https://www.growveg.com/guides/three-ways-to-save-tomato-seeds/

That link gives some good info on simple seed saving for tomatoes specifically. As for damping off, I know some people struggle with that but it's really not hard to avoid. It is a problem that stems from over watering, or inappropriately sized containers for seedlings that are too big (and therefore hold too much water around the seedling, so still an overwatering issue). I grow a lot of seeds indoors each winter including tomatoes, what I do is sow in small 6-cell trays and bottom water. If you take the time to learn what it feels like weight-wise when the soil is dry, it becomes easier to truly know when the seedlings need water. I don't keep a fan on my seedlings or whatever and they're fine.

Maybe someone knows the answer, but if you save the seeds of a volunteer (that may originally have come from a hybrid), are you going to get a clone of that volunteer, or are you going to get some strange mix of what went into the original hybrid? No question if you save the seeds of a hybrid, you'll get the latter. That is, at some point, after some number of generations, I would think the variety should stabilize.

If you really want a clone of the desirable volunteer, just propagating with some foliage would do the job, and in zone 9, saving it over the winter might not be that hard to do

You could just toss a ripe tomato or two where you want it next year. That works for the delicious volunteer cherry tomato(es) that come up every year in my front garden - they sprout where the ripe fruit dropped. ( I also don't know where the first plant came from - I've only grown Sweet Million in the back yard, which truly is a monster plant, much larger and with smaller fruit than the volunteer.)

Yes, you can let them sprout at the old spot and transplant - I would let a couple grow until the stems are rather sturdy, then plant them a bit deeper than they were. They will put out roots from the formerly above ground stem. My experience is that tomatoes are very tolerant of being moved.

Thank you all so much! To try everything, tomorrow morning I will rescue some pieces of the tomato bush which the gardeners put in our "green" (yard waste) garbage can this afternoon and see if I can propagate them! Also I will try drying seeds and using Mischievous Magpie's method (thanks for the link), and I will make sure some of the ripe tomatoes I still have left are put in the fenced garden (where there is enough space for a monster). Hopefully one of those will work - thanks again. This forum is the very best for getting immediate and helpful answers to almost any gardening question.

Jackie

Jackie, propagating tomato cuttings is truly much easier than a rose. A tomato will make roots out of any part of the stem that gets buried, I bet you'll have success.

I had the same thing happen to me....a tomato seedling came up many years after a tomato plant had been in that bed, and it grew to be a monster plant. It was a cherry tomato. The last couple of years no tomatoes have sprouted there. This year I planted a Better Boy that grew huge and ate a big rose plant, using it for support. I also planted a Sweet 100 which grew huge and little plants from seeds spread I guess by animals have sprouted in a number of places. I'm pretty much expecting to have volunteer tomato plants next year. I bet just putting tomatoes out there where you want them will work. I think Sweet 100's must be especially easy to keep going.

FYI, Sweet 100 is a hybrid (as well as Better Boy), and thereby seeds from it won't reproduce reliably. It is owned by Syngenta, and the parentage is pretty confidential, but it is suspected that the heirloom Gardner's Delight cherry is principal among them. So you'll likely get cherries of some sort, but not Sweet 100s.

My "sweet million" volunteers - which I realize are probably not true to the original - nevertheless are very tasty and sweet, and seem to have most of the characteristics of the variety. Those front garden cherry tomato volunteers are also delicious - I like them better than store bought, for sure.

One year when I made a 6' tall cage out of concrete remesh panel, the tomato plant topped 8' !

After reading comments here I looked up recipes for green tomatoes and there are quite a few. I made a good hamburger with no bun recently . I made a " jam" out of onions and fresh tomatoes, a little balsamic vinegar and no carb sweetener. Cooked the hamburger patties, put gouda on top, then a fried green tomato, the jam, and some remoulade sauce. Yum.

The green tomatoes have a lot of tang.

Update - we did manage to get some remnants out of the green garbage can where the gardeners had put the entire tomato bush (at my instructions). So far I have 4 little cuttings in water in glasses - two on the window sill, and two in the back porch, in front of a window. I agree that this seems the best way to propagate the same bush - I had no idea that tomatoes were perennials (although VERY tender ones), or that they were so easy to root!

Thanks, everyone!

Jackie

Yes. If it tastes good and grows well, who cares what it is!

If you are harvesting seeds from a hybrid, the point is, you don't know if it'll taste good or grow well. But making cuttings of the plant you like is the perfect solution. You will get a lot more of exactly what you liked. It would be interesting to understand whether the seeds from that cloned plant will be true.

dan, this IS a volunteer plant.

Erasmus, green tomato "mincemeat" is one of my favorite recipes to can. It does make a good pie, along with anything else you can think of for that spicy sweetness.

Sherry, I know that. My question was whether seeds from a volunteer plant that came from a hybrid might be true. The farther away you get from hybridization, the more stable a variety becomes. True that the OP isn't talking about seeds anymore, and that's smart.

In my experience, my volunteer cherry tomatoes have always developed into good cherry tomato plants. Including Sungold. The larger tomatoes that I've had volunteer from hybrids have had more variable fruits, with more noticeable differences from the parent. Tomatoes are generally self-pollinating so volunteers often have the parent as both mother and father.

Tomatoes are probably one of the most rewarding plants to grow from seed because you can taste them within a few months of sowing the seeds! Not like an apple tree, where you might have to wait 5-10 years to know if the cross was any good. So if you really like the specific plant, you can try for cuttings. But if that fails, or just as an experiment, try seed as well. It's probably a win either way. :)

Another update - 2 of my cuttings are putting out lots of roots! So happy. I found clear instructions on the 'web about how to treat them, and how to harden them off in the Spring. Now I have to figure out where to plant one of them, NOT where the one grew last season, and in direct sun, and with enough space for a HUGE plant. Hmmm.. The roses the tomato ate were still alive when we removed the tomato which had eaten them, but not happy - I have fed and watered and pruned and apologized to them.

Jackie