Tasty tomatoes

F1 hybrids will give you consistency of harvest, says Peter

- Peter Seabrook

GARDENING takes time: sow some tomatoes, and it is four months before you begin to taste the fruits of your labours. Should you make a mistake in choice of cultivar, it is a year before you start again, and then things may well have changed.

This year, I have heard from several gardeners that their favourite tomato – ‘Gardener’s Delight’ – is not as good as it was. Some packets even yielded large beefsteak fruits instead of the cherry size they should be, the result of careless rogueing of mother stocks.

Where what we call ‘open seeded’ (as opposed to F1 hybrid) cultivars are grown in fields for seed, it is essential that the plants are regularly and rigorously checked, and that any not true to type destroyed. However, the more committed the seed grower to retain pure stocks, the less seed they will have in the end, and this reflects in the price.