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regaldozer

can 2 heirloom varieties cross in 1 fruit

regaldozer
12 years ago

Picked my first pink brandywines (YAY!) which were growing next to my ugly ripe.

look at the bottom left tomato, one half looks exactly like brandywine and the other half like ugly.

herre are some closeups of the same tomato



and for fun....




SO whats the diagnosis?

Comments (11)

  • yumtomatoes
    12 years ago

    It seems to me that what you have is a brandywine that is ripening unevenly.

    You would not see the results of this year's cross until you grow out the seeds of this year's fruit.

  • missingtheobvious
    12 years ago

    Fruit shape is absolutely not determined by whether or not there was cross-pollination. Fruit shape, taste, etc. are determined only by the genetics of the plant it grows on.

    If a particular tomato flower is cross-pollinated, the only thing affected is the genes in the fruit's seeds.

    Also, it is possible for a flower to be pollinated with pollen from more than one flower. And the different flowers that provided pollen might be from different plants. So seeds from the same fruit could have different parentage and grow plants with different characteristics (indeterminate vs. determinate, regular leaf vs. potato leaf, disease resistant or not, etc.) which bear fruit with different characteristics (different colors, sizes, shapes, and tastes, etc.).

    It is normal for large-fruited tomatoes to bear fruit of different sizes -- sometimes odd shapes, too (for instance, I ate a square 4-celled, pointed-like-a-heart Black Krim earlier this week; nothing else like it on the vine). Abnormal flowers may result in lumpy or lobed fruit; beefsteak types are more prone to having these abnormal flowers.

    [The only exception to this that I'm aware of is that -- IIRC -- mild peppers pollinated by hot peppers have unexpectedly hot seeds.]

  • regaldozer
    Original Author
    12 years ago

    cool - genetic abnormality. hope it tastes good. I'll eat the 2 brandys side by side and let y'all know

  • yumtomatoes
    12 years ago

    To further explain what missingtheobvious is saying - when you grow a tomato plant from a seed, the genes in that seed (referred to as its genotype) determine the qualities of the plant, such as the shape of its leaves and the shape/color of its fruit (referred to as the plant's phenotype).* Cross-pollination of the flowers of a plant will not affect the phenotype of the plant.

    Cross-pollination of the flowers of a plant with a different variety of tomato plant will result in fruit having seeds that contain genes from both varieties of tomato plants involved in the cross-pollination. If you grow the seeds of this fruit into a tomato plant, the resulting plant is referred to as a hybrid because it has genes from 2 different varieties of plants. This hybrid is more specifically referred to as an F1 hybrid (first filial "F1" generation).

    HTH.

    *I oversimplified this a bit since it is not just genotype that determines phenotype; environment can affect phenotype. An example of this is the color of the flower of a hydrangea being determined by the pH of the soil. Or the catfacing of a tomato's shape due to low temperatures during blossom formation.

  • digdirt2
    12 years ago

    Simply put - there will be no change in this year's fruit even with 15x crossing. Ugly will produce Ugly. BW will produce BW. Period. Only the seeds are affected.

    You do not have a genetic anomaly.

    Dave

  • carolyn137
    12 years ago

    Simply put - there will be no change in this year's fruit even with 15x crossing. Ugly will produce Ugly. BW will produce BW. Period. Only the seeds are affected.
    You do not have a genetic anomaly.

    ******

    Dave, speaking as a long time now retired teacher I like your short answer a lot not only b'c it's correct, but b/c it's succint. LOL

    Not taking anything away from anyone else who posted more genetics at all, b'c cross pollination of unfertilized ovules in the tomato ovary by one or two or even three different kinds of pollen is surely interesting but doesn't obtain is this situation that's been described.

    Carolyn

  • regaldozer
    Original Author
    12 years ago

    so how do I account for the deep red on the one side of a Pink brandywine?

  • yumtomatoes
    12 years ago

    "so how do I account for the deep red on the one side of a Pink brandywine?"

    I wouldn't call that deep red from the picture. It looks pink to me. The fruit looks like it is ripening unevenly.

    I have had tomatoes ripen unevenly. I have had them turn red on parts and stay greenish yellow on other parts and once the greenish yellow part turned to red, the rest of the tomato was rotten. I am not sure why this happens.

  • missingtheobvious
    12 years ago

    so how do I account for the deep red on the one side of a Pink brandywine?

    Red fruit have a yellow skin. Pink fruit have a clear skin. After the fruit has finished ripening, remove some skin and compare it with skin from red tomatoes and pink tomatoes.

    By the way, ripe pink fruit should be dark pink -- just as dark as red tomatoes are dark. The "pink" flesh in the third photo won't be ripe enough to eat for many days yet. By then the color of the two sides of the tomato will most likely have evened out.

  • digdirt2
    12 years ago

    so how do I account for the deep red on the one side of a Pink brandywine?

    Simple. Uneven ripening. Happens all the time and is environmental stress/weather related 99.9% of the time. And based on the photo it isn't "red", it is pink, a fairly normal BW pink. Set it next to a truly red tomato and the difference will be obvious.

    Scout's honor - if you really had an anomalous tomato from current cross pollination, given how nature works, it would be the first one in recorded history.

    Just let it ripen up more on the counter and then eat the BW and enjoy it.

    Dave

  • regaldozer
    Original Author
    12 years ago

    we ate the cherokee purple and the BW that has even ripening for lunch. OMG so good. even if the BW was a little early, it sure was delicious.

    nothing in the world like a mater picked this morning for lunch.

    thanks everyone

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