variety that I was distributing, which I wasn't with Taps, I would NOT have distributed the wrong leaf form.

So Craig and I got different results re Taps, and I'm saying we got different results and that time was NOT a factor for me.

An additional problem is the instability of Dr. Carolyn Pink, which most of you know about. And I've been dealing with this for about nine years now, and still cannot stabilize the fruit size/taste of Dr. Carolyn Pink.

The variety Dr. Carolyn was throwing red fruited plants for many years and again, saved seed from ivory gave both and saved seed from red gave both.

So I don't think it's as easy as saying that time solves all genetic instability problems, I really don't, and actually I have a new outlook on this.

And that came out of a relatively recent thread, I think it was at GW, where folks were talking about spontaneous mutations, as I was as well, and I was saying, as I often do, that they are permanent heritable mutations.

But Keith came back and said that not all such mutations were permanent and heritable and gave a reference and cut and pasted some info.

it turns out, which I didn't know, that tomatoes have what are called jumping genes, which I knew from other systems, but didn't know they had been described for tomatoes.

So in the case of Polish C , Taps and Dr. Carolyn pink it's very possible that jumping genes are at work.

There is no specific time that a jumping gene stays in one place where it has knocked out function of a specific trait, or indeed released from suppression and allowed the expression of a different trait.

So the tomato genome, as with other genomes, can be seen as kind of a moving target, if you will, as regards DNA expression as moderated by jumping genes.

[sirtanon]

Wow, Carolyn.. I've never heard of that before. Pretty wild stuff. I'll have to try growing out one of those varieties and see what I get.

.......................

That aside though, my first reaction to the question posed was that it was a cross.. that 2 out of 10 ratio looks conspicuously close to the 1:4 ratio seen with PL/RL dehybridization. And, considering the plant was very vigorous, it's possible it had the much talked-about "hybrid vigor"

[Fusion_power]

I'm in the crossed seed camp. I've grown Polish C from Sandhill for the last 3 or 4 years. My seed produce Potato Leaf foliage. I don't see RL vs PL foliage expression varying at all.

I will point out a couple of genetic anomalies that can occur. One is in tomato and the other in onion. The Green Stripe gene in tomato is definitely known to express sometimes and other times to be present but unseen. A line of tomatoes carrying the GS gene can magically drop a seed that produces green stripe fruit. With onion, pink color is controlled by a set of genes that are buried way back in the genome. It is common to cross a white onion with a yellow onion and get a pink seedling. The white breeds true. The yellow breeds true. But cross the white and yellow and you get pink. This is caused by a genetic combination that restores an historic genetic linkage. A gene is turned off in the white onion that would otherwise produce pink. Another gene is turned off in the yellow onion. When the yellow and white are crossed, both required genes for pink are now present and the offspring exhibit an unanticipated pink color.

Just to reiterate, I have had no problems with Polish C exhibiting any leaf form other than Potato Leaf. I have seedlings started and will be saving new seed this year.

Fusion

[carolyn137]

Fusion, Keith was discussing the green stripe genes when discussing jumping genes. Didn't you also post in that thread?

And in general there could be a big difference between getting an RL plant from a PL original, depending on whether it's a presumed natural cross or a spontanous mutation.

This is something that Keith and I have been discussing off and on, for many years, and I mean that.

A spontaneous mutation is most often thought of as a change in one base pair in a triplet sequence in the DNA. I think many of you remember that DNA is composed of the four bases thymine, guanine, adenine and cytosine and it's the arrangement of the specific triplet sequences, each one of which specifies one amino acid, that determines whether the protein product will be functional, or not.

But spontaneous mutations can also occur by deletion or addition of bases to the sequence, as well as by inversions as well as by new repetetive sequences.

All of this I know from other systems, but tomatoes also being eukaryotic, apparently it's only been recently that such things as jumping genes and other mechansims have been reported re certain tomato genes.

If you get a cross between a variety homozygous dominant for RL, with a PL, which is homozygous recessive, you're always going to get ALL RL heterozygotes in the seed that's saved from that cross as long as ALL ovules in the tomato ovary were X pollinated. And how can you be so sure that there was no change in any other traits, such as fruit form, taste, etc.? You can't be sure.

So are all RL segregants of normal PL's the same with respect to all other traits? Maybe, maybe not.

And it goes the other way as well, as in are all PL segregants of normal RL's the same with respect to all other traits? Maybe, maybe not.

Look at the difference folks find with Cherokee Purple, normally RL, with the PL one that Jere Gettle found in his tomato patch. Those who have grown both say they aren't the same as to fruit traits.

If a natural cross is between a heterozygous RL and a PL, then about one half of the progeny should be RL and one half PL, if all of the ovules in the tomato ovary were fertilized.

And after a natural cross you may get ratios very different depending on the DEGREE of cross pollination for any one fruit, as well as how many fruits were used to save seeds.

Which is why I urge no one to save seed from just one fruit.

Interesting stuff, say I, but this whole concept of jumping genes, as I know them from other systems, puts a new perspective on flip flop with leaf form for a few varieties and why my initial saved seed from Galina's Yellow gave me plants with ALL cherries, but in different colors, and NO PL plants at all. And the RL with ivory cherries was the one that Steve Draper named Dr. Carolyn. And it helps me to explain why I get two fruit sizes for the Dr. Carolyn Pink that was sent to me, already named, by a fellow SSE member, and why those two different fruit sizes have different tastes, at least to me and some others who have grown both.

Dr. Carolyn has thrown both red and pink fruited plants with RL foliage. And the whole thing has been a mystery to me in the past. Now I have more to think about and consider.

[PaulF]

Is this essentially the reason Aunt Ruby's German Green from Glenn at Sandhill are a smaller size and some other ARGG are more beefsteak in size. Growouts from the smaller size remain smaller and growouts from the larger size have remained larger. To my palate, both taste the same and have the same texture, juiciness, coloration, seed output and are regular leaf plants.

[Patrina_Pepperina]

An article about scientists using jumping genes in Micro Tom:

http://wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il/sit...446&doc_id=952