Grafted Tomatoes

[Setec Astronomy]

So back in January I ordered some Orange Paruche seedlings from Territorial Seed, and they arrived yesterday. They had some paperwork with them about grafted tomatoes, but I didn't know if that applied. So I was getting ready to plant one out today and I looked at it and it sure looked grafted, so I read the instructions...and it said "keep graft line well above soil level".

I had just got finished with some of my leggy seedlings that I grew, which I planted as deep as possible, and these seedlings came in a tiny pot that was only half full...so they got planted about 2" deep to keep the graft in the right place.

Is this an Orange Paruche thing, a Territorial Seed thing, or what?

What is the purpose of a grafted tomato and what is it grafted to? Just when I finally acclimated myself to burying the stem when you plant a tomato...here's one you're not supposed to bury the stem.

[MissS]

There are many and varied reasons people graft tomatoes. Most often the reason is to create disease resistance in non-resistant varieties or to increase productivity. Why this company grafted your seedling I just do not know. The description says that it is productive and vigorous. It also is TMV, ToMV resistant which is not much but more than many. You would have to ask the company to what variety they grafted these on to and for what purpose.

[Setec Astronomy]

Ha, I just got to the point where it doesn't seem wrong to bury the stem, and now it feels wrong not to.

[MissS]

The reason not to bury the stem on a grafted tomato is to ensure that the plant does not form roots from the plant on the top of the graft. I tried growing a grafted tomato just once and that plant had the graft above the soil line but still kept trying to grow roots that I would have to clip off in order to not allow it to grow it's own roots.

[Setec Astronomy]

Well, I got seedlings from my normal place and some of them looked just like the Orange Paruche, which looks like this:

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A couple of the new seedlings:

IMG_2425.JPG

IMG_2426.JPG

So I emailed the owner of the farm who said no, they are not grafted, but understood what I was seeing and said that's a normal growth pattern of some tomatoes. I guess I should have posted pictures initially...so is the consensus that none of these are grafted and I just jumped to that conclusion based on Territorial including "Grafted Vegetable Planting Instructions"?

I'm going to feel really silly after planting about half a dozen plants very shallow to keep them below a graft line that wasn't really there.