I suspect someone named them that because they thought it would help sell those plants. There are thousands of varieties of tomatoes, but I've never seen "Sizzler" on any cultivar list or any catalog or anything else.

Most of the heat-setting type tomatoes only set fruit at temperature a very few degrees hotter than the temps at which general tomatoes set fruit. They do not set fruit endlessly no matter how hot it gets. I've grown a dozen or two varieties of heat-setting tomatoes and almost without exception they have been very disappointing. Most of them only set fruit a week or two later in the season than regular tomatoes do in our climate. We just get too hot too early in the year for them to make much difference. Also, for the most part, it is as if the heat-setting gene kills the flavor genes. The best of the heat-setting types I've grown were Merced, and I no longer remember if it was marketed as a heat-setting type or if we just noticed that it did really well in the heat, and Phoenix, which did set fruit in our garden this year when the high temps were between 108 and 112.9. All the others---Heat Wave, Heat Wave II, Solar Set, Solar Fire, Sunmaster, Sun Leaper, etc. have been a big disappointment.

Sizzler could have been a renaming of one of the BHN-number types, like BHN444, BHN648, etc. I think tomatoes sell better when they have a memorable name instead of a serial number type of a name.

The Wal Mart stores in Ardmore and Gainesville, which are the two stores at which I shop, usually have Bonnie Plants transplants about 95% of the time. If the 'Sizzler' was from BP, it ought to be listed on their website. It also might have been from a local wholesale grower.

In the tomato world, there's relatively little that is new under the sun in terms of heat setting types. They're all about the same....if you've grown one, you've pretty much grown them all. The sad thing about Merced is that its seed no longer is available commercially and it actually was worth growing. That is really frustrating. None of the newer ones they've released taste nearly as good or set fruit as well in our heat. Phoenix is the first one I've grown since Merced that hasn't been a total disappointment. How's that for an adverising slogan? "This heat setting tomato is not a total disappointment."

Dawn

I saw the Sizzler I believe around here 1-2 years ago. Can't remember where for sure. It could of been one of the greenhouses or one of the big box stores like Wal-Mart. My closest Wal-Mart the last few years along with the Bonnie plants have carried a few from someone else. The reason I remember it is it was supposed to have heat tolerance and set fruit in warmer temps. When I see a variety with those attributes I usually pay it a little more attention. Haven't seen it or the seeds since. I imagine it is like several others. For some reason it was eliminated soon after being released. An example of that is Jetsonic. I received seeds of it as a freebie. It has performed better here for me than Jet Star or Jetsetter. But can't find the seeds anymore. Reimer's used to list them but was always out. My original seed came from Totally Tomatoes. I have contacted them and they said they can no longer get the seed. I could list several more. It seems some are introduced and then eliminated for reasons we will probably never know. Jay