How did you learn to cross tomatoes?

[Julianna]

I am curious how you all got into this. I am going to read up on the process to try to do it this summer. I like collecting tomatoes with family names and since there isn't one for Zain, I want to make one for him (and it have a name in mind).

Also, at what stage do you typically name your crosses?

[Doffer]

youtube

[wykvlvr]

I learned how to online but I still have to master the moves with my small micro dwarf tom

I made a good write up for someone in the micro tomato group that you can see here with links and information that may help you get started
https://www.tomato-talk.com/forum/the-l ... ew-crosses

[Julianna]

I learned how to online but I still have to master the moves with my small micro dwarf tom

I made a good write up for someone in the micro tomato group that you can see here with links and information that may help you get started
https://www.tomato-talk.com/forum/the-l ... ew-crosses

Thank you!

[Nan6b]

I knew the basics of genetics from grade school and high school classes: definitions of dominant, recessive, homozygous, heterozygous, semi- or co-dominant, etc. I put that into practice when I was breeding budgies before breeding tomatoes, but you can put it into practice with tomatoes. You'll need to learn a few tomato genes, like regular leaf is dominant over potato leaf. There are places on the internet that can teach you to emasculate a tomato flower and cross-pollinate it. Have in mind what you're trying to create; but the fewer things you need to have, the better (For example, a yellow potato-leaved heart is harder to get than just any old heart). I started looking for a micro heart, but ended up taking the best-tasting one of each generation. I now have a great-tasting full sized elongated "icicle" type tomato.

I named my tomato "Rae's pink heart" before I started cross-pollinating, but that name isn't appropriate now, so I'm thinking of "Rae's pink icicle".

[Shule]

I don't hand-pollinate (although I admire many of those who do). I let natural crosses happen, and work with those, and I use F2s from commercial F1s, sometimes. I've been doing that as long as I've grown tomatoes from seed (since 2014).

There are some advantages to this:
* It selects for strongly viable pollen. (For the natural crosses, I mean.)
* It selects for pollen from flowers insects find interesting, in the case of such as bee crosses.
* You don't have to do any of the crossing yourself.
* Surprises can be fun, as can the detective work / guessing about the parentage.
* Maybe it's more romantic for the tomatoes if they don't have arranged outcomes.

The downsides aren't as bad as you're probably thinking.

A really major thing I've noticed is that unremarkable F1s from natural crosses tend to have significantly more remarkable offspring. Don't let an unremarkable F1 deter you from growing the F2s. The F1 doesn't always tell you much about the desirability of the line, especially if it wasn't in good soil or some such when you grew it.

To get more crosses, I've tended to grow more varieties. I may narrow them down where I want certain groups to be more likely to cross.

I also look for sports/mutants (which can be rare, but they do happen). They can be stable right away, potentially.

With the exception of Frittata Kitchen (which is a sport of Bloody Butcher), I haven't named any varieties, yet. However, I do name my individual plants, and the resulting collection of seeds from each plant, and their names might resemble the final outcome. So, while I'm pretty sure I'm going to call a tomato Snacker when it's stable, I call the project Snacker_, and the plants such as Snacker_B, Snacker_B0, etc. (according to my naming system). The seeds of Snacker_B are called Snacker-B. For Snacker-B seeds given away, I encourage people to keep using that name as if it were the variety name (then we know which of my plants the unstable line of seeds they're growing came from). But for me, the next plants will be such as Snacker_C, Snacker_C0, Snacker_C1, etc.

I'm close to naming a Snacker_ tomato Snacker, but only because it had so many recessive traits in the F2, in 2020. This year, it was at F3, with Snacker_B being the most desirable plant. I may need to further stabilize the taste and how the calyx attaches, but otherwise, it should be stable.

It can take a long time to stabilize most crosses, though! Eight to ten+ generations is a good idea.

I name my projects at arbitary times (like when they seem to have segregated somewhat, or whenever; not at the F1, per se). So, Snacker_A was an F2 (not an F1); the F1 was very different.

[Julianna]

I knew the basics of genetics from grade school and high school classes: definitions of dominant, recessive, homozygous, heterozygous, semi- or co-dominant, etc. I put that into practice when I was breeding budgies before breeding tomatoes, but you can put it into practice with tomatoes. You'll need to learn a few tomato genes, like regular leaf is dominant over potato leaf. There are places on the internet that can teach you to emasculate a tomato flower and cross-pollinate it. Have in mind what you're trying to create; but the fewer things you need to have, the better (For example, a yellow potato-leaved heart is harder to get than just any old heart). I started looking for a micro heart, but ended up taking the best-tasting one of each generation. I now have a great-tasting full sized elongated "icicle" type tomato.

I named my tomato "Rae's pink heart" before I started cross-pollinating, but that name isn't appropriate now, so I'm thinking of "Rae's pink icicle".

Luckily, I am pretty easygoing with this project and don't have any wishes except great taste. I am reasonable with genetics although I just have not bred tomatoes before. It didn't seem difficult in theory, but I thought I would just ask a few things just in case.

I have my name in mind already and just was not sure if I got to sort of tentatively use it when going for the F2s or not I want to see what I get with a few grows and then choose.one for the name. I was thinking to cross Frog Princess and either Black Seaman or Stump of the World and make Zain's Frog Moon. I may do both crosses and make a better tomato for Adam beyond the existing Adam1 .

[Julianna]

@Shule I totally laughed at the romantic comment. I figured this was a really long term project. Figured may as well start now. I remember reading the discussion on how F2 begins the real fun. My goal is to be able to let the littles have their "own" tomato. I have not intention of going beyond that. And in that sense, it absolutely doesn't matter what I do in my own yard as far as naming, but I was just curious how everyone else was doing it.

[Pippin]

What has surprised me along the way is that you may not see some early, obviously unstable tomato individuals again later. Screening some early phenotypes, how they look and taste, is like making friends with this very nice and interesting person but at the same time saying goodbuy as you will never meet again. Later in the process you may just be sad why that good friend has apandoned you. Some unstabe traits and combinations simply cannot be stabilized.

This is probably also why people tend to get interested in the tomato genetics as it is nice to understand which traits are stable and which may still change.

[Nan6b]

Pippin, I like your 'good friend' comments. I saw a beautiful dwarf heart in F2 that never showed up again. I still have the F3 seeds (to make f3 plants) from it if I want to go back and try again.

[Julianna]

That sounds kind of sad . But also fun. Like an adventure.

[Pippin]

Yeah, it is little sad too. But still rewarding.

It also makes it a little difficult to name cultivars too early in the process. One option is to give a project name first (like Zain's Frog project) and leave the actual cultivar naming later when you see what you get (like Zain's Frog Moon, Zain's Frog Stone and Zain's Frog Beaty). Unless you already know that you are explicitly looking for a yellow tomato as Zain's Frog Moon and you will only save that one.

The ”standard” number of generation before having a stable variety is in my understanding around 8.

[Julianna]

@Pippin the Moon is for his birthday which occured on the full moon, so it doesn't matter the color. I am pretty easy on this and really am just looking for flavor and something I can name. Probably good since it means I will not be looking for something extremely specific.

8 generations isn't so bad!

[bower]

One day I followed a link to a youtube video that showed how to emasculate a flower and apply pollen. Maybe looked at a couple of videos that day, there are tons of them! I said to myself, that doesn't look too difficult. And I went straight down to the greenhouse and made my first ever crosses that day.
Here's one to get you started:


So true about the naming and the 'good friends' goodbyes. I always have to give a name to any line I'm working on, because no way I can remember numbers/letters/identifiers that aren't a word I can say. Now I'm wondering, when a variety is finally stable, should I give it a new name?
So also true about following the tasty tomatoes and ending up with... what size or shape was I aiming for? Aw shucks, this one is the one.

[worth1]

Keith Mueller.

[mama_lor]

I also learned it on Keith Mueller's page. Doing the cross mid-season, so like 3rd flower bunch seems to be a good idea, often early in the season there are pollination problems.
Now, learning how to optimize the output is a different story, I just go by luck (I mean how to select the early generations thinking ahead of the final stable version). Also, if I find an F1 that is amazing, I find it's better to just keep making that F1, the stable output will usually not be comparable.