Goodloe, are you doing Tomato Science? Love it! I did a total of 20 seeds, 10 each of two varieties.

Nah...just trying to sound like I know what I'm talking about...

My main producer is Big Beef, but these frozen tomatoes probably include several other varieties, so we'll see how it goes...

[mention]goodloe[/mention] IMO, if you're doing seeds frozen in the fruit in a freezer, plant as many as you can (without promoting rotting), and if even one sprouts keep it to grow in the spring!

Ok, Folks...I will be dropping previously frozen tomato seeds this afternoon! These seeds were taken from a bag of tomatoes that were "rough chopped", put in a ziplock bag, and frozen since about August, 2018. They are of several varieties, I imagine, but mostly Big Beef...They will be planted in 2 flats, 20 seeds each, and placed on a heat mat in a room that stays at about 68 deg...I will give them 21 days...so, if after those 21 days, I have zero germination, then I'll can the whole thing. Let's see what happens!!

My prediction is no germination. But if you do get germination, I'll be VERY interested.

I think freezing should not kill all the the seeds. I have many volunteers sprouting every spring from fruits that dropped from the vines. They survived on the surface, and we had temps down to -15 C (5 F) in the last couple of years.

arnorrian wrote: ↑Mon Dec 30, 2019 6:17 am I think freezing should not kill all the the seeds. I have many volunteers sprouting every spring from fruits that dropped from the vines. They survived on the surface, and we had temps down to -15 C (5 F) in the last couple of years.

We get tomato volunteers even when it's been below -20° F. in the winter, but I still haven't had a single seed frozen in the fruit in the freezer sprout, yet! I think the seeds must prep themselves for the winter somehow, as winter gradually gets more severe. I think it's more than the moisture factor, but I could be wrong. If it gets super cold for a long period all at once, maybe they just don't know how to handle it.

This is bad news. For some reason I thought you could sprout seeds frozen inside the fresh fruits. Even though I never tried it. I wanted to use frozen peppers for seeds —I will still give it a go but doesn’t look promising.

[mention]MsCowpea[/mention]
Well, pepper seeds are a lot drier than tomato seeds in the fruits; so, there's a better chance for them, I think. Not sure, though. Frozen in the freezer or outdoors?

We could certainly do the experiment with pepper seeds...

Shule, Freezer

It is funny that compost pile volunteers will pop up after a nasty winter but whole frozen tomatoes won't.

One year I was saving seeds from a round speckled roman tomato (normally a plum type).
Over many generations I was saving/starting seeds from only the round ones.
I got lazy and instead of saving seeds my usual way I froze the entire tomato (3 or 4)
None of those seeds popped the following planting season,so all that genetic materiel was lost.

Well, folks, the results from my frozen tomato seed experiment are in. (See post #24 above). BIG FAT 0% Germination! Zip, zilch, zero, NADA!!...The question is settled, for me, at least...

Store bought sun dried tomatoes don't pop either.
Burger king tomatoes will pop even after being microwaved.