seeds from 1962???

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by loudog

Waiting for someone to finish the Magnus story! please ! hope this doesn't end up like MASH and The Rooster Crowed at Midnight. lol

Can do.

I had one Magnus plant in my tomato field and it was set out very late b'c it took close to two months for any germination.

Fall approached, I was back teaching full time, and soon it got close to first killing frost. So after work I'd stop by the farm and cover that one plant, and that meant in the AM I'd have to swing by again, to uncover it.

My mother was still living there, but used a walker and couldn't go outside and also had developed senile dementia.

It was midweek and I saw two large fruits that had developed more than just a blush so I took them inside to the kitchen and told my mother I'd be there Saturday to check on them.

I did, she said they'd ripened up and she ate both of them.

No words can express how I felt, but there was no way I could blame my mom either.

Then I got lucky again and we went into Indian Summer, as it was called, with warmer temperatures. I think it was two or three more large ones developed a blush and this time I took them to where I was living at the time, and when ripe back to the farmhouse b'c that's where I did all of my fermentations.

End of story.

Carolyn

[loudog]

That is a great story! Thank you very much Carolyn! I put Magnus on my grow list for next year. Louie

[cythaenopsis]

Wow, really touch-and-go there Carolyn; so glad to hear how you singlehandedly rescued the Magnus. Did the new seeds you fermented ended up germinating within predictable time for heirloom seeds?

[nctomatoman]

A ha - as in an aha moment. I just went back to Off The Vine - when Carolyn and I were in the process of finding, acquiring and growing out historic varieties was just when we began to do our tomato newsletter, Off The Vine.

The answer to this mini-mystery is in the text of an article that I wrote for OTV volume 1 issue 3....it turns out..drum roll....that in a way both of us were somewhat right and somewhat wrong in our recollections. I did get the large seed sample, share it with Carolyn, and I got a single REGULAR leaf plant, which was wrong. Turns out Carolyn got TWO plants to germinate, both potato leaf. And she generously sent me one and grew the other out herself.

So we both got to experience Magnus as described - we both got to save seeds.....and in my garden this year is Magnus growing from seed I saved in 2002, which is from seed saved from fruit from the plant Carolyn sent me.

Here is the text from Off The Vine.

"Magnus: This was the most difficult variety to germinate, but Carolyn struck it rich with 2 plants (she sent me one via mail!). This was the cover variety for the 1900 Livingston seed catalog, and it seemed to grow true to type. It is unusual in being a potato leaf variety that does not afford huge fruits. The vigor is good, and the tomatoes are nearly globe shaped, very smooth, 4-8 ounces and medium pink, with a good flavor. This one will get another chance next year, as its position in the garden was not the best."

It is really important to get details of history like this correct....so know we have the details of how it all went down! There was luck involved - I actually used to scan GRIN while at work (since we didn't have home PCs) - I didn't find Magnus at first, but when I started using wild card symbols, and added the first work Livingston, that is when it emerged. Luck with finding the seed, luck that Carolyn got two plants to grow, luck that she was generous enough to share a plant with me.....

The serendipity of gardening...

[IronPete]

Awesome story! Now its on my 'wanted list', lol! Iron Pete

[Karla]

Enjoyed! and wonderful!

[cythaenopsis]

Great to hear this, Craig. I find it fascinating, this cultivation of historic varieties. Astounding how seeds so old can be coaxed to germination. I wonder if some day they'll have the technology to automatically reconstruct a seed based on the DNA that can be read from it, allowing the production of fruits/grains/vegetables from thousands of years go.

[zero244]

I will try your method if I need to revive some old seeds. Just recently I sprouted some seeds from 2008 that were kept at room temps. It took a couple extra weeks but they did sprout, which surprised me.
Your technique for starting old seeds might work very well for even fresh seeds.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by zero244

I will try your method if I need to revive some old seeds. Just recently I sprouted some seeds from 2008 that were kept at room temps. It took a couple extra weeks but they did sprout, which surprised me.
Your technique for starting old seeds might work very well for even fresh seeds.

If you are reffering to what I did to wake up old seeds,post # 6, I wouldn't even treat 2008 seeds since they are only about 6 to 7 yearfs old, I'd just double sow if I had enough seeds
which I almost always did have,I double sow seeds up to maybe 10 years old and then older I'd treat them as I posted in post #6.

I don't see any need to treat fresh seeds, up to about 5 yo, and for sure not to double sow.

just my experience the way I did things.

Carolyn

[ilex]

Cuarentena tomato from Alginet was recovered from seeds that old by a local university. Seeds were stored at room temperature inside a gourd.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by ilex

Cuarentena tomato from Alginet was recovered from seeds that old by a local university. Seeds were stored at room temperature inside a gourd.

The person who started this thread said in post #12 that the seeds weren't from 1962 but were from the year before that.

So are you saying above that seeds from 1962 were still viable, or are you refering to my comment about 50 yo seeds d being germinated when the Cheyenne, WY seeds were transferred to the USDA station IA and they were stored in a filing cabinet at room temperature also.

Seeds amaze me all the time and here's alink to some of the oldest that germinated,look at the seed that was 32,000 years old.

https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q...eed+germinated

Carolyn

[JLJ_]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

The person who started this thread said in post #12 that the seeds weren't from 1962 but were from the year before that. So are you saying above that seeds from 1962 were still viable. . .

Carolyn, are you sure about post #12? What I thought was that in reference to the original remark . . .

"the son gave me some seeds after i asked him if he had some from his dad.
the son said they were from 1962, and they go back to 1912. he said his dad called them crispy red"

. . . post #12 said that rxkeith had obtained additional information, and had found that what the son meant was that the variety dated back to at least 1912, and his father had grown the variety, and saved seeds, since 1962, but that the batch of seeds given to rxkeith were saved just last year -- 2013.

What I'm wondering, though, is if there was a description of the fruit named 'crispy' red -- seems an odd name for a tomato, makes one wonder if it could be 'crispily' similar to Selbo's Ribbed Red?

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by JLJ_

Carolyn, are you sure about post #12? What I thought was that in reference to the original remark . . .

"the son gave me some seeds after i asked him if he had some from his dad.
the son said they were from 1962, and they go back to 1912. he said his dad called them crispy red"

. . . post #12 said that rxkeith had obtained additional information, and had found that what the son meant was that the variety dated back to at least 1912, and his father had grown the variety, and saved seeds, since 1962, but that the batch of seeds given to rxkeith were saved just last year -- 2013.

What I'm wondering, though, is if there was a description of the fruit named 'crispy' red -- seems an odd name for a tomato, makes one wonder if it could be 'crispily' similar to Selbo's Ribbed Red?

My fault in my post above saying that they were the year before that, meaning 1961. When I should have said the year before, meaning 2013/

All else is the same and since I have this ready to post anyway, I will

Whoops, the cut and paste is still from Camo
's thread in the German Johnson thread.

Sometimes that happens and I hope I just got rid of that previous cut and paste.

Carolyn

[ilex]

Yes, I'm saying that 50 year old seeds were viable. You can store a lot of seed inside a gourd, and they managed to sprout a few of those. The variety was considered extinct.

Cuarentena is from the marmande family, an early, cool tolerant, fairly commercial, productive variety. It was one of the early varieties grown before greenhouses came.