Virtually all my selected F2 plants were indeterminate. I had a couple of PL plants, as expected, when I crossed to a PL parent in the F1. I planted my selected F2 plants a little too close together and the plants were very vigorous and leafy. Fruit set in the canopy didn't get enough light for much anthocyanin accumulation, but fruit near the top and on the edges got plenty of light and did express the Aft trait.

Do other factors like elevated temperature seem to work with light to promote anthocyanins?

[QUOTE=Fred Hempel;192116]Do other factors like elevated temperature seem to work with light to promote anthocyanins?[/QUOTE]

Temperature seems to have an effect, but its cool temperatures that stimulate anthocyanin accumulation. This is especially true in vegetative tissue.

Nice looking tomato, to me thats a winner color combination. How does it taste?

Yesterday I planted the seed of F1, F2 and F3 lines from which we will select plants for our 2011 “Blue tomato” breeding nursery. In preparation for this I reviewed notes from our 2010 F2 nursery, a summary of which (w/ photos) I posted this morning at our tomato breeding blog @ [URL="http://www.frogsleapfarm.blogspot.com/"][COLOR=#800080]www.frogsleapfarm.blogspot.com[/COLOR][/URL]. We’ll also be including a couple of Tom Wagner’s new OSU Blue-derived lines in the new nursery this year.

Frog, atv and abg are up-regulated in cool temps. aft is up-regulated at higher UV exposure. Because higher UV levels usually correspond with higher temps, this gives the impression that high temps are the cause of excess fruit anthocyanin when in fact the culprit is UV. atv tends to express in vegetative tissue while aft tends to express in the skin and pericarp of fruit.

I've got a couple of lines with seed started. One is a black on black from crossing P20 with a black fruited line. Another is a very sweet line derived from Sungold, Little Lucky, Lucky Cross, Purple Haze, and P20. The fruit are an almost iridescent brilliant red with dark blue/black shoulders.

DarJones

DarJones - I have no way of tracking abg, so not sure if it is even in play in my material, but your other comments are consistent with my experience. One of my striped Aft lines is a black on brown, and I agree that the brilliant red/blue-black contrast is stunning.

First seeded, first up - F3 lines tracing to crosses with OSU Blue. F2 plants were selected for both strong anthocyanin expression in seedlings and in fruit. Great uniform expression of anthocyanin in hypocotyls of these blue/indigo lines.

The anthocyanin expression is very strong for such young seedlings. Does extra light bring out more "color" in the seedlings?

[QUOTE=dustdevil;205136]The anthocyanin expression is very strong for such young seedlings. Does extra light bring out more "color" in the seedlings?[/QUOTE]

Yes bright light helps, but you can see in the photo the very dark purple hypocotyl right at emergence. It was warm enough to move these outside for a while today, last year this really helped sort things out. However these F3 lines look very uniform for purple hypocoyls - atv and Aft may both be homozygous frm the intense selection last generation

I put these seedlings under a UV light this afternoon. Generally anthocyanin production in plants is up-regulated by UV light, which was lacking with my indoor set up. It's too cool for the outdoor natural light treatment, so I decided to try UV supplementation to sort out the progeny.

Frog, atv is expressed in vegetative tissue. When you select for deep purple seedlings, you are selecting for homozygous atv. The only way to consistently select for homozygous aft is from expression in fruit exposed to direct sunlight.

DarJones

Yep, I'm at the seedling stage now and selecting for atv. The UV treatment is designed to help in that selection. It will unfortunately be a while before I can get these seedlings significantly exposed to outdoor natural light, and I have to winnow numbers down soon.

[QUOTE=Fusion_power;205784]Frog, atv is expressed in vegetative tissue. When you select for deep purple seedlings, you are selecting for homozygous atv. The only way to consistently select for homozygous aft is from expression in fruit exposed to direct sunlight.

DarJones[/QUOTE]

Seedling selections for anthocyanin done and transplants recovering well. Here are two F3 lines, one large fruited and segregating for PL, the other a red cherry.

Hi Frog.

I enjoy your tomato breeding posts here and on your site. The photos are nice!

Dust