Hello

What do you consider to be a heirloom tomato ?

Is there a date that distinguishes heirloom from “modern tomatoes” ?

Thank you for your help

heirlooms would be around about 50 years or so i think.
then there are the old heirlooms that are a hundred years or older.

i am some where in between that in age.


keith

rxkeith wrote: ↑Mon Feb 10, 2025 7:59 am heirlooms would be around about 50 years or so i think.
then there are the old heirlooms that are a hundred years or older.

i am some where in between that in age.


keith

Thank you

Good question.

I think of heirlooms as automatically open pollinated tomatoes and then also with roots going way back into the first 2/3rds of the twentieth century or even earlier. The tomatoes don’t necessarily have to be discovered that far back, maybe some grandma or aunt or dad passed the seeds down to someone more recently who then passed them down to someone else and the original aunt or grandma gets their name stamped on the fruit, but the variety might be even older than the namesake. But, take something like Brandywine, there’s a number of strains and derivatives, are they all heirlooms? Then there’s the heirloom crosses, for example, Brandywine X Cherokee Purple = Bear Creek (RL) or Gary O Sena (PL).

Then there’s the tomatoes developed by famous name modern breeders. They are mostly all open pollinated, but many have stripes, swirls, anthocyanins, multiple colors, odd shapes, unusual textures, diminutive plants, etc. I don’t think of these as heirlooms.

I consider an heirloom as an OP tomato variety saved and cherished by someone. If not saved and cherished, seed may no longer be viable, and it may no longer be, let alone be an heirloom. As soon as it's an OP variety, and someone cherishes it, it becomes an heirloom at that time, with no guarantee it will continue to be. Many of the older heirlooms are with us, because only one person grew the variety and saved the seeds, for several decades.

Will Toad Suck Toad remain an heirloom?

Twenty-five years ago when my garden saw its first "heirloom tomato" this topic was going strong on what at that time was about the only tomato growing website. Even then the standard was discussed as being fifty years being a stable variety. Then three or four websites popped up where the discussion continued with a pile of tomato growers of some esteem pitched in with their opinions.

So if now the standard is still fifty years, then the bar has moved forward twenty-five years. I have never expressed an opinion (I don't think so, but then I said a lot of things I don't remember). My postings on-line and my opinions expressed at the various seminars attended and moderated have begun to indicate "Heirloom/Open Pollenated" as the descriptor. This question is beyond my pay grade and I will continue to grow what tastes good and varieties that are either considered "heirloom or OP"

What couldn't be decided twenty-five years ago, or even longer ago, has not been decided definitively even now and I can't and will not try to figure it out.

If the variety originated and became stable in the age of the world wide web and social media, then it automatically isn’t an heirloom. If the name doesn’t contain someone’s family first or last name or relationship to the family or a specific location, color, resemblance to another fruit or vegetable or animal or its anatomy, a people group, or a historical anecdote, then it cannot be an heirloom. Just because a variety meets one or more elements of this criterion doesn’t necessarily mean it is an heirloom.

The general counsel I used to hear on the subject was that an heirloom was a stable tomato that had been around for 50+ years or so (along the lines of what rxkeith was saying). However, I don't think there's actually an official definition that everyone can agree on. Some people say any stable tomato is an heirloom.

It would appear that all heirlooms are open pollinated but not all open pollinated are considered to be heirlooms. Think this depends on how old the variety is and how many years you think an heirloom should have been around and if it has any significant history. At this point I check offerings for being open pollinated and don’t worry if it’s considered an “heirloom” or not! Too confusing!
But seeds I got from a niece this last summer would be ones I would personally consider an “heirloom” since they came from a neighbor lady who brought the seeds from Italy probably at least 30 to 40 years ago and whose family still grows them every year. Produced a fabulous large luscious red I plan to grow again this summer and will continue to save seeds!
I like @Paulf’s take on this!

Thank you all for sharing your point of views on heirloom. Interesting