Educated Advice Needed

[budfaux]

Ok, here's the deal... Alabama Intensive.
In an approx. bed 25'-30' long X 8' deep, I have 46 tomato plants. All are looking great! All started from seed by me.
Starting from one end to the other it runs like this:
8 Roma, 4 Celebrity Hyrbrid, 4 better Boy Hybrid, 4 Sioux, 4 Black Zebra,4 Nepal, 2 Abe Lincoln, 2 Box Car Willie, 2 Big Rainbow, 2 Mortage Lifter, (small fruit) 2Black Cherry, 2 Nugget, 2 Sugary, 2 Supersweet 100 Hybrid, and 2 Nectar Hybrid.

Being a neophyte to this cool tomato culture that until recently I didn't know existed, the thought of seed saving/ cross pollenating is really appealing to me. With what I've provided above variety wise:

Would it be crazy to save any seeds from the hodgepodge I have growing so close together?

Should I concentrate on a particular variety to see what the results would be?

I'm wide open to the ideas and opinions anyone would care to offer.

[Worth1]

Yes I would there are people I know that are on SSE that do the same thing and they dont bag blooms.

Most tomatoes pollinate before the bloom even opens.

Worth

[beeman]

Originally Posted by budfaux

Would it be crazy to save any seeds from the hodgepodge I have growing so close together?
Should I concentrate on a particular variety to see what the results would be?
I'm wide open to the ideas and opinions anyone would care to offer.

I would suggest that you can save seeds, even with all the varieties, provided you bag the blossoms until the fruit forms.
Provided bees and wind are not given access, then the seeds should be pure as the parents.

[budfaux]

My fault for not including more in my original post.
The bees and whatnot have been busy. I've got tomatoes from marble size to almost tennis ball size.
This week I noticed one cluster of fruit on one of my Black Zebras was taking on a conical look similar to a Roma. The fruit on the rest of the plant are orbs. The fruit on the three other BZ's are orbs.
Say the tomatoes from this cluster taste good and I save the seed, would the offspring exhibet the same look and taste, revert to the parent, anyone's guess, etc?
This is all new to me so please excuse in advanvce any rookie questions that have probably been covered!

[Cole_Robbie]

I think Carolyn said on here recently that the very first tomatoes you pick will be the least likely to have cross-pollinated. That rule might not apply in everyone's climate, but generally for most people, pollinating insects are the least active in the early part of spring, when the season's first tomatoes are pollinated.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by budfaux

My fault for not including more in my original post.
The bees and whatnot have been busy. I've got tomatoes from marble size to almost tennis ball size.
This week I noticed one cluster of fruit on one of my Black Zebras was taking on a conical look similar to a Roma. The fruit on the rest of the plant are orbs. The fruit on the three other BZ's are orbs.
Say the tomatoes from this cluster taste good and I save the seed, would the offspring exhibet the same look and taste, revert to the parent, anyone's guess, etc?
This is all new to me so please excuse in advanvce any rookie questions that have probably been covered!

Any cross pollination that occurs this season will not show up until next season with the seeds you save this season.

As long as all the rest of the fruits on your Black Zebras are orbs I wouldn't worry about it that much.

Here's a link that might help titled how to prevent cross pollination and it's one of the best I know of with lots of info and pictures:

http://faq.gardenweb.com/faq/lists/t...852004159.html

Hope that helps,

Carolyn

[daninpd]

My main worry about your intensive gardening is that I calculate you have something like 25" row and plant spacing. If something bad starts up in one little spot in your garden, it can spread like wildfire. I use 42" row spacing with plants 39" apart in the rows. At the peak of the season I'm out there with the snippers cutting back plants that are trying to stick a branch into the depths of a neighbor's foliage (tomatoes can get WAY too friendly). And they are all 6' tall. Air circulation gets uber diminished at that time of the season.

By all means, save seed from your OPs. I'm always happy to trade seeds with anyone paying attention like you seem to be. I think the experts say cross-pollination from insects is about 5% and in my experience it seems to be less. And, sadly, there are fewer bees to worry about them doing their thing in my tomato patch. Happy growing!

[budfaux]

You folks are great!
With every reply, more questions pop into my head!

Cole, within the confines of my garden, I've been letting my brocolli, spinach, radishes and Asian greens flower and go to seed. I've also blackberry and blueberry plants within 50' or less of my tomatoes. All the flowering has brought bees aplenty for several weeks.

Carolyn, your link makes perfect sense to me and I'll keep it handy!

But lets say I did a 180, and saved seed from parent plants that, who knows how the pollen was distributed?
If a certain tomato(s), (non hybrid parent) from a specific plant exhibits characteristics in flavor, size, (mainly taste) etc., one or two that separate from the pack of that plant, would those parent seeds represent a close facsimile the next season?
Would potential pollenation from my hybrids to my open pollenateds be a fly in the ointment from the get go?

I sorry to be posing what are probably freshman questions to you folks, but this tomato thing has really got me fired up!

[budfaux]

Originally Posted by daninpd

My main worry about your intensive gardening is that I calculate you have something like 25" row and plant spacing. If something bad starts up in one little spot in your garden, it can spread like wildfire. I use 42" row spacing with plants 39" apart in the rows. At the peak of the season I'm out there with the snippers cutting back plants that are trying to stick a branch into the depths of a neighbor's foliage (tomatoes can get WAY too friendly). And they are all 6' tall. Air circulation gets uber diminished at that time of the season.

By all means, save seed from your OPs. I'm always happy to trade seeds with anyone paying attention like you seem to be. I think the experts say cross-pollination from insects is about 5% and in my experience it seems to be less. And, sadly, there are fewer bees to worry about them doing their thing in my tomato patch. Happy growing!

daninpd, the plants are jammed to be sure! 25' long X 8' deep (200 sq ft, give or take, including four interior rows to walk)

Another thing I failed to mention is I'm try new staking techniques I picked up on youtube. I'm using the usual wire "Big Box " store cages on the first 16 plants listed in my op. The next 10 plants I'm using the "Florida Weave". (who knew, not me!) The next 10, I'm using the vertical cord, single stem theory, but most have at least 3 stems and I added extra cords from above. The small fruited which are growing like kudzu, I made a PVC arbor with trellis netting... hopefully a small tunnel I can walk through.
I have done a lot of low leaf and sucker pruning. Still, you're right about air flow. The humidity in Bama is pretty fierce!

[Worth1]

Designation example for feet and inches.

25' = feet 25" = inches.

You said "daninpd, the plants are jammed to be sure! 25' long X 8' deep (200 sq ft, give or take, including four interior rows to walk)"

Now I know your beds aren't 8 feet deep are they.

How wide are the beds?
I cant tell from the description?

If you had one bed that was 25' long X 4' wide it would be only 100 square feet.
Do you have two beds?


Worth

[daninpd]

"The men are standing in ranks eight deep" doesn't mean they are standing on each others heads. "Deep" can be from your perspective, like "breadth and depth". Photography includes "depth of field". My dream world would include digging my garden 8' "deep", then lining the danged thing with gopher wire. Keep the little blighters out for good!









w

[Worth1]

Originally Posted by daninpd

"The men are standing in ranks eight deep" doesn't mean they are standing on each others heads. "Deep" can be from your perspective, like "breadth and depth". Photography includes "depth of field". My dream world would include digging my garden 8' "deep", then lining the danged thing with gopher wire. Keep the little blighters out for good!









w

Makes sense now.
I am used to working with dimensional drawings where things are laid out flat.

In other words the plot of land was 300' X 100'
The garden plot or area was 50'X50'
When the term bed was used I assumed it was a raised bed.

Sorry for the misunderstanding.

Worth

[budfaux]

Here again, my apologies!
I should have posted width X length. 8'X 25' including the four or five narrow rows for me to walk through. Does not include my walking rows at each end.
Two raised beds containing 20 of the 46 plants.
I probably could have planted a third less in plants so I could better see whats going on. It's a literal jungle, and this time of year it seems like the plants grow a few inches a day, but that probably just my imagination running away with me.

I appreciate everyone's patience with me. I'm sure kinda dumb questions or comments will pop up from me from time to time, (or all the time...) but being here is being like the proverbial kid in a candystore!

[daninpd]

Please post a picture around late July. I bet it's going to look like a solid block of greenery. Should be interesting!