Six years ago in 2016 two tomatoes, one volunteer, the other in a seed mix produced a few ripe tomatoes for me.
Then the next year in 2017 inspired by the few tomatoes in 2016 I thought I would direct seed more methodically so I tried about 70 short season kinds (varieties and breeder's mixes) thinking it would be a bit of a breeding project. Wasn't, turned out in my climate in that year it worked great. Most tomatoes worked I would say as long as they were listed as 70 days from transplant or less. I started needlessly in March- I had to weed about five times before the seeds sprouted! I continued seeding right up till a few days after average last frost on May 15th and all the rows I seeded ripened fruit. I got tons of tomatoes! I'm thinking now that tomatoes can be direct seeded, it's just a bit of a different game than transplants. It also may not work for everyone. For example, instead of growing a few large plants it involves growing many small plants.
The most interesting tomatoes for shortness of season I grew that year included varieties called Coyote (yellow fruits), Jagodka, 42 days, Forest Fire, Krainy Sever, Dwarf Hirsutum Cross, Sweet Cherriette (35 DTM from Transplant!), Amurski Tigr (Stripes), and Blue Ambrosia (Blue Skin, orange fruits, and the female part of the flower sticks out making cross pollination more common).
The feature of Blue Ambrosia I found most interesting was the way the female portion of the flower sticks out, that means when brushed by a bee or if pollen is added by a pollination tool that cross pollination with other tomatoes is far more common. So I put as much pollen as possible from many different varieties as possible and then I saved all the seed I could.
So in 2018 I grew out and identified some first year hybrids from known mothers and unknown father's from 2017 using varieties with the female portion of the flower or the stigma sticking out of the flowers as the mothers, the mothers were Blue Ambrosia and a unknown short season red potato leaf from a tomato seed mix a friend sent me. I planted the Blue Ambrosia seeds direct seeded and picket out many obvious hybrids to grow seed from again. I planted the potato leaf seedlings in a flat and as potato leaves are recessive I was able to pick out the regular leaf ones as hybrids. There were only a few.
I also discovered some new tomatoes, Big Hill and Brad being chief amongst them.
In 2019 I planted a large portion of the second generation tomato population and some second generation tomatoes from a friend mixed and direct seeded and dry farmed. Yep I grew tomatoes without starting them indoors and without ever watering- though it was a very good year for it as it rained at regular intervals. It worked remarkably well and I made many selections. There were pale yellow tomatoes, blue skinned tomatoes, small cherries, orange tomatoes, red tomatoes, and great big beefsteaks, I had striped tomatoes in both blue and yellow from a cross between Blue Ambrosia and Amurski Tigr. Some of the red ones had stigmas which stuck out very well and I saved lots of seed. I also planted the potato leaf offspring and found to my delight that they segregated to a blue skinned bicolor (tasty marbled yellow and red flesh) of which Blue Gold is the probable father.
I think this is an example of a blue bicolor- of which I ultimately am naming a selection "Mission Mountain Sunrise" it may be available in 2022.
Some of the second generation diversity.
I suspect that Brad Gate's Dark Galaxy might have been the pollen parent on this cross.
The female part or stigma sticking out which makes natural crossing more likely.
Beefsteak flower with the female part (stigma) sticking out, making cross pollination more likely.
Stripes!
Exserted Tiger (now available from Snake River Seeds).
Possibly a blue Golden Tressette which proved to segregate wildly in 2020.
Stripes.
A pink and a golden spotted.
Stripes!
Exserted Orange sibling lines.
Some of the diversity in the F2 year.
Stripes.
Yellow Stripes!- want one like this with a stigma that sticks out and good blue, still looking.
Strange pale yellow ones, very mild flavor.
In 2020 my direct seeded project was a wild cross and all proved to be unpalatable but it proved that the wild material used could work fine direct seeded at this juncture in the project (approximately 7th generation since the wild cross). I also discovered an exciting new tomato called Wild Child bred by the same breeder as Blue Ambrosia in New Mexico. Wild Child is a very early red cherry tomato and a stabilized cross with Solanum habrochaites the same wild species as my direct seeded variety. I also grew two tomatoes for seed that I either bred or had a hand in breeding. I call them exserted tiger and exserted orange or exserted orange hill. This is because the technical name for the female part or stigma sticking out is exserted. Frequently confused with exerted but the former means "to stick out" and the latter means "to work hard".
I just seeded year five or part of it. I seed based on what I learned in 2017 starting about 20 days before the last frost and continuing until the date of average last frost (May 15th here). This seed is a wild cross project strain that is much improved from 2020's. This year for the first time I put down compost and sand underneath because of all the tomato seed already in the soil- I want to keep that buried so I get what I planted.
Clump of tomato seed.
Seed before I broke up the clumps- after fermentation tomato seed dries like this. I usually break it up crumbling it with my fingers right before I run it through the seeder.
Bag of seed I chose, it is from my friend's very creative project to create a tomato which always crosses. It's a very long term project but after 7 or 8 generations it is bearing tasty fruit.
Tomato seeder plate.
Seed in the hopper.
View from seeder height.
Seeded Strip.
This photo is of some tomato seed I found. Since it's over by the carrots it's likely from the 2020 volunteers from the 2019 direct seeding.
Some tomato seed on the sand.
A row newly built with compost and sand.
Seeded Strip.
Seeded and flagged. The neighbor dog is helping, or he thinks he is.
