Quote:
Originally Posted by travis
I think "adaptation" of a line of tomatoes to a particular garden has a lot to do with selection of superior examples by the individual grower over extended periods of time. Well, I know it happens that way with me anyhow, because I never save seeds from an inferior example of a variety. Instead I always save seeds from the superior example(s).
As to "adaptation" that appears to have occurred in cases where "it didn't do well the first year, but the second year it performed much better," I attribute to variable soil and weather conditions one summer to the next.
I would love to see good data indicating acclimation of a tomato variety over an extended run of years, but I have not seen anything other than casual anecdotal evidence, and even that came without any data relative to weather and soil conditions.
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That's the kicker. It all sounds very intriguing, but I'm not sure enough research has been done to definitively show that the success of a tomato variety in successive years in a garden can be attributed to anything other than improvements in the gardener's skillset, improvements in the soil, and climatic variation.
In the next few years as at home genetic testing becomes affordable, I think a lot of heirloom tomato mysteries will be solved and the kind of research being mentioned here could be crowdsourced much as the Dwarf Project did to dwarf tomato varieties.