Sunrise Bumblebee in time warp. Achieves heirloom status.
 

[url]http://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B00IJN7UGM/ref=cm_sw_r_fa_dp_dBC.wb00QR0M3[/url]

And also heriloom status... (see same link)

To be fair, he's only using it in the title, and their farm name is "Heirloom Tomato Farm" in kana. Not sure why they didn't pick a more traditional sounding name. This persons lists Pink Bumble Bee with Heirloom in title too.

I read the description and didn't see them mention heirloom explicitly other than title. I've seen way way worse riffs on Tom Wager's tomatoes descriptions from the seed companies in China. The way they translated is hilarious sometimes.

Some people think that there are only Hybrids and Heirlooms. The term "open pollinated" is way too complicated for them.

Well I couldn't read the page, but Sunrise Bumblebee probably falls under the created heirloom category.Time doesn't matter

1-Commercial Heirlooms: Open-pollinated varieties introduced before 1940, or tomato varieties more than 50 years in circulation.
2-Family Heirlooms: Seeds that have been passed down for several generations through a family.
3-Created Heirlooms: Crossing two known parents (either two heirlooms or an heirloom and a hybrid) and dehybridizing the resulting seeds for how ever many years/generations it takes to eliminate the undesirable characteristics and stabilize the desired characteristics, perhaps as many as 8 years or more.
4-Mystery Heirlooms: Varieties that are a product of natural cross-pollination of other heirloom varieties.

Created heirloom, to me, is an unsatisfying moniker.

The term "heirloom" generally implies something passed from generation to generation, and clearly that is not the case here.

10 years ago I would have liked the term (in part because it is natural to want to get in on the "heirloom" thing) but now I find that naming things "created heirlooms" just muddies the waters, and makes it such that any OP variety can (and will be) called an heirloom.

I would now prefer to use the term "heirloom" in a much more restricted way, and would prefer that we find other descriptors for the majority of OP varieties that are clearly not heirlooms in the traditional sense.

Well.... you could contact them if you feel they should change the description. According to their Amazon listings, the "Heritage Tomato Farm" is claiming to be the primary vector for introducing these vars into Japan.

I don't have enough time in the day to work on my tomatoes. I certainly don't have time to fight over semantics with a vendor whom I have no control over.

I'm just happy they are selling Sunrise Bumblebee.

[QUOTE=Scooty;547698]Well.... you could contact them if you feel they should change the description. According to their Amazon listings, the "Heritage Tomato Farm" is claiming to be the primary vector for introducing these vars into Japan.[/QUOTE]

It is confusing to customers and the general public. A lot of people think any crossed tomato is a hybrid and lots of other silly things. I try to educate all I can but many ask me the same questions a few weeks later so they obviously aren't retaining the info.

Ha! found their website. [url]http://www.heirloom-tomato-farm.com/[/url] They seem to call everything but the Bosque Blue "heirloom". I just did a quick gander, I think this might be the only place selling some of these seeds in japan.

Well, it's probably more annoying to customers here than there. Tomatoes aren't used much in japan, china or korea. It's one of the few new world crops that didn't really take off in that area other than when they do localized versions of western cuisine.

To market customers, heirloom means it tastes good.

Absolutely. Which is why a surprising number of people think SunGold is an heirloom.

[QUOTE=Cole_Robbie;547721]To market customers, heirloom means it tastes good.[/QUOTE]

That site has a yen for exaggeration.

[QUOTE=Tormato;547728]That site has a yen for exaggeration.[/QUOTE]

Very punny!:))

[QUOTE=Tormato;547728]That site has a yen for exaggeration.[/QUOTE]


That site wants you to give them yen for the product!