Micro-tomato crosses

[ChrisK]

Some new F2s. Antho line in the parentage. Easy to spot nestled in among the bigger siblings.

[KarenO]

ahhh what beautiful babies Chris!

Karen

[jmsieglaff]

The thought of growing a micro dwarf by my sunny patio door all winter is a very warming thought. Do you anticipate to do a seed offer for any of these at any point?

Justin

[jmsieglaff]

Think I answered my own question, I read a page or two back and sounds like there won't be an offer until 2017?

[ChrisK]

2017 is the current plan for the first one. By that time it will be, for all intents, stable at F8 or F9. I need more diligent growers like Dan to help me advance faster!

I have a lot of micro crosses but I'm detailing them elsewhere where I can manage my own sub-forum.

An offer will be made here though when ready to release.

Originally Posted by jmsieglaff

Think I answered my own question, I read a page or two back and sounds like there won't be an offer until 2017?

[Zenbaas]

Originally Posted by ChrisK

2017 is the current plan for the first one. By that time it will be, for all intents, stable at F8 or F9. I need more diligent growers like Dan to help me advance faster!

I have a lot of micro crosses but I'm detailing them elsewhere where I can manage my own sub-forum.

An offer will be made here though when ready to release.

Chris I'm sure there are quite a few tomatovillians who would be willing to help you "advance" faster.

[jmsieglaff]

I've read through a good portion of this thread and didn't see it exactly stated--but I certainly haven't read every word. If one were to cross a micro dwarf with a regular dwarf--I assume the F1 would be regular dwarf? Would the F2 segregate out at 25% for micro--or is more than 1 gene involved and it be a smaller percentage? I'm growing a micro dwarf this winter and if I like the flavor reasonably well, I may grow another one this summer to cross with a released dwarf project purple tomato for a fun little project.

[Darren Abbey]

Originally Posted by jmsieglaff

I've read through a good portion of this thread and didn't see it exactly stated--but I certainly haven't read every word. If one were to cross a micro dwarf with a regular dwarf--I assume the F1 would be regular dwarf? Would the F2 segregate out at 25% for micro--or is more than 1 gene involved and it be a smaller percentage? I'm growing a micro dwarf this winter and if I like the flavor reasonably well, I may grow another one this summer to cross with a released dwarf project purple tomato for a fun little project.

The basic idea of the micros is that they have two distinct dwarfing loci (d, 'dwarf'; sd, 'sun-dwarf'), while dwarfs have one dwarfing locus (d or sd). Other traits like sp ('self-pruning') and various other [unnamed] genes can be involved in producing a particular growth form.

I've been growing out F2s from a micro ("Tiny Tim") X regular (Roma) F1 and have found micros to be near the 1/16th (and dwarfs near the 6/16th) expected from the two-gene model. They have varied from upright to sprawling, but I haven't grown enough to estimate any ratios involved.

With your proposed cross, I would expect the F1s to be "dwarf" and a quarter of the F2s to be "micro". The micro-trait will then be fixed, but it will take the several more (to F8-9) generations to stabilize all/most of the other genetics that are segregating in the population.

[jmsieglaff]

Thanks for the info! Growing micro dwarves in the winter is a nice treat.

[Scooty]

Reading through this thread is really interesting; especially with the idea of going back to small, rather than large. I've only played around with crosses using minibels a while back, with bad results.

The only thing I've used my minibels for recently is grafting as rootstocks. While small, they do pretty well if you're trying to contain larger dwarfs in a smaller container.

The red robin x sungold f1 line looks to be probably the most promising. If there's any more need to help grow that line out, I'd love to help.

[dwhughes]

Is anyone keeping a pedigree database on the crosses that Tomatoville members are making (at least, the OP stabilized ones)? I found a 1960 report on heirloom tomato pedigrees from that time period: http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/...9#.VvWQGMtf3bg
-Dave

[Darren Abbey]

Originally Posted by dwhughes

Is anyone keeping a pedigree database on the crosses that Tomatoville members are making (at least, the OP stabilized ones)? I found a 1960 report on heirloom tomato pedigrees from that time period: http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/...9#.VvWQGMtf3bg
-Dave

I would imagine there are people keeping their own pedigrees, but I hadn't thought about it in a broader sense.

Tatiana's Tomatobase seems to contain a lot of parental notes for the different strains, when known.

[Jeannine Anne]

Lovely interesting post. I grow micros but have never crossed any.
Does anyone know if there is a list of actual micro tomatoes anywhere, ones that are commercially available I mean.I have googled and looked around here but no definitive list
I have quite a few but would like to see what else is out there.

Thank you and keep up the good work, I would love to offer to help but with my husbands health right now I am sadly not reliable and don't like letting folks down..but growing for me is doable

XX Jeannine

[MarinaRussian]

Just wondering if any variegated dwarfs and micros exist

[ChrisK]

Working on it!

Originally Posted by MarinaRussian

Just wondering if any variegated dwarfs and micros exist