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Old November 10, 2011   #15
carolyn137
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Location: Upstate NY, zone 4b/5a
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Lineage, cultivar, strain, variety, open pollinated descendent of a hybrid variety - have you posted somewhere, Carolyn, what the proper definitions are for these terms? I agree that word choice is important so that confusion and miscommunication are minimized.

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Some of those terms have been known forever, and not defined by me since there already was agreement in the tomato world.

The definition of strain was asked just recently here and Travis and I posted in that thread which is in the General Discussion area.

Cultivar is a term that those in academia use to refer to a variety, and that word is almost THE only word used almost exclusively in scientific articles, papers, about tomato varieties being used in the studies,

A variety has forever been recognized as one where the various traits of the variety are known and the variety is stable, and remains so unless or until a mutation or cross pollination occurs, and that's also discussed in the thread here about strains.

Open Pollinated (OP) usually refers to a variety where all seeds sown give rise to the same identical plants and fruits, again, unless a mutation or X pollination occur.

When working with a hybrid, whether it be a known commercial hybrid, or a hybrid that was one from deliberate breeding , or whether it be from an accidental X pollination, selections made from the saved F2 seeds from the hybrid give rise to F generations, so If I make a selection amongst the F2 plants from the initial hybrid, such as maybe Ramapo F1, the saved seeds are referred to as F3 seeds and onward one goes until all seeds of a single selection give rise to the exact same plants and fruits.

At that point it's an OP and different individuals doing the work may at that time rename what they have or just refer to it as an F6 or F7, or whatever. There's no consensus on that. it really depends on whether it's a dehybridization of a known commercial hybrid to an OP state or whether it's something quite different from what one started out with.

http://www.kdcomm.net/~tomato/

I highly suggest the above link to KM's superb tomato site for explanations of genetic segregation and how many generations it takes to get a selection to the genetically homogeneous OP state. And there's so much more at that site in terms of how to make crosses, well, you just have to see. Start with the link on Cultivation, I think that's the one where segregation is discussed and don't forget to look at all the other resources and links at his site.

As for Marv Meisner I know him well and have for years. His user name at most places is lubadub. He's posted here at Tville in the past but as he's said, there isn't that much interest at this site in growing big tomatoes, which is true.

Here's a couple of links from Garden Web that might interest you and in the one you'll see him asking if I saw what he posted, and there's a long backstory between Marv and myself that goes back to Gordon Graham's award winning 7# 12 oz tomato.

http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/l...3326655.html?6

http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/l...395418365.html

Those are just a few of the links. And yes, those interested in growing big tomatoes kind of stick together and post at the same sites and share seeds amongst themselves and others when they're available.

Marv has offered to send me some of those seeds of large ones but I've never taken him up on his offer and probably won't, b/c I've never had any interest whatsoever in growing large tomatoes, if they happen they do, but there are lots of folks for whom it's the chase and the fun of doing so, just as it is for those who enter competitions for the largest cabbage, the longest carrot, the largest turnip, etc.

But the main reason I grow tomatoes, about 3,000 varieties to date, is for taste and it sure helps a lot if the tasty ones are also good producers.

I almost forgot that because of some talk between Marv and myself, I think I remember I'm supposed to be sending him bulbs for a BLACK TULIP.
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