What does FT mean?

[Jayc]

I'm in the UK and someone asked recently what does FT stand for in a tomato description. After looking at some tomato sites often in the US some varieties have these letters. As an example, Sunsugar are described as Sunsugar FT Hybrid, it has got me wondering, what does the FT signify? I did think it could be disease resistance?

Many thanks in advance for any help.

[FarmerShawn]

Are you possibly misreading it, and instead of FT, it says F1? F1 indicates it is the first generation of a cross pollination, which is predictable, although saving seeds and growing out the next generation, F2, usually results in considerable genetic variation.

[Greatgardens]

Can he cite a specific example with a link? Could also be Fusarium + Tobacco Mosaic Virus resistance.

[Jayc]

Originally Posted by Greatgardens

Could also be Fusarium + Tobacco Mosaic Virus resistance.

This is what I wondered also but Tomato Mosaic Virus is usually written as TMV or ToMV.

There are quite a few sites all listing FT usually with the same varieties. I hope it is ok too link a site here, I will remove it if it is not.
Continuing with Sunsugar,

SUN SUGAR FT HYBRID
Sunsugar FT Hybrid #5859 (20 seeds) A hybrid orange cherry tomato with unbelievably good flavor and productivity. Very sweet, fruity-tasting tomatoes are borne in long clusters on vigorous plants. Many other cherry tomatoes have a tendency to crack, especially when ripe, but this one has crack resistance bred in while still keeping a thin skin. The taste of these tomatoes is such a delight that they're often picked and eaten in the garden instead of ever making it indoors. Indeterminate. 62 days.

from http://www.tomatogrowers.com/SUN-SUG...ductinfo/5859/

Other examples of listed varieties from this site have VFF or VFFFN (others too), again I don't know what these relate to? I couldn't find an index.

[Jayc]

Originally Posted by FarmerShawn

Are you possibly misreading it, and instead of FT, it says F1? F1 indicates it is the first generation of a cross pollination, which is predictable, although saving seeds and growing out the next generation, F2, usually results in considerable genetic variation.

I thought it might have been that at first, but no definitely FT.

[slugworth]

google ft hybrid tomato and you get many hits.

[koigardener]

https://www.pnas.org/content/103/16/6398.long

[Fred Hempel]

Definitely not that...

Originally Posted by koigardener

https://www.pnas.org/content/103/16/6398.long

[imp]

Okay, I couldn't track it down, so emailed them to just ask, will post what they tell me about the abbreviation "FT".

[Scooty]

I'm leaning toward it being a typo which has been perpetuated through copy-pasting. If you google FT tomato hybrids, you notice that it's mainly suncherry results, which we know is an F1. Yet if you look at the description for all these FT tomato hybrids, it's not the information included that makes me think this, it's the information that is missing. There is no mention of F1. Assuming FT means something other than F1, then F1 would be additionally mentioned as well. This leads me to believe that FT and F1 were meant to convey the same meaning, hence typo.

[Jayc]

Originally Posted by imp

Okay, I couldn't track it down, so emailed them to just ask, will post what they tell me about the abbreviation "FT".

You're a star imp.

[Jayc]

Originally Posted by koigardener

https://www.pnas.org/content/103/16/6398.long

Heavy going for me but interesting.

[Jayc]

Originally Posted by Fred Hempel

Definitely not that...

I'm glad!
I was struggling with it a little.

[Jayc]

Originally Posted by Scooty

I'm leaning toward it being a typo which has been perpetuated through copy-pasting. If you google FT tomato hybrids, you notice that it's mainly suncherry results, which we know is an F1. Yet if you look at the description for all these FT tomato hybrids, it's not the information included that makes me think this, it's the information that is missing. There is no mention of F1. Assuming FT means something other than F1, then F1 would be additionally mentioned as well. This leads me to believe that FT and F1 were meant to convey the same meaning, hence typo.

You could well be right and you make good points. I didn't look at all the results as I'm not familiar with some of the companies, but I'll look at some more now. There are a few UK based results but none from the more popular and well know companies. I notice though that US Tomato Growers list quite a few of their varieties as Hybrid without referring to them as F1. So I think it is not clear.

[imp]

Got an email back and here is what they wrote:


You can see those letters such as V, F, N, T, St combined together in various ways on a lot of our tomato varieties. They indicate the disease resistance of the variety. For the Sun Sugar the "FT" means resistance to Fusarium wilt and Tobacco Mosaic Virus.

Here's a list of what the letter codes mean:

A -- Alternaria stem canker
F -- Fusarium wilt
FF -- Fusarium wilt races 1 and 2
FFF -- Fusarium wilt races 1, 2, and 3
N -- Nematodes
T -- Tobacco mosaic virus
St -- Stemphylium gray leaf spot
V -- Verticillium wilt




So, there it is.