Hey folks,

I haven't gotten into seed saving, and one of the main reasons is that I worry that if I save a tomato's seeds they will not be true to type. I don't have a lot of room to do something like isolate plants that I want to save seeds from or the like. I would also feel bad if I traded 'bad' seeds.

What do you folks do to a plant that you want to save seeds from?

I put big organza bags over the a truss before the flowers open, then take it off when the fruit has set and mark the truss with a ribbon.

I don't do anything and to my knowledge and have never had a cross although it may have occurred. On the few occasions that I have donated seeds I have informed the recipient that I don't bag blossoms.

I don't bag any flowers or separate plants and I've never had an accidental cross from one of my plants. I did however receive crossed seeds from professional sellers ...

Thanks folks! Hmmm, so sounds like I can just be lazy and will 'mostly' be OK

One thing you can do is to save seeds from first or last fruit. Being the first part of the season, bees are (generally) less active, and the same reasoning may apply to last, if they are late enough.
Every climate must be different, but for me that does really hold true. If you don't really have seasons... I'm not sure.
It's always a good idea to watch for bee activity. If they're not too active early season or late, those would be your best times.
I've had crosses here from bumblebees, but early season the big queens have no interest in tomato flowers because although there's lots of pollen, tomatoes don't produce any nectar, and the queens need both. Once they get a brood hatched, the little worker bees patrol my tomatoes daily and they don't miss a blossom until fall. After they mated I think the worker population drops off and likewise the interest in gathering pollen without a nectar reward.

Bower wrote: ↑Fri Mar 31, 2023 7:11 pm One thing you can do is to save seeds from first or last fruit. Being the first part of the season, bees are (generally) less active, and the same reasoning may apply to last, if they are late enough.
Every climate must be different, but for me that does really hold true. If you don't really have seasons... I'm not sure.
It's always a good idea to watch for bee activity. If they're not too active early season or late, those would be your best times.
I've had crosses here from bumblebees, but early season the big queens have no interest in tomato flowers because although there's lots of pollen, tomatoes don't produce any nectar, and the queens need both. Once they get a brood hatched, the little worker bees patrol my tomatoes daily and they don't miss a blossom until fall. After they mated I think the worker population drops off and likewise the interest in gathering pollen without a nectar reward.

Ah that's a good tip, thanks, I'll try to wait till the end then so I can taste before I save . I remember seeing bumblebees every now and then but nowhere near daily.

If you pollinate the flowers when they first open with an electric toothbrush it will reduce the chance of having a cross.

Kraky wrote: ↑Thu Mar 30, 2023 3:28 pm Hey folks,

I haven't gotten into seed saving, and one of the main reasons is that I worry that if I save a tomato's seeds they will not be true to type. I don't have a lot of room to do something like isolate plants that I want to save seeds from or the like. I would also feel bad if I traded 'bad' seeds.

What do you folks do to a plant that you want to save seeds from?

I did all of the wrong things. But if you know there is a tomato that you want to be 100% true - do the things people have written about, and hope that you got true seeds.

In past years, I've not bagged and generally had few tomato crosses. However, there have occasionally been some. My learnings are that bees aren't particularly attracted to tomato blooms, but will go for them when other pollen sources become unavailable and that's when crosses tend to occur. If you see bees on your blooms, you probably need to bag or collect from fruits that were pollinized at a time when they weren't interested. Also, I've found that daily hand watering tends to help if you're spraying the foliage. My theory is it tends to vibrate and shake the flowers before they fully open and may help self-pollinate before the bees are able to get to them. This year, however, I'm going to be using large fine mesh bags I've purchased on Amazon and will be labeling my seeds as to whether they were bagged or not.

I get crosses maybe about 8 to 20% of the time, depending. It's important to know that just because seeds from one fruit or even one seed get crossed doesn't mean the other fruits, or even other seeds in the same fruit, have been crossed. Each grain of pollen corresponds to one seed. So, if you have a PL tomato, and save seeds, and one of them turns out to be RL, and the rest are PL, then the PL ones are probably still true to type (if your original variety was). The RL one is a cross.

Crosses are pretty common in traded seeds. As long as people know your process, they'll probably be okay with the risk most of the time. I mean, whether you bag your blossoms or not.

Crosses happen in store-bought seeds, too. Not quite as often as with traded seeds, but still more often than you might think.

I don't personally bag blossoms. What I do instead is save seeds from multiple fruits (in separate bags). If one turns out to be a cross, I can try the other another year. I can give people seeds from multiple fruits in such cases, too. The hard part is making a point of recording which bag the seeds came from.

I tend to think most tomato crosses come from wind, but i could be wrong. I see tiny fast bumble bee or fly-type creatures pollinating tomatoes sometimes. I rarely see honeybees on tomatoes.

Carpenter bees actively forage tomato flowers. I haven’t seen very many carpenter bees around my garden this year, though.

My community garden is surrounded by a nature preserve so we get lots of bumble bees. So I keep track of bagged and unbagged and label accordingly.

OhioGardener wrote: ↑Wed Apr 12, 2023 2:56 pm In past years, I've not bagged and generally had few tomato crosses. However, there have occasionally been some. My learnings are that bees aren't particularly attracted to tomato blooms, but will go for them when other pollen sources become unavailable and that's when crosses tend to occur. If you see bees on your blooms, you probably need to bag or collect from fruits that were pollinized at a time when they weren't interested. Also, I've found that daily hand watering tends to help if you're spraying the foliage. My theory is it tends to vibrate and shake the flowers before they fully open and may help self-pollinate before the bees are able to get to them. This year, however, I'm going to be using large fine mesh bags I've purchased on Amazon and will be labeling my seeds as to whether they were bagged or not.

If you have the space for three or four squash the bumblebees prefer them to tomatoes.

Lemonboy wrote: ↑Thu Apr 13, 2023 12:44 pm If you have the space for three or four squash the bumblebees prefer them to tomatoes.

That's a good idea. I usually do grow 3-4 different squash most years, only 1 variety of each species, because I don't even trust bagging them for that very reason.

For saving squash seeds I first tape the blossom closed on the female flower before it gets a chance to open. Then I remove the stamen from a male flower of another plant of the same variety and then remove the tape of the now mature female flower and rub it gently against the stigma of the female flower to pollinate it.

Shule wrote: ↑Thu Apr 13, 2023 4:11 am Crosses happen in store-bought seeds, too. Not quite as often as with traded seeds, but still more often than you might think.

The other thing I've found is OP varieties can have some variation or instability in the variety itself which you won't necessarily see if you only grow 1 plant. When I'm saving seeds, I always try to grow 4-6 plants of the same variety, planted 2 plants per hole, so that I can cull out any off-types and save from the best fruit.

I've not been saving seeds for very long (several years), and haven't traded much, so I don't know whether I've had many crosses. But, we have a dense, robust patch of pumpkins with hundreds of blooms. Despite this, my tomato blossoms were pretty busy with bumble bees last week. So, I do worry about crosses. Fortunately, I saved most of the seeds I really need to trade early in the season. Actually, most of the fruits on my plants were pollinated many weeks ago, and I hadn't seen bumble bees then.

Martha