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Post by steev on Jun 18, 2015 3:08:10 GMT -5
Can't say I care where the hard/tasteless comes from; I just think it needs to go away.
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Post by darrenabbey on Jun 18, 2015 22:37:08 GMT -5
Industrial breeders are working on doing so. Now that they have some idea of why they're that way, they can work to avoid those consequences while still making marketable varieties.
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Post by steev on Jun 18, 2015 22:50:22 GMT -5
While I'd not want to discourage industrial breeders from remediating some of the missteps of the past, if they can, I have to say I really think the preferable solution is less Big Ag, more local and sustainable food production, for reasons beyond the quality of the food itself, but the energy-cost of transport, the ability of people to survive where they are, and the avoidance of conflict due to population migration.
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Post by Joseph Lofthouse on Jun 19, 2015 0:32:33 GMT -5
I was doing some math recently regarding energy-cost of transport.
Turns out, that it takes about twice as much energy per pound to get my vegetables to my local market 11 miles away as it does to bring them 750 miles from California by semi-truck. And it takes me 5X as much fuel per pound as what the train could offer. If I took my vegetables to market on a human powered bicycle, I'd about break even with the train's fuel efficiency.
I think I'd find markets closer to home before I'd peddle a bike full of vegetables into town.
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Post by steev on Jun 19, 2015 3:08:50 GMT -5
joseph: I think you've just found out why Big Ag is so popular, crappy though its products may be. Cheap is good; or at least it's cheap, even if not good.
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Post by darrenabbey on Jun 20, 2015 2:00:43 GMT -5
While I'd not want to discourage industrial breeders from remediating some of the missteps of the past, if they can, I have to say I really think the preferable solution is less Big Ag, more local and sustainable food production, for reasons beyond the quality of the food itself, but the energy-cost of transport, the ability of people to survive where they are, and the avoidance of conflict due to population migration. My perspective is more that people who want their ideals captured in the food plants need to be involved in breeding them. If your ideals aren't involved, then someone else's will be instead. |
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Post by reed on Jun 20, 2015 6:10:39 GMT -5
I'm mostly taking the old approach, just planting as many kinds as I can and selecting the best. That's mostly because I don't know how, at least not yet, to do much purposeful breeding. I'm getting lots of ideas but for the most part lack the practice and knowledge to act on them.
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Post by kctomato on Sept 2, 2015 13:30:56 GMT -5
The original line for the trait of firmness, which has been incorporated into most modern commercial tomato cultivars, traces back to a S pimpinellifolium line. This is the trait everyone attributes to commercial tomatoes being hard like baseballs. I was pretty sure the baseball trait was caused by the prevalence of the ripening-inhibution mutation, which was found in a breeder's field in the 1960's, rather than a trait introgressed from S. pimpinellifolium. That trait and others ( the-biologist-is-in.blogspot.com/2014/03/evolution-and-tomatoes.html) results in the nearly-tasteless commercial production types that survive shipping so well. While traits you mention like rin and nor (mostly rin) have been used and do produce baseballs, it was the work in Florida with S pimpinellifolium that was the original source of firmer tomatoes. That work on firmness eventually produced a line for mechanical harvest around 1971 between Florida and Heinz called 'Florida MH-1' or 'MH-1' (Walter x Heinz 3). That line was not widely accepted but did go on to the background material of more recent commercial pedigrees. Key breeding line parents to some of the 'Mountain' series have it in their backgrounds NC84173 and NC8276 as well as many of the Florida lines. rin (found in 1968) and nor lines did not get widely used since they produced poor color that consumers didn't buy. It wasn't until the 90's when it was found that certain parent lines could influence the amount of ripe color in rin backgrounds. Lots of crossing was done to find the the right combinations. Eventually lines that combined rin and B og (crimson gene) in particular were released but this didn't occur until about 2000. |
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Post by imgrimmer on Sept 2, 2015 13:44:47 GMT -5
I'm growing f1 from a cross I made last year between S. Pimpinellifolium and Black Mystery. The Black Mystery I have came from Gleckler's and is like an earlier Cherokee Purple. The S. Pimpinellifolium parent was exceptionally deep red in color. I have 2 f1 plants and the first flowers forming look like cherries. I will take a closer look at the stamens. I'm very curious to see and taste the results. Any news? |
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Post by DarJones on Sept 3, 2015 11:23:52 GMT -5
Swamper sent me a pic of the fruit a few days ago. The S. Pimpinellifolium he used is a line I call "Lycopimp" because of the intense red color. It was literally a bird planted seed in my garden plucked from among the dozens of S. Pimpinellifoliums I grew that year. The fruit of that single plant were brilliant glowing red as compared to the other plants I evaluated. I saved enough seed to send to a few who were interested in high lycopene. Foolad published some research a few years ago where plants were selected based on red color intensity and tested via gas chromatography. Boiled down, selection for intense red color is a valid proxy to select high lycopene fruits and plants.
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Post by DarJones on Sept 5, 2015 2:09:24 GMT -5
Here is a pic courtesy of Swamper. I like the color!  |
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Post by reed on Sept 5, 2015 4:43:39 GMT -5
Mine that have grown wild for years are the tiny, pea sized yellow ones but this year two bigger ones about the size of nickels showed up. One is orange and the other one bright red. The leaves, flowers and growth of the plants is exactly the same. I saved a pretty good supply of seeds if anyone wants some. The orange one is in the woman's flower garden and may still be there to get some pictures, the red one was in my way and I plucked it out after saving seeds. Flavor wise I thought they were both more intensely sweet than the tiny yellow ones, not really a different flavor just more of it.
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Post by imgrimmer on Sept 6, 2015 14:34:47 GMT -5
reed Could you post a picture of it?
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Post by reed on Sept 7, 2015 6:29:33 GMT -5
I didn't think I had pictures but I found this one. It was taken when I first discovered the plant in a neglected corner and dug it out of the weeds. I almost pulled it up with the weeds but noticed the fruits were bigger and more orange than normal, then on this plant they went ahead and turned all the way red. I don't have pictures of the orange one. They looked the same but stayed about the same orange color as the one on the left in this picture.  |
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Post by philagardener on Sept 7, 2015 17:20:42 GMT -5
reed , sounds interesting (but your picture isn't loading again - thanks for fixing that!). Looking forward to seeing it :>)
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