Hi,

Still off season here. Starting to sow tomatoes in April. Will grow the F2 from my very first crosses this season.

I have been saving seeds from some commercial hybrids (Luciebell - red and Katiebell - yellow). As F1, they were relatively small growing indeterminates, healthy, open growth habbit with very good flavor. ”Baby plums”, cherry tomatoes. They are part of Rainbow Blend together with Lizziebell (orange) and Flamingo (pink). Lucie and Katie have segregating to determinates (or semi determinates). Lizzie and Flamingo have stayed indeterminate. It is the growth habit of Lucie and Katie Fn that I woud like to discuss here.

They bloom like nothing I have seen before. Basically, all suckers from sertain hight upwards are just flowers. I removed these inflorescence ”suckers” accidentially when the Lucie (Fn) started self pruning first time - the plant re-grew them (seconday inflorescence?). Next season I was more careful and didn’t remove them anymore.

I have learned that there can be tomatoes that have too many flowers and fruits in the plant. Most flowers are fertail and develop into fruit. The growth habbit reminds me of Sprite (with some more bloom and fruits). The inflorescence structure is ”normal” (not multi-flower). Small plants are more productive than the original F1’s. I have lost some of the original good flavor and I have some splitting.

For me, the plants looked relatively tall for an determinate (maybe 1,5 m or little more). I have crossed some with determinates (e.g. Lime Green Salad) and F1’s have been shorter. The Lime cross will not go forward because it had a major splitting problem, probably from both parents.

I have read about supressor genes of sp (like ssp or sft) which makes determinates taller. Some may cause increased blooming at heterozygotize form. But I think my determinates are just normal sp’s. The height could be explained by inter-node distance which reminds typical indeterminate.

Hi Pippin! I've done some crosses with determinates and indets as well, and I also saw that you can get quite a tall growth habit due to internode length as you said. Also I got many mixed patterns in the growth habits, as to the number of leaves between clusters etc. There seem to be a number of genetic elements in growth habit besides sp.
Would love to see some pics of your plants when the season gets going.

Just adding a photo of my Luciebell Fn in the older discussion. The plant is impossible to photograph, it is some 120 cm high, I grow it without any major pruning, so the appearance is messy.
My little breeding project is related to a more compact growth habit and this little devil is not settling down in my crosses as I would like. When crossed with a short internode plant, it segregated only 3 out of 60 as something that could be called as a compact or a managable plant. They just grow all over into a complete mess. I had many good experiences with my F2s last season and this was not one of them. I keep observing some cracking. The other parent in the cross was not prone to cracking.

Some of the messyness in the appearance of Luciebell Fn is probably due to it’s leaves: it seems to have some narrow leaf gene too. I become aware of this because I have also crossed Luciebell Fn (determinate version) with Kotlas. I planted some PL F2s last summer and one was almost ”leafless”, funny looking plant, droopy narrow PL, almost naked. Surprisingly, it produced sweet, cherry size, asymmetric ”hearts”, not what typically is considered as heart type tomatoes, I mean something that looks like a physiological heart of a small mammal (left side being stronger and larger than the right). And one would not expect such a sweet flavor from a plant that almost have no leaves. Not perfect though, little cracking here too but with careful watering still managable. This was one of those freaky plants that one decides to save seeds in the last minute because one doesn’t recognize the potential out of confusion. No photoes, of course, to be shared with other tomato enthusiasts. I will probably start referring to this line as Naked Heart if the leaf and fruit forms remains and stabilizes.

Here is also a photo of Luciebelle Fn x Lime Green Salad. I did grow 6 F2 plants, all of them were huge disappointments as the fruits crack and did not taste very good. I only saved the below one, it is a multiflora, red, oddly shaped cherry. I was just facinated by the beauty of the bloom, started calling it Spider (it actually resembles the Venus sea fan coral). Don’t know if I will ever grow it again because it also cracks and is in the more acid side of the spectrum.

Playing the genetics lottery is fun! I love to see new combinations of traits!

There's a lot of fruit on that Luciebell! Something I always like to see in a tomato.

Luciebelle Fn x Lime Green flowers are quite large. Are the fruit small grapes like the above picture, or something bigger?

Spider has pear-ish shaped, "barbapapa" fruit, not much larger than Luciebelle. Clearly smaller than saladette tomatoes, for example. Probably not yet stable because the neck is not yet narrow enough to be a "true" pear. Didn't find any pics of ripe fruits but below some green stage ones.
Found one more pic on the Luciebelle itself, earlier from the season - still blooming heavily. The plant is almost fully in the picture, it does not continue much down. It could probably be grown as hanging basket plant without support. I tie them up because they are growing under plastic.