Does anybody know how to distinguish 'solanum pimpinellifollium' from 'lycopersicon var. cerasiforme'? Looking at representative photos of each online do not appear to show any difference.
I am growing out a specimen derived from seed of strain sometimes called "everglades cherry", that I obtained in florida. It appears to have very high resistance to early blight, as I am growing it in infected soil yet it is thriving and making ripe fruit. I wonder if is in any way different from the one marketed as "matt's wild cherry".

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A complex question which is why I cut and pasted it so I wouldn't forget something.

Solanum Pimpinellifolium ( currants) plants have very different leaves than others, and they are very hairy as well as the stems. True currants and certain other species, not usually grown, do have good tolerance to most foliage diseases, which is well known.

When Johnny's introduced Matt's Wild they very carefully said it was a cerasiforme, which means it's NOT a currant variety, more closely related to a common cherry,and that b'c of the possibilitry of cross pollinations.

And that b'c it used to be thought that ALL pimps had exerted stigma's, but it turns out they don't. About half do and hald don't.

I lost my Google search for the Everglades one but if you do a search there just entering.....Wild Everglades Tomato... you'll see that there are many many links and links within links and most consider it to be a cherry, not a currant one, although the fruits are small, and there doesn't seem to be a consenus. There are other varieties with fruits that small that are cherries and not currants as well.

Last year a man in FL bought a plant of Wild Everglades. I don't know one called just Everglades Cherry, as you mentioned, and it turned out the fruits were PINK, not red, so I asked him for some seeds, he'd never processed seeds before, so I told him to just smush up some fruits, put them in a baggie and send them to me, he did.

It was called Ted's Pink Currant,, and I offered seeds for it elsewhere and also SSE listed it.

What did I miss? LOL

If I had grown theone Ted sent me seeds for here at home, Iprobably would have been able to decide if it was a currant or cherry, but ever since 2004 when I severed all four quads in my right leg and have to use a walker, few are grown here at home, and not by me. Seed production for me is done by four wonderful folks elsewhere in NC, IL and W NYState.,

What I have grown here at home is a variety called Sara's Galapagos, which is a stable interspecies cross and the fruits are wee reds and the foliage and stems very hair. I love this variety and have SSE listed it, sent it to the owners of seed sites I know well and also offered it in past annual seed offers.

And prior to that I have grown, sans walker, several ones just called generically Red Currant.

Carolyn

Thanks for the reply, Carolyn. I checked my specimen and the leaves are not hairy, so I guess it is cerasiforme.

Sorry about your disability, that is very tough for a gardener.

I just want to point out pimpinellifolium typically have smooth stem and leaves, not at all hairy like regular tomatoes. Also, cerasiforme contains genes from cultivated(esculentum) and wild tomatos(pimpinellifolium). All three are interfertile and have been mixing before humans got involve. There's a studies that suggest cerasiforme is a result of interbreeding between esculentum and pim. And another that suggest cerasiforme have originated from pim (this is a bit newer and found it more convincing).

About matts wild cherry, it is speculated that it's late blight resistance comes from Ph-3. The Ph-3 resistance gene used in tomato breeding come from pimpinellifolium. So, it possible matt's wild cherry is a pim or a cerasiforme with pim genes. Idk if it's tolerant to early blight.

As for early blight resistance, IâÂÂm not aware of any good resistance(like those for RKN, V, or F123). You may want to check out NC State University Tomatoes like Mountain Magic, Plum Regal, or others (NCSU or other sources) for tolerant varieties.
Both parent lines of Plum Regal were moderately resistant to EB (also resistant for VFF). So, it might a good tomato to use for crosses if you plan to improve some OP tomatoes tolerance to EB (and add V, Fol1, Fol2 resistance).