Read more tomato growing tips from Margaret Roach.
4. Open-pollinated tomatoes are not mass-produced, uniform widgets (nor is any other OP plant). A ?Brandywine? is not a ?Brandywine? is not a ?Brandywine.?? With non-hybrid varieties like it, there can be great swings from seed-seller to seed-seller, based on where and how they raised the seed for generations, and what they had in mind as they selected each crop.
5. With open-pollinated tomatoes, it?s possible to save seed and get a next generation that reliably resembles the parent plant. However, careful selection?sort of a ?survival of the fittest? regimen, but enforced by the gardener?s hand?is key to good seeds next time around. Therefore, seed saving begins at seed-starting time, I learned from a seed-farming friend. Sow only the biggest seeds in the packet, discarding the runts (and then discarding slow-to-germinate or weak seedlings), continuing your selection process ruthlessly at each life stage, right through to harvest.
6. Feeling daring? You can also save seed from a hybrid tomato, and try ?dehybridizing? it, by selecting among its offspring next year and beyond for traits you like. Breeder-author Joseph Tychonievich talks about dehybridizing and about smart selection with OPs, too, in this story. When it?s time for harvest: how to ferment and clean harvested tomato seed.
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