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That's interesting, Maf, because I didn't find the yield of my dwarf tomatoes last year to be any lower than that of taller indeterminates.

Maybe this just shows how hard it is for me to grow tall indeterminates efficiently for yield in my small outdoor garden, without a good support system for the plants.

Yes, in some situations dwarf growing habit will work better, particularly if you live in an area with strong summer sun and/or do not have a good system for pruning and training tall indeterminates to fit your space.

Mainly, my comments about br vs d growing were related to commercial greenhouse situations. Where the plant breeders have embraced br but as far as I know have not utilised d. They grow the plants to usually one stem (but sometimes two) and prune off all side shoots. The growing season is long in heated greenhouses and when the plants reach the roof the strings supporting the vines are lowered to extend the harvest season. When this stage is reached some of the stem will be resting on the ground and could be a vector for disease or other infection. The advantage of br in this situation is that it would not need to be lowered as soon as the wild type, and potentially is a longer lasting vine.

This new EU variety is released in 2024 and have 2 leaves between the flower clusters. Properly because of the br gene.

https://culinaris-saatgut.de/en/varieties/vegetables/tomatoes/salattomate-631-fl/

Semi determinate, with 2 leaves between flower clusters, is completely different to br which reduces the length between internodes but does not reduce the number of internodes. Typically br plants have 3 leaves between flower clusters in an indeterminate situation. Obviously you could have semi-determinate and brachytic in the same plant but there is no evidence that this is the case here.

9 looks like the only one with all homozygous gf leaves. 1, 6 and 8 look like they have some homo gf leaves among them.

My experience of gf is that there are 3 stages of chlorophyll retention; homo, hetero and wild type. Hetero and wild type are close to each other but not exactly the same, while homozygous is distinctly different.

Also, there are about five different alleles of gf and I do not know if they all act exactly the same way.

Anyone who is concerned about the reduction in yield of br (brachytic) mutants compared to wild type, I can assure you it is much, much less than the reduction associated with d (dwarf).

I don't know of any commercial greenhouse varieties developed with d but many have been developed with br. These commercial operations are ruled by the dollar (or euro) and would not waste space with something that was not economically successful. 

P.S. in d (dwarf) all plant parts are reduced in size such as flowers, leaves etc, but in br (brachytic) everything seems to be at or near normal size, except that the internode length is reduced by roughly half.

Call me old fashioned, but give be brown paper coin envelopes any day of the week!

The full text of the same paper referenced above that investigated d and sp in Micro Tom, Genetic and physiological characterization of tomato cv. Micro-Tom suggests that miniature (mnt) is believed to be one of the genes contributing to the micro size, but this was not proven in the article.

It has been suggested, based on its pedigree, that the phenotype of Micro-Tom is the result of two major recessive mutations: dwarf (d) and miniature (mnt) (Meissner et al., 1997).

In summary, the phenotype of Micro-Tom plants is due to at least three mutations. The characterization of two of them, sp (producing a determinate phenotype) and d (reducing internode length and producing smaller, rugose, and dark-green leaves as a result of reduced BR content), has been carried out in this work. In addition, Micro-Tom has another mutation (putative mnt), still uncharacterized and that does not affect GA metabolism but which is likely to be associated with GA signalling.

It is also worth noting that each flower cluster terminates the stem that it is growing on, and what appears to be the continuation of this stem is in fact a new side shoot.

The only real difference between determinates and indeterminates is the number of leaf nodes between flower clusters. In all other ways they behave and grow exactly the same. As @Steph S says above, any apparent pause in vegetative growth is purely related to high fruit load sapping finite resources.

Did they actually ship any seeds before it was pulled?

[We understand from Baker Creek that they will not be selling seeds of this variety.]

As mentioned in the other purple thread, Norfolk are reporting that Baker Creek have removed their Purple Galaxy from sale because it did indeed contain the patented GMO germplasm. I will link to Norfolk's website and quote the relevant passage:

Is NHP's Purple Tomato related to the "Purple Galaxy"?

We have received many questions about the purple tomato marketed by Baker Creek as "Purple Galaxy" in their 2024 catalogs. We understand from Baker Creek that they will not be selling seeds of this variety.  Given its remarkable similarity to our purple tomato, we prompted Baker Creek to investigate their claim that Purple Galaxy was non-GMO.  We are told that laboratory testing determined that it is, in fact, bioengineered (GMO). This result supports the fact that the only reported way to produce a purple-fleshed tomato rich in anthocyanin antioxidants is with Norfolk's patented technology. We appreciate that Baker Creek tested their material, and after discovering it was a GMO, removed it from their website.

One parent line was developed from a cross in the UK in 2005 with further selection taking place in outdoor trials in Worcestershire & Warwickshire.

This parent contains the PH2 gene.

The second parent was selected in the USA

This parent was shown to have excellent blight resistance even in very warm, humid conditions.

This parent contains the PH3 gene.

This seems to me to prove it is hetero for both genes. One parent is homozygous for PH-2, the other is homozygous for PH-3. Therefore the F1 created from these parents will be heterozygous for both.

Thanks @Justin Jardinier, from that description sounds like Crim Crush F1 is hetero for both genes, good find. I think the 'selection' in the text refers to the selection of the parent plants?

I have also read that CC has some minor resistance genes that either offer additional protection or amplify the protective effects of PH-2/PH-3 via synergy.

My experience of Crimson crush last year is that in conditions where all other plants are killed or mortally wounded, CC develops minor lesions on 10-20% of leaves and some infection of ripe fruits but very little infection of unripe fruits. If drier weather follows the blight period, then strong growth resumes. (Obviously your mileage may vary with different strains of late blight).

The interesting takeaway for me is that there is a good potential for selecting for better than parent resistance in the F2 of Crimson Crush. Or indeed in the F1 of CC x Mountain Magic as MM is also hetero for PH-1/2. My math is 1 in 16 homozygous for both genes in either of those situations. Plus you have the potential minor resistance/amplification genes flittering around in the background.

Also their Instagram has taken down any post or video of them. The link shared on this thread earlier doesn't work.

Yes, it seems now to have totally disappeared from Baker Creek website and social media. Even the pictures of the catalogue cover seem to be gone.

The rumours I have seen are that one of Baker Creek's suppliers grew the snapdragon GMO germplasm without licence and passed the seeds to Baker Creek with the story that they occurred as a random mutation. I think I need to add allegedly to that sentence somewhere....

A new one I'd never heard of is Merrygold F1, supposed to be the first orange blight resistant tomato. Looks cherry size.

https://www.thompson-morgan.com/p/tomato-merrygold-f1-seeds/wkf2497TM

https://www.dobies.co.uk/vegetable-seeds/tomato-seeds/tomato-merrygold-f1-seeds_mh11925

Do we have any definitive info on whether Crimson Crush is homozygous for one of both Ph-2 and 3? I just searched the internet without finding anything to say for sure.

Good question. Lots of resources quote that it has both PH-2 and 3 but don't confirm homozygous or not. Ph-3 is only partially dominant so for maximum levels of resistance one would expect it to be homozygous. Either way it had pretty good resistance when I grew it outdoors last year.

I don't have the space for this, but it would be quite easy to check by growing out a number of F2 plants and assessing the uniformity or otherwise of the blight resistance.

(It is well known that Mountain Magic is only heterozygous for PH-2 and Ph-3)

Hi Maf,
  Wishing you good luck with 'Gary Loves Rosella' F1 ... Are you also re-making Raspberry Beret F1 This year ?

Thanks, plenty of seeds for 'Gary Loves Rosella' so if it passes the taste and health test this year I can send some for you to try next year. And yes, I will be remaking Raspberry Beret F1 this year, or should I say attempting to! I hope the pollination gods oblige! It must have taken ten attempts last summer to make one viable fruit of Gary loves Rosella, I must be losing my touch...