Sungold volunteer...what to expect?
 

I spotted an interesting volunteer in my garden today and I'm pretty sure it has to be a Sungold sport. Last year, Opalka, San Marzano Redorta, Amish Paste and Sungold grew in this area. Now, I have a darling little 6" tomato plant with at least 6 flowers on it. In my zone 5 garden, without the benefit of a greenhouse for extra-early starts, I wouldn't expect to see flowers for another few weeks. Yet, there they are on that bushy little plant.

So...I suspect I'm accidentally dehybridizing Sungold. I think it's pretty reasonable to assume that this isn't one of the paste varieties unless there was some kind of spontaneous mutation involved (which I think is highly doubtful.)

This plant's early nature has really peaked my interest and I'm wondering what else to expect. I know that quite a few people have tried to find a stable OP version of Sungold that was just as tasty as the original. I am certainly going to save seeds and am really curious about what kind of flavors I might run into with this line. Any thoughts? Any comments about previous discoveries when dehybridizing this variety?

I had a bunch of Sun Gold volunteers come up one summer. They were all different colors. Some of them were yellow or gold, some orange, some red. They all tasted OK, but none of them tasted like Sun Gold. I think I saved some seed from the orange ones, but I never got around to planting it. One of these years...lol.

Last year I allowed a sungold volunteer to grow and produce. I planted a Sungold next to it so I could compare the two. Not only could I not see or taste a difference, but no one else could either. I guess I was lucky.
[A thought just hit me as I typed the above comment. Should I have saved seeds from that? Too late now, of course.]

I have no room for volunteers this year, so I have been merciless with whatever sprouts up. Poor things.

In 2005 I grew a Sun Gold in one corner of my garden. Late last summer 2 or 3 little plants starting producing small Sun Gold colored tomatoes. The tallest plant was not more than 1.5 feet tall. The other 2 were smaller. Fruits ripened in mid-late September and a bit into October. Fruits tasted just like Sun Gold, but were a bit tart. I can only speculate as to the reasons why the taste was not quite perfect. I think it was because I had little plants trying to finish up in September and October. Not as much sunlight or heat, so the taste was not as wonderful. I saved seed and now have 12 Sun Gold F3s in pots, 2 hanging planters and 1 I farmed out to a curious fellow gardener. So far, the plants look alike. No differences I can see. No flowering yet, as I just finished setting out plants this past week. I want to see if luck will strike again, and if it does, I'll save a lot of seed. Best wishes on your experiment.

Sungold is such a favorite for Sandy and I that I've been doing the same thing since 2003. There's not a lot of room in our beds so I've had to limit myself to just a few growouts each season, plus they've had to suffer frost kills, insects and disease just like my other toms, so it's been a slow process with a few tantalyzing results but mostly disappointments.

Every year I try to grow a few seeds from each succession plus a few originals. I only save seeds from the most promising fruits. I'm growing an F4 or two this year, plus seeds from earlier generations, including a new selection of my F2 growout that popped up last season.

I've seen the same variation in both fruits and tastes as others have. Some have looked just like Sungold but were very tart to the point of being inedible. Some were red and nothing special. One or two had tiny fruits that had the right color but were super-sweet. Seeds are sparse in these small ones.

I thought I'd read where someone was actually successful at this, but I've never tried to get any seeds. I don't think any of the originators of the variety has ever gone on the record about the parents. From the variability of my growouts, I'd say there's more than two parents involved in the line.

It's hardly scientific, rather I'm treating it as just an entertaining exercise and maybe I'll get lucky this season. We're yet to find a "match" to the original.

So yes, you should've saved some seed! ;)

-Ed

Thanks for the responses all. :D I'm really excited to see what I end up with now. The plant has had quite a growth spurt since the last time I posted. It's still only about 24" tall but for my area, that's about average at this time of year. It's also covered in buds and I see a couple of little cherry toms hiding in there too. We shall soon see if this is a tasty one...:D

I've got my fingers "un-crossed" for ya! ;)

I'm growing 6 plants, four generations. Talk about a shotgun approach, but it's a lot of fun anticipating and finally sampling the results.

-Ed

Hi Pooklette,


Recently, I have gotten into the very bad habit of importuning several Tomatovillians who have discovered very dwarf Sungold or other mutants with early flowereing times to please keep a close watch on their plants, to please keep cuttings if possible of the original plants, or if discarding, to please consider sending a few seeds to me.

As i related to Mary in PNW, i have spent a lifetime in the interface of the signaling pathways where light, phytohormone adn certain other signals converge to regulate plant size and flowering time.

Since 2000, finally we have been getting solid results to questions that have remained elusive for all of the years of the past century. If you are interested, you may wish to look at somem of the scientific papers and references i have briefly quoted below.

[BTW, they are of interest too, for those wishing to learn more of ABA physiology and 'wilty' mutants]

Your 6inch plant with early flowering is a segregant of great interest to me. Please do not let it die; you can always take stem tip cuttings in a glass of water, should the need arise.

We know where the genes affecting certain 'dwarf' formations are located. We know where certain genes affecting flowering time are. There is more to be learnt about the latter; it is a complex subject.

Many hundreds of researchers have spent their lives on this one question alone!

Thanks much.

mouse


important information about novel cross-talk between sugar and other signaling pathways mediated by phytohormones, nitrogen, and light signals[B] (Sheen 1999[URL="http://www.genesdev.org/cgi/content/full/14/16/2085#B47"][/URL][/B])

[B] Cloning the Tomato [I]Curl3[/I] Gene Highlights the Putative Dual Role of the Leucine-Rich Repeat Receptor Kinase tBRI1/SR160 in Plant Steroid Hormone and Peptide Hormone Signaling[/B]

Teresa Montoya,1a Takahito Nomura,1ab Kerrie Farrar,a Tsuyoshi Kaneta,c Takao Yokota,b and Gerard J. Bishop2a

[B] A Putative Role for the Tomato Genes [I]DUMPY[/I] and [I]CURL-3[/I] in Brassinosteroid Biosynthesis and Response[/B]

Chala V. Koka,2 R. Eric Cerny,2,3 Randy G. Gardner, Takahiro Noguchi, Shozo Fujioka, Suguru Takatsuto, Shigeo Yoshida, and Steven D. Clouse*


[B] Manipulation of the Blue Light Photoreceptor Cryptochrome 2 in Tomato Affects Vegetative Development, Flowering Time, and Fruit Antioxidant Content[/B]

Leonardo Giliberto, Gaetano Perrotta, Patrizia Pallara, James L. Weller, Paul D. Fraser, Peter M. Bramley, Alessia Fiore, Mario Tavazza, and Giovanni Giuliano*

locus for Arabidopsis flowering time:
[B][I]ELF3[/I] [/B]

Hi Mouse,

That's all like a jet plane in the stratosphere over my head, but I'm glad to help if I've accidentally grown something that's applicable to your research. I sent you a PM on another topic. We'll exchange addresses and I'll send you some sample material.

It's possible I could send live cuttings and I'll bag some blossoms to save seed. I have extra seeds of my various Sungold growouts, but there's no way of knowing what might arise from them.

-Ed

Update...

I was right on the money assuming the volunteers were Sungolds. I probably shouldn't admit this outloud but, I let more than one of the volunteer plants live. I just couldn't resist. So, now I have a Sungold F1 A and a Sungold F1 B growing out there.

A is the one that flowered early, while the plant was still tiny. It has grown considerably since then but I'd say it's still only about 30" tall. Its tomatoes are a bit elongated, bright orange at maturity and are [U]very[/U] sweet. (Perhaps a tiny bit less so than Sungold F1, but still noticeably sweeter than most varieties I've tried.)

B flowered maybe a week after A, and that plant was also itty bitty at the time. This plant is about 24" tall right now and its tomatoes are just a tiny bit smaller than the usual Sungold. (This one is also bright orange.) I haven't sampled the flavor of this one yet because I'm hoping a few more will ripen in the next couple of days so I can save seeds from more than one at a time.

The picture on the left shows tomatoes from both plants. The three larger, slightly elongated fruits from plant A are on the top of the plate, and the smaller fruit from B is on the bottom. In the picture on the right, there's a sliced version of a very tasty, sweet tomato from plant A. I'm saving as much seed as possible from this plant. I'll try to do the same with plant B as well.

This accidental experiment has been fun so far! :D

Edited to add: I don't know if it's my monitor or what, but those photos look really dark. That's a quarter in the center of the plate just to give a bit of size reference to the photo...in case you can't see the pics any better than I can. :roll:

This is an OLD thread,

But I just found it and thoght i'd bring it back to life. My question is what is the size of the F2 fruit you all have got in these sungold grow outs. Why? I got a cross I'm trying and want to get an idea if bigger stuff comes out of sungold f2 seed(to see if the cross may have took). On one of my plants I got fruit 3 times bigger than sungold, anyone seen this in the f2?

My F-2 Sungolds have all been cherry tomato sizes.

I ended up letting quite a few of the Sungold volunteers live in my garden last year. That flock of volunteers had quite a bit of variation too. None of the fruits were large though.

Two of the plants developed normal Sungold sized fruits with a nice bright orange color. Another had slightly larger, very elongated, almost paste-type fruits that were again, bright orange. One plant made teeny tiny, bright orange fruits. All of these orange fruits had green gel too (except the teeny ones.) Yet another plant had slightly smaller cherry sized fruits that were red in color.

One really interesting thing I found was that one of the plants with normal 'Sungold looking' fruits was positively [U]covered[/U] with blossoms once it got going. It reminded me of Rose Quartz Multiflora or Reisentraube in that regard.

What the first fruit off one of 5 plants looks like. Cherry shaped, but MUCH bigger than sungold, nearly 1 oz. Supprisingly it seemed to be pushing bicolored, it is an orange fruit with red flesh running through the core(but not radiating out into the locules. Also, mainly green gel. This doesn't sound like any sungold F2 I have heard of, so maybe the cross took. Interestingly a friend growing a similar cross said to expect all red cherries.....

Well, I took the bait and started 360 Sungold F2 this winter and chose 12 to plant based entirely on the very distinct scent we've discussed. They are also similar to the F1 in size, leaf shape and plant habit. The plants are setting fruit now on long sprays of blossoms and should begin to ripen in the next few weeks. I'll take some photos one of these afternoons when the wind dies down. It's been a rough spring here.