annie
Tomato Gardener
Posts: 48
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Post by annie on Aug 14, 2010 11:58:40 GMT -5
Since I may have a difficult time trying to cross tomato cultivars, given Georgia's quickly-appearing heat and humidity in the spring (though I haven't given up on that possibility), I've shifted to thinking about grafting tomatoes if it's just too hot and humid to cross them next spring.
Apparently Dr. Randy Gardner et al believe you can use any strong tomato variety that has tolerance to the diseases you're concerned about for a rootstock replacement for the standard expensive ones.
What I'd like to do is build in a strong foundation for tolerance to Early Blight using an existing tomato line as the rootstock, and unless Mountain Magic becomes available on a commercial basis for 2011 or I can get some seeds from a kind soul who has some, I'll be limited to commercially-available cultivars in what I can use for a rootstock if I don't go for Maxifort or Beaufort.
So, after reading all I can find about Early Blight resistance in tomatoes, Matt's Wild Cherry keeps heading up my list. The plants are reputed to be vigorous and with nearly total tolerance for both Early and Late blight strains.
But I've never grown Matt's Wild Cherries. If you've grown them, can you confirm the sturdiness and vigor of the plants themselves? I want to graft at least a Cuostralee and a Mortgage Lifter (two nice heirlooms for which I have clean seeds) to a strong rootstock to see if the grafted plants will last longer through Early Blight than ungrafted plants.
I cannot do a controlled experiment -- don't have the space for controls -- and I want to take some new steps to keep disease pathogens to a minimum next summer, so all I can do is see if the plants last longer than early August next year.
Besides grafting and strict sanitation measures, here are the steps I plan to take.
1. Plant nothing but clean seeds. 2. Plant a cover crop of hairy vetch that I can cut in the Spring and use for a mulch under the tomato plants. Used as a mulch under tomatoes, hairy vetch helps your tomatoes resist fungal diseases as well as encourages them to live longer. Hairy vetch also jumpstarts, as it were, several tomato genes into high gear, believe it or not. Not surprisingly, two of them are the genes that help to resist the fungus. 3. Intercrop varieties of tomato plants alternating more tolerant cultivars with less-tolerant cultivars re fungal diseases. Studies have shown that tomato fungal diseases don't spread as quickly when plant cultivars are mixed and intercropped. 4. Purchase tomato seeds of other hybrids and heirlooms that have been seen to have Early Blight tolerance in varying degrees in Southern field tests.
Maybe these steps taken together will allow me to grow a decent tomato crop that lasts longer than six weeks next year!
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Post by linuxer1999 on Feb 1, 2012 6:43:00 GMT -5
Well, I am too cheap to buy Maxifort, but have done some of the same reading you have. Yes, Matt's Cherry and TommyToe look interesting for Early Blight resistant rootstock. Have sprouted some Matt's Cherry a few weeks ago and found it takes a WHILE for them to come up... maybe 12 days, as opposed to just 4 for some ordinary-sized tomato seed (Eary Girl and Brandywine). The plants are really small too... so if you grow them for grafting, they must be started well in advance of the OP scion cultivars if you plan to do early top-grafting. Will try Juliette and Mountain Fresh Plus VFF as rootstock as well. What I'd really like is some locally grown volunteer TommyToe seeds to use as rootstock.
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Post by tucsontomato on Feb 4, 2012 22:28:35 GMT -5
Hey there Annie, I really like how you are coming up with ideas to fight the problems you are facing! I thought about root grafting as well. I guess I am just way too lazy and have had so many failures that I keep asking myself why I keep trying to grow tomatoes. I suppose I just haven't figured out that mother nature is telling me Tucson is a terrible place to grow tomatoes! Hot and Humid are what I struggle with most too. Here in Tucson in July we get summer rains from Monsoon Storm patterns. I've been testing varieties for a long time now. My best advise is to stick with the semi-determinates. As it goes with steps you can take you might want to try the following: Use the Florida weave method or some other similar method of trellising that keeps the lower leaves away from the ground. Once the plants get big enough, trim off any leaves that touch the ground. Never overhead water during times of heat unless you are growing 100 varieties at once and want to find out which has the best foliage disease resistance! Open Pollinated Winners for me: Siletz -Parthenocarpic (will set fruit in the hottest summer). I wrote about it in the TOW part of this forum. I am currently working to have this one survive my greenhouse area - which tends to get more disease then my summer garden ever does. Ozark Pink - Hands down one of the best for foliage disease resistance but stops setting fruit in heat of the summer. Neptune - Determinate, compact yet open growth, The most heat resistant cultivar I've ever come across. Hybrid: Celebrity - AAS Winner. The standard for heat resistance/disease resistance and fruit production. Too bad Monsanto bought out the company that sells the seed.
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Post by linuxer1999 on Feb 7, 2012 11:14:04 GMT -5
Well annie, it is sad that you no longer seem to lurk this board. Can't find you on yuku either. I'm going to do your experiment for you. And perhaps, if jc is inclined, break off a new thread. Have sprouted 6 Matt's Wild Cherry with the intent of using them as rootstock. These will be planted in a full-sun sloppy-wet garden spot of 20 years that is thoroughly infested with Early Blight. For the last 3 years running, no tomato has really survived the heat of summer there. Will use some Juliette and Mountain Fresh Plus VFF as rootstock as well. By around June 1, will know if grafting onto Matt's Wild Cherry is the way to go to defeat the fungus diseases that plague us Southeastern gardeners.
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Post by linuxer1999 on Feb 27, 2012 22:25:04 GMT -5
Yeah, I think I'll keep my rants to this thread, as I don't think there is a whole lot of interest in grafting EB resistant rootstock. Kind of a specialized thing.
I grafted 4 plants 4-5 days ago. Of these first 4, maybe 1 will live. It is a Brandywine on top, Juliette on bottom. Yup yup... had some problems.
Mistake #1: I was growing under red florescent lights. This tends to make for squat plants with big stems -- which is exactly what I like. Unfortunately, the ideal top grafting spot on the stem is between the seed leaves and the first true leaves. The stems on my Juliette and MF+ rootstock plants were nearly too big for the 2mm grafting clips by the time I had enough space there to make a cut. Have replaced a couple of my reds with ordinary cool white (blue) florescent bulbs now, so the next batch of plants may be a bit taller. Well, you live and learn. Sure glad I did not buy the 1.5mm clips!
Mistake #2: Removed the plants for a few hours from the recovery chamber after 2 only days. They really need much more than 2 days. They wilted badly, and most have not recovered even after putting them back in the chamber.
My improvised recovery area is merely a heating pad with a clear plastic storage container inverted over the top. Am pleased that this works so well. Am able to regulate the humidity by leaving a gap at the bottom. I can make the humidity so intense, that the plants don't wilt at all just after grafting.
The Matts Wild Cherry is one odd tomato plant. TINY seeds that take a while to sprout. Takes much longer for them to reach grafting size than with other plant. I estimate they need to be started at least 21 days in advance of their scion, as opposed to just 4 days in advance, if using some other rootstock.
Matts Wild Cherry has a very distinctive look. It is RL, but the little leaves are rounded on the ends. Like a little bonsai tomato plant.
Will be ready to graft heirloom scions onto 4-5 MWC rootstock plants in a few days -- hopefully, with good match for the stem diameters. The MATURITY of the stems will be vastly different. My grafting skills are so weak that I am skeptical that the grafts will take.
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Post by linuxer1999 on Mar 3, 2012 0:28:12 GMT -5
Probably right about the endosperm. Big heirloom beefsteak seeds seem to shoot up faster than anything else.
The final tally seems to be that 4/10 of my first grafts will live. Am pretty certain now that with the cold dry air of my basement, they need to be on the heating pad for a whole week or more.
Have made new grafting knife from a safety razor to make better cuts. This next batch which will include about 4 Matt's Wild Cherry. Will also be more careful to make the stem diameters match -- this seems to be a big deal with top grafting.
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Post by linuxer1999 on Mar 8, 2012 1:59:49 GMT -5
Well, 4/10 of my first batch grafts survived fine, and are now facing the light and growing. I know now my principle problem was the temperature. Even when moving the grafts under weak light, they had to be on the heating pad to completely heal. My basement's temperature is too cool. I am incubating another batch of 9 grafts right now. Have made a new tool, as well. See pic. The new tool (on the right) uses one of those really thin and floppy safety razors sandwiched and glued between two plastic plant labels. It works very well! A regular razor (on bottom) is nice and stiff, but does not cut as cleanly. Have found that with such small stems, it is much easier to make matching straight cuts, than diagonal. Attachments:
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Post by linuxer1999 on Mar 8, 2012 2:06:58 GMT -5
A picture of a small Matt's Wild Cherry Tomato. It has two true leaves, and it is still oh-so-small. But is it suitable for grafting? I'd say yes. The stem stays the right size for top-grafting longer than my other two root stocks varieties. Now I am curious to see how productive, or fruitful, the grafted tomatoes will be with a cherry rootstock. And the big question: Will it resist Early Blight any better than a non-grafted plant? Well, I sure hope so. A couple of years ago, no tomatoes survived the heat of summer in our main garden save a volunteer cherry of unknown kind. Sure do wish Anne was here to contribute to the discussion of her own question. Where did she run off to? Does anyone know her on another forum? Will post some clean pics of my Frankenstein grafted tomatoes with a better camera if anyone is interested. Attachments:
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Post by linuxer1999 on Mar 30, 2012 1:55:18 GMT -5
Well Mule, I did have better luck with my second round of grafting. 7/10 survived just fine. 2 of these were recycled scions and rootstock from previous attempts, so really, 7/8 of my "fresh" tries at grafting worked. Only one died mysteriously -- and it was firmly attached! The solution for was to keep grafted plants over the heating pad for the duration of their healing process, and also to keep them dark for a full 4 days. In short: It is indeed possible to graft very young tomato plants and have a high success rate with a mere heating pad and a dome. There are 4/10 from the first batch, and 7/10 from the second. This leaves me with 11 frankenplants. MWC means Matts Wild Cherry rootstock, and MF+ means Mountain Fresh Plus. Sadly, only one MF+ survived. 11 Frankenstein Tomatoes ------------------------ 1 Planted in Back Yard (not blight infested): MWC / Early Girl 6 Hardening Outside: Juliette / Martian Giant Juliette / Yellow-Red MWC / Traveler MWC / Jubilee Juliette / Jubilee MF+ / Jubilee 4 Still in Basement: MWC / Early Wonder MWC / Rutgers MWC / Cherokee Purple Juliette / Cherokee Purple It was silly to use an Early Girl as a scion, as it is already a disease resistant and very vigorous hybrid. It was convenient at the time though. The Rutgers and Early Wonder are not really good candidates for this experiment either. The Rutgers already has some disease resistance, and the Early Wonder is semi-determinate. Despite my haphazard scientific(?) method, it should still be easy to determine if the Matt's Wild Cherry and Juliette root stock grafts outperform (or just out-survive) the regular plants in our full-light over-tilled blight-infested garden. Several regular plants of a common scion type will be sewn in along with the 6 hardening grafted tomatoes in the coming days. (Pic) Though this is very early to plant for west Tennessee, am hopeful all these will survive, as it is VERY VERY warm this year. Last year, there was still snow on the ground at this time. This year, all the trees have already greened. My Early Girls have opened some flowers! Attachments:
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Post by bulllake on Apr 1, 2012 14:26:09 GMT -5
Mule ---- do you follow a prevention spraying program . If so , what does it entail ? I have liquid copper , Mancozeb , and Daconil on hand .
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Post by linuxer1999 on May 13, 2012 3:58:34 GMT -5
I tried some liquid copper solution on the garden last year ... but the situation was hopeless as EB had already firmly infected the stems. In fact, I think the sick plants reacted badly to the copper.
The grafted plants are well in place, along with some controls. All are healthy, most budding out little 'maters. The rain pattern has not been so bad in TN this year as in the past 3 though, so our fungal disease problems may not be nearly as severe -- this is bad for my experiment.
Notes on the Matt's Wild Cherry: My super-early pure MWC did not like the cold so much as the Early Girl plants. However, it survived and has now surpassed the rest in size. Have had time to root a couple of cuttings. The Early Girls will probably beat the MWC to the first ripe fruit. It will be close. Was so warm early this year that I successfully planted a row in the first week of March. Though the family and friends think I'm nuts, the threat of snow is about nil now that it is mid-May.
There were some ugly stem size differences in the grafted plants early on, but they disappeared weeks ago. It is neigh impossible to tell where the grafts were made in the stems now. Have been careful to plant shallow enough that the scions will not make roots that reach the soil early in the season. All is well.
It may be at least 6 weeks before things get interesting. In years past, EB has taken hold about the same time that the first big flush of fruit ripens.
Where-oh-where is Annie?
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Post by linuxer1999 on May 15, 2012 2:06:47 GMT -5
Mule: Oh ye of little faith! In parts of South East Asia they graft tomato scions onto eggplant rootstock so that they survive the flooded fields. I WANT TO BELIEVE that cherry rootstock will help the plants resist EB. Just came back to visit the farm in TN today. The MWC in the low-light garden is over 6 feet tall now. A sprawling monster, as expected! Sadly though, the grafted plants in both gardens are no larger than the regular ones. The 13 tomato plants in our over-tilled blight-infested garden are all still doing well. Am still confident the blight will bite them. I looked up one of the books on a link in your post about early gene identification in new tomato varieties in Texas. Strange how I've never even heard of some of most of those cultivars. Some were very familiar though, like Marglobe and Rutgers. You might find it entertaining to read about tomato farming 130 years ago with Truck Farming at the South at openlibrary.org/books/OL234336M/Truck-farming_at_the_SouthThe author uses some funny idioms and words ... the term "at the south" is used instead of "in the south" in the title. A dry spell is a "drouth" instead of a "drought" ... also some other anachronisms there I only hear from older folks here in Tennessee. Once the drouthy [STET: yes, it is a real word] mid-summer weather hits our over-tilled tight clay soil ... EB will play heavy in the tomato survivor game. If all 13 survive till frost, I'll be shocked ... but at least there will be lots of tomatoes.
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Post by linuxer1999 on Jun 27, 2012 17:15:07 GMT -5
A soaking rain around June 3rd, together with 3 weeks unrelenting heat and no rain have made it plain that all 13 of my grafting-experiment plants have the Early Blight. In other words, Matt's Wild Cherry, Juliette, and Mountain Fresh+ are NOT immune from the disease. Even the Old Brooks, a blight-resistant heirloom, is doing horribly. One plant though, which has MWC rootstock, and [Arkansas] Traveler scion, is remarkably green and healthy, but still has blight on the bottom leaves. Will be interesting to see if it survives until Fall. Happily though, the first flush of fruit is largely unaffected. If past is prologue, there will be almost nothing in the second flush, and the plants will quickly wither in the the summer heat within 4 weeks. If there is any interest, I'll post a link to detailed pictures on my web site when I get back to Arkansas. This image is of an Early Girl. I really like this variety, but it does not resist EB very well. Attachments:
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steves
New Member
Searching for (or creating) the ultimate mater!
Posts: 11
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Post by steves on Sept 4, 2012 13:28:12 GMT -5
I didn't have the time for grafting this Spring, but last yr I played around with it. I had better success when I was practicing in the winter than when I was doing it for real. I used Beaufort, Celebrity & Black Beauty Eggplant. I only had success with 1 eggplant rootstock; the scion was Black Cherry. The fruit was not any bigger than my regular Black Cherry & the plant still had some foliage disease altho it did not die. My best-looking plants this summer are Tasti-Lee, MWC, Galapagos Orange Grape & Green Giant. I am surprised by GG, not so much by the others which are known for disease resistance. If I was tempted to try grafting again I think I would go with Tasti-Lee for the rootstock. Steve
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Post by linuxer1999 on Dec 7, 2012 4:20:49 GMT -5
Just a final note about the MWC grafting experiment... One plant did make it to hard frost still producing fruit, and it was the Traveler grafted to MWC rootstock. Those plants grafted to MWC and Juliette rootstocks were indeed the last standing. Mountain Fresh Plus based plants died quickly, as one may expect of a determinate variety. Those traveler leaves sure resist drought, and direct sun well!
So in conclusion: grafting to hearty cherry rootstock does indeed help productivity and longevity in EB infested soil. Sadly though, I have yet to grow ANY variety of tomato that is actually immune to Early Blight.
Already have sewn seeds for next year's blight plan by planting a Hairy Vetch cover crop. These little beans are indeed cold tolerant! (shrug) May also try tabasco pepper (will that work?) or Maxifort for rootstock.
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