Beautifully Promiscuous and Tasty Tomato Project

[William S.]

Found first plant to save seed from based on flower structure. Guessing around 5 or 10 plants blooming so far.

[William S.]

Also did not take a picture, but on a lot of plants the very first flower seems to be forming as an extra big messy beefsteak type. Which makes perfect sense with Big Hill as the highest percentage domestic ancestor.

[William S.]

I think this was my favorite flower today. A first flower of a R18 G2

[Chance]

Same William

[William S.]

I wrote the word "exserted" on the marker flag of about 5 of the 119 or so transplants in my promiscuous isolation block.

Guessing that is around 10% of those actually blooming. Disinclined to remove the failures as they may be otherwise interesting and or informative.

If at some date I realize that obligate outcrossing has failed with this population I think I would isolate the rare extreme exserted individuals. In some ways the rarity of extreme exsertion may be evidence towards outcrossing. For example, I learned working with unisolated Blue Ambrosia that I needed to continually select for extreme exsertion. Last year most plants in the population had at least minimal exsertion. I did not select for it. I suspect that R18 has a higher rate just as extreme forms of Blue Ambrosia did.

Could also be that exsertion rates will increase with later flowering plants and or July temperatures.

I'm hesitant to select too harshly for exsertion alone if this population has obligate outcrossing. There are a few potato leaf individuals whose seedlings may confirm a outcrossing rate. I would say 100% PL = no outcrossing, 1-3% RL = moderate exsertion, 30% RL = highly exserted, and 70 to 100% RL = strong evidence for obligate outcrossing. Not sure what I would make of 40% to 60% RL. That would be really good but what would it mean? I could interpret that multiple ways.

Inserted individuals will also be interesting to observe for signs of infertility.

[William S.]

Layer cake flower. First bud. Second bud convinced me to write exserted on the flag but this flower is just a triumph of fusion. I think it goes involucral bracts In The center, then petals, then a green stigma tube, then anther tube, then petals, then involucral bracts again.

[William S.]

Well about four of six promiscuous project bicolors I planted with the LA2329 Habrochaites have flowered. The first of these I looked at has very good exsertion and is thus ideal for seed saving with hope of crossing. The other four not quite as good. The Solanum habrochaites itself I suspect maybe next weekend it will be blooming.

[William S.]

Also Bombus are visiting R18

[Garrett Schantz]

Found some small insects on some Peruvianum flowers. They have been climbing all over them. Buzz pollination would probably be best for these flowers, bumblebees will probably still visit them anyway.

Haven't found them on other species yet.

[William S.]

My last surviving potato leaf direct seeded is blooming and is exserted. With that combination of traits I suspect it belongs to the promiscuous project despite it being in the mixed planting. Should be fun to find out its outcrossing rate.

[William S.]

My favorite this year so far is the R18 line Joseph sent me from the 2020 Idaho grow out. I have five plants marked eith double flags and four of those have tomatoes set. None ripe yet though.

Another favorite is in my crossing block with LA2329 but so far no seeds. I had a similar plant but it got bad blossom end rot. It has open flowers and odd fruit set behavior.

[Steph S]

Awesome pics... you could grow those for the flowers alone!    The small insects might be sweat bees (halictid bees).  Carolyn M. used to say those were important pollinators for tomatoes, and visited more than bumblebees.
Bumblebees are really thorough with the tomatoes here. No flower too small, as long as it opened today.   I would expect to find a lot of crosses, just due to the level of pollinator attention.

[William S.]

So this year I have a lot of promiscuous project plants from bicolor plants of 2020 whose flowers don't quite meet my standards for exsertion of the stigma. I collected a mixed bag of the earlies from them to save some seed from. There are reds and pinks mixed in there. The red and pink row last year was XL. I didn't mix the seed. Therefore XL was a pollen parent. Intrigued.

[William S.]

Got about two seeds out of the first hand full of R18. They cracked because of watering for nearby squash.

Also got first fruits from a pink descendent of a bicolor probably XL line was father. Seems fairly common. This one though was a rare exserted stigma plant amongst the transplants.

[William S.]

Really liking R18 a accession Joseph selected in 2020. It seems to have the extra big flowers and exsertion desired, it fruited late with early abortion. So far only 2 seeds because of a lot of empties but I've accumulated another big pile of them to cut up. Empties have plagued me this year maybe from the July heat.

Lots of red and pink tomatoes this year in the promiscuous isolation garden. Good evidence for a high out crossing rate with the XL row as I only replanted seeds from bicolors and orange tomatoes. Except for a few XL plants in a different isolation garden. However most are not exserted this year and I am highly selecting for the few that are (so far).

I could use flavor testers to see if any of the many others have exceptional flavor. Some of them sure look lovely. I found one with great flavor I think of it as "little tiny pumpkins" doesnt taste like pumpkins though just fruity orange goodness but so far they are seed free!