FarmerShawn wrote: ↑Tue Aug 11, 2020 3:49 pm I am growing it this year to save seeds for the Carolyn Tribute seed offer. I just saved seeds from one fruit today, and, of course, tasted it after I squeezed the seeds out. Wow! It was absolutely delicious! It was a nice, good sized pink beefsteak. It got bumped off my grow list a few years ago to make room for some newcomers, but I have a feeling it may go back onto my must grow list for next year!

MissS wrote: ↑Tue Aug 11, 2020 6:04 pm What??? You are only just now starting to think about what you are growing for next year??? Many of us have that and the next two years after that planned out.
Gary O'Senna is a large purple tomato with PL (potato leaf) foliage. It is a mid-season variety with in my opinion excellent taste. Great out of hand or in a sandwich. This year I am growing all of my favorite tomatoes out side by side. Sadly while I did start some of these seeds the rabbits ate them before they got put into the ground so they will not be making a showing in this years garden.

MissS wrote: ↑Tue Aug 11, 2020 8:25 pm @Pokemato I doubt that there is a seed offer or swap that you can't participate in here on the forum due to being a newbie grower. Many of us will sponsor the newbies without seeds for the swaps. All of us here love to help the newbies out and enable a new addiction to tomatoes and seeds. In just this season alone you could potentially have hundreds of varieties of seeds. I myself will have a seed offer of what I have been growing and all that you need will be a TomatoJunction membership and a SASE.

Fusion_power wrote: ↑Tue Aug 11, 2020 8:45 pm Keith Mueller bred Gary'O Sena and sent me seed about 14 years ago. It is from a cross of Brandywine X Cherokee Purple selected for excellent flavor. The fruit should be dark similar to Cherokee Purple with some catfacing. They are potato leaf. I grew 2 plants this year (out of about 400) just to keep a few available for the table. Ranking them for flavor is tough because there are so many good tomatoes now, however, I put them in the top 20 I have grown and sometimes in the top 10. Brandywine and Crnkovic Yugoslavian are in my opinion just a tad better flavored, but only because my taste buds prefer balanced flavor tomatoes. Gary'O Sena is more robust which means it really shines in a BLT.

MissS wrote: ↑Sat Aug 15, 2020 2:05 pm @JosephineRose I did a search and all I found was a thread that you made last year at TV asking the same question. How about you email Marianna and ask her about it. She should know the history on this one better than anyone else. And if you get a reply, please let us know.

Gardenboy wrote: ↑Sat Oct 17, 2020 1:21 pm How did your grow out work out with the BFT and the Spudatula plants this year? I always grow BFT but I am also trying Spudatula since BFT is my favorite black tomato variety. Thanks as always for any information.

Fusion_power wrote: ↑Wed Dec 09, 2020 10:00 am Spudatula aka Black From Tula PL originated in my garden in 2002 when I got seed for Black From Tula from Chuck Wyatt. A few of the seed produced potato leaf plants. I grew them out and eventually sent seed to Bill Malin (Spudleaf) who renamed it Spudatula. It is IMO an improvement over Black From Tula as it is more productive. Increasing production usually comes with a slight reduction in sweetness on a per fruit basis therefore the flavor may not be quite as sweet as Black From Tula. This is a generally true statement as most highly productive tomatoes have similar reduced sweetness.

The original Gary'O Sena tomato plants from seed Keith sent produced a few that made pink fruit. Per Keith, pink is not correct for this variety so I culled them and kept seed from the darker fruited plants.

If you can get hold of Bear Creek, you will find it is also a very good tomato with similar genetic history as Liz Birt and Gary'O Sena.

If you want to see pictures of fruit from the original plants, please look near the bottom of this page on my website. http://www.selectedplants.com/varieties.htm

Tormato wrote: ↑Thu Dec 10, 2020 3:18 pm

Fusion_power wrote: ↑Wed Dec 09, 2020 10:00 am Spudatula aka Black From Tula PL originated in my garden in 2002 when I got seed for Black From Tula from Chuck Wyatt. A few of the seed produced potato leaf plants. I grew them out and eventually sent seed to Bill Malin (Spudleaf) who renamed it Spudatula. It is IMO an improvement over Black From Tula as it is more productive. Increasing production usually comes with a slight reduction in sweetness on a per fruit basis therefore the flavor may not be quite as sweet as Black From Tula. This is a generally true statement as most highly productive tomatoes have similar reduced sweetness.

The original Gary'O Sena tomato plants from seed Keith sent produced a few that made pink fruit. Per Keith, pink is not correct for this variety so I culled them and kept seed from the darker fruited plants.

If you can get hold of Bear Creek, you will find it is also a very good tomato with similar genetic history as Liz Birt and Gary'O Sena.

If you want to see pictures of fruit from the original plants, please look near the bottom of this page on my website. http://www.selectedplants.com/varieties.htm

I got a hold of Bear Creek in donations to the MMMM swap. One says it's a beefsteak, another says it's a cherry. I've been holding off in packing any for participants, until I clear this up. It is the only variety, out of thousands, that give conflicting descriptions.