BD,

If you had a group of the same plants and of them there were a couple that showed a greater affliction to disease you would then cull those two and only grow the better plants and save seeds from the best of best of them.

Despite any tomato having great flavor, if it is lacking in vigor as compared to others in your garden, even if they're not the same species, I don't think it's a good idea to save seeds from the less-than-healthy plants.

T

Yes, the fungal foliage diseases as well as the systemic diseases such as Verticillium and Fusarium can be seed borne. They're on the seed coat, while the bacterial foliage diseases and those systemic ones that have been worked with are in the endosperm of the seed and hot water treatment is necessary to inactivate them and it's not something that home owners do.

The purpose of fermentation or oxyclean or TSP or whatever methods are used is to reduce the amount of pathogens that cling to the seed coat. The only good work is the data generated by Dr. Helene Dillard which showed that fermentation indeed does lower the pathogen burden but doesn't eliminate it.

But since infection is dose dependent it does help.

At another site Hoosier and I talked about data to prove that methods other than fermentation with tomatoes removed lots of those pathogens but he was unable to find such data.

Carolyn, who doesn't have to worry about the systemic disease where she lives but has saved seeds from fruits harvested from plants with fungal foliage pathogens and has not seen that carry through with those seeds, but of course they were fermented.

Great! Thanx to both of you! I do ferment but it's still better to save your seed from the healthiest of the same variety. Got that!

Reason for my Q....I have only 1 plant of an F4 PL Brandy/NAR cross I have been growing out from Hoosier's F1 seeds a couple years back. And just like it's ancestors it is already showing lower yellow leaves way before my other varieties. BUT...last year's F3 kept going strong with new top growth and produced some great toms later in the season that were beauties. This may be the case again this year. This is interesting to me. I wonder if F5, F6 and F7 will be the same as in lots of yellow and specs and spots but a decent supply of fruit anyway. Part of the fun is the surprise! BTW, I already had my first OSU Blue. I started these plants a month earlier than normal. They were OK. Too small IMO to be called Real tomatoes! And I am fermenting some seed right now...;-)

OSU Blue Fruit is an interesting tomato for sure. I found it was a fairly decent cropper and made nice saladettes that weren't the greatest for flavor, but neither were they the worst, and actually better than so-so. Hubs liked them a lot.

Thanks for the refresher lesson on the desirability of "fermenting" seeds, Dr. Carolyn.

I have done this but because I forget the seeds and leave 'em too long ( a couple weeks in the fermenting mash) , they tend to be killed.

Recently I had a valued (potato-leaf Polish, my favorite) tomato plant survive the winter. I had a fruit (self-pollinated, for sure) and crunched it into fertile dirt in March 2010. The temperatures were mild and the seeds exploded with germination. No fermenting and no pathogens either. Amazing.

Dr. C., what do you suppose a brief application of diluted household bleach would do to fresh tomato seeds? Let's assume I had already washed the seeds in a coffee strainer... rubbing them vigorously (before any bleaching) to get the gel-coat abated.

Any comments appreciated.

I can't help myself. I like to tinker.

John

Diluted bleach works very well.

Here is a link that might be useful: Cleaning Tomato Seeds

Hi John,

I am obviously not Carolyn, but I have seen it recommended to rinse the seeds in a dilute solution of bleach (one part household bleach to five parts water.) You can either rinse the tomato seeds in it, or put them into the bleach solution for 1-2 minutes, (but no longer than 2 minutes or you will probably sterilize your seeds so that they won't germinate!) then rinse with plenty of clean water and dry them as you normally would.

Hope that helps.

Betsy

Recently I had a valued (potato-leaf Polish, my favorite) tomato plant survive the winter. I had a fruit (self-pollinated, for sure) and crunched it into fertile dirt in March 2010. The temperatures were mild and the seeds exploded with germination. No fermenting and no pathogens either. Amazing.

****

John, fermentation of seeds is not at all necessary for seeds to germinate. There have been a couple of times that I've had to sow seeds directly from the fruits. And no transfer of pathogens in your situation could mean that the original plants had no disease or that the level of them on the seed coat was not sufficient to initiate infection.

(Dr. C., what do you suppose a brief application of diluted household bleach would do to fresh tomato seeds? Let's assume I had already washed the seeds in a coffee strainer... rubbing them vigorously (before any bleaching) to get the gel-coat abated.)

I don't know the answer. Everyone I know does that quick bleach on seeds that have been fermented or processed in a different method and use it just before the dried seeds are sown. If I were to guess I'd say on fresh seeds it may not do too much b'c there's always gunk hanging onto fresh seeds before they're processed.

I've never used bleach and while I have used fruits from plants that had foliage diseases the fermented seeds have never shown a transfer of disease. It would be much more important IMO if I were dealing with Fusarium or Verticillium or other systemic diseases I would imagine.

Carolyn

Thank you Trudi, Betsy, and Carolyn for the responses... and so quick at that.

It seems Betsy implies the bleaching be done just after fermentation is completed. Carolyn suggests bleaching just before sowing the seeds... after, perhaps, the fermented and dried seeds have lain in an envelope for a year or longer. This is all more of academic interest to me than practical interest... though I am steeling myself... with education perhaps... to ward off diseases in the future.

I live in an environment where heretofore the only substantial disease threat to my tomatoes has been some sort of warm-weather (i.e., August onset) mildew. I can stop that with Daconil, if necessary.

Very recently, however, I had one possible late blight sighting and removed the whole plant. I had heard about the problems with early onset of late blight (which is actually a mold), in the eastern USA in 2009, and am duly concerned.

An experienced colleague suggested that plant may have been cursed from its seed ... implying pathogen on the seed or in the seed. I was amazed. I was also slightly incredulous that the mold had not proliferated to nearby plants... The plant was 3 feet high before I ripped it out.. not having understood the potential threat until then.

Well, maybe that wasn't "late blight" but the lesson was learned. I upgraded my vigilance. Incidentally, the afflicted plant was a Stupice heirloom, bought at a nursery as a seedling. Stupice is, ironically, supposed to be somewhat resistant to late blight. Maybe that is why the plant disease progressed only very slowly. The hallmark of this disease was black lesions on the stems of the plant... in places where bruising could not be blamed on my tomato cage wire, etc.

I retract my earlier statement that I killed my seeds by fermenting them for two weeks. I really have not tested, nor tracked, on this exact point.

But I did notice a very low germination rate on seeds that I had far more carelessly retained... Seeds that simply lay dried out on a kitchen plate, without any prior fermentation or cleaning, for months, in a remote area of my house. Treating valuable seeds THAT way is, apparently, a big no-no. Those seeds died.

While it's true, as Carolyn said in her first reply, that I did not find any data to confirm which and to what degree a bleach bath of any particular strength or duration kills seed-borne tomato pathogens, I did find data regarding the effectiveness of bleach baths for other species seed/diseases and for fungi not necessarily affecting tomatoes.

For example, one study I found gave data that implied a bleach solution was effective on a species of fusarium that plagues evergreens. Others were specific to broccoli seed, and other vegetables. The closest I got to tomatoes was a study on sanitizing eggplant seeds with a bleach solution. But nothing specific to diseases I am familiar with.

Additionally, I found no data applicable to the effectiveness of fermentation with regard to specific tomato pathogens. So, it seems that the effectiveness of fermentation is equally anecdotal to that of bleach baths with regard to sanitizing tomato seeds.

Bottom line for me is that I will continue to use a two or so day fermentation to deteriorate the gel sack and then follow that up with a good rinsing, scrubbing, bleach bath (1 part household bleach : 4 parts tap water, for 1 - 2 minutes stirring), followed by a thorough rinsing and drying inside a cone coffee filter.

As an alternate means, for seeds I need to clean and sanitize same day, I will use either Oxiclean or trisodium phosphate (TSP) to break down the gel and sanitize the seeds at the same time.

Any seeds I receive as gifts or trades always get a 2 minute bath in a 1:4 bleach/water solution or a brief fizz in hydrogen peroxide straight from the bottle. I don't need any new diseases. Just getting an effective control program down pat for the ones already here.