Green shoulders

When tomatoes ripen and still have green shoulders, are the shoulders usually unripe, or are they like green-when-ripe tomatoes there?

I mean, is this usually uneven ripening, or are they usually bicolor (e.g. GWR and red)? I'm pretty sure I've seen some that had just ripened unevenly, but I'm not sure that it's the norm. (After all, some tomatoes have yellow shoulders, but the rest of the fruit never turns yellow at any point.)

[Gardeneer]

Some varieties even the green shoulder part is ripe. Those are the so-called black/dark/purple/bi (multi ) color varieties.
For example a ripe Big Beef, Big Boy .. should not have a green shoulder.
That , of course, is what I have experienced . The experts will tell you about the "Green Shoulder" gene.

Thanks for your information!

[brownrexx]

Modern hybrids, like Big Beef, have been bred to have a gene for uniform ripening. Older varieties do not have this gene so green shoulders are perfectly normal.

Does the green part taste ripe? I don't know since I usually don't eat that part. Someone else will have to answer that one.

Originally Posted by brownrexx

Modern hybrids, like Big Beef, have been bred to have a gene for uniform ripening. Older varieties do not have this gene so green shoulders are perfectly normal.

Does the green part taste ripe? I don't know since I usually don't eat that part. Someone else will have to answer that one.

I've heard about modern hybrids that have had it bred out, but even my heirlooms rarely if ever get green shoulders. I wonder if the growing conditions also play a role, or if I've just managed to select varieties that coincidentally don't have them. What are some varieties that are definitely supposed to have green shoulders? Isn't it mostly just supposed to be the big beefsteak heirloom varieties that get them, rather than the round, medium or small ones? I have heard that Yellow Pear can have green shoulders, though. I don't remember if it had them when we grew it, but our neighbor's end of season ones two years ago seemed all yellow.

Here are some open-pollinated ones I've tried that I remember did not have any green shoulders for me (not all of these are large, heirloom beefsteaks, but some are):

* German Pink
* Pruden's Purple
* Golden King of Siberia
* Peaceful Valley's Beefsteak (it was round and small, though)
* American Seed's Beefsteak (it was round and small, though)
* Aussie
* Creole
* Thessaloniki
* Black Giant
* Black
* Mexican Yellow
* Pink Stuffer
* Yellow Ruffled
* Chapman
* Cuostralee
* George Detsikas Italian Red
* Matina (it's not supposed to have them, though)
* Medovaya Kaplya
* Glacier
* Sweet Ozark Orange
* Seek No Further Love Apple
* Missouri Pink Love Apple
* Pink Cheeks (it can have yellow shoulders, but not all of mine did)
* Giant Belgium
* Persimmon
* Black from Tula
* Aladdin's Lamp
* Big Sungold Select
* Omar's Lebanese
* Oroma
* Roma
* Zapotec
* McGee
* Ethel Watkins Best
* Napa Giant (basically Mortgage Lifter)
* etc.

Of course, Green Giant, Cherokee Green Pear and Green Pear all had green shoulders, though.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by brownrexx

Modern hybrids, like Big Beef, have been bred to have a gene for uniform ripening. Older varieties do not have this gene so green shoulders are perfectly normal.

Does the green part taste ripe? I don't know since I usually don't eat that part. Someone else will have to answer that one.

Precisely.

The uniform ripening gene has been bred into almost all more modern varieties, meaning F1's, but there are many OP's where it is normal to see green shoulders.Not a problem for me or many others.

Carolyn

[zipcode]

The actual amount of green shoulders will vary quite a bit among the tomatoes without the uniform ripening gene. The reason: who knows, there's probably more than 1 gene involved.
Growing conditions definitely play a role also.
I find that big hearts have the most shoulder of all tomatoes generally. I am taking here about the part that actually is green inside the flesh, not the greener skin on the outside. Black tomatoes appear to have lots of green shoulder but they are generally quite edible, unlike the hearts.

Thanks, Carolyn and zipcode.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

Precisely.

The uniform ripening gene has been bred into almost all more modern varieties, meaning F1's, but there are many OP's where it is normal to see green shoulders.Not a problem for me or many others.

Carolyn

I totally forgot to add the following.

https://consumer.healthday.com/vitam...ty-666253.html

The above shows that what we know as the uniform ripening gene was known back in the 1920's

http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/...omato-ripening



https://www.google.com/search?q=unif...&bih=790&dpr=1

Carolyn

Originally Posted by carolyn137

I totally forgot to add the following.

https://consumer.healthday.com/vitam...ty-666253.html

The above shows that what we know as the uniform ripening gene was known back in the 1920's

http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/...omato-ripening



https://www.google.com/search?q=unif...&bih=790&dpr=1

Carolyn

That's fascinating about the flavor/sugars. That reminds me of how tomatoes with blossom end rot tend to taste a lot better in my garden. (Seriously, they're awesome, and they can be a lot sweeter.) I wonder if it's because the tomato doesn't have to ripen the whole fruit, so it concentrates its efforts (worthy of a whole fruit) into what's available. This leads me to wonder if the reason they gave for why the uneven ripening makes them sweeter is an assumption, or if it's something they've studied in and of itself, too. Whatever the case, it's still pretty fascinating.

Thanks, Carolyn!