Try this one.

Here is a link that might be useful: Trudi's method

Just take the seeds out and sow them. There's no need to ferment, no dormancy period and the gel inhibitor is part of the normal tomato life cycle and its purpose is to keep the seeds in fruits that fall to the ground in the late Fall, from germinating until conditions are favorable in the Spring.

There have been just a few times that I've had to take fresh seeds out of a fruit, did nothing at all with them, sowed the seed and all was well.

Don't put whole tomatoes in the freezer b'c that's one sure way of killing the seeds. It happens b'c the seeds are in a moist environment and ice crytals form and totally disrupt the seeds making them non-viable.

And as has already been said the chances of your getting the same fruits with the same tastes that you bought at the supermarket are slim indeed b'c most are hybrids so seeds don't come true. If there was a section there that said heirloom tomatoes, or whatever, and that's what you bought then almost always, but not always, the seeds will give you the same as the fruits. The problem is that you don't know where those OP fruits came from and there could have been cross pollination, or much more rarely a mutation.

Carolyn

Thanks for the responses! I will be starting them tomorrow!

a garden show on public tv channel had this issue covered this weekend -- they said just put the seeds in container with water, set aside for a day - the gel should be gone/disolve

I can't believe anyone would put so much trust in a grocery store-bought tomato.

I had a wonderful potato-leaf Polish tomato plant that made it through our mild winter. It had a ripe fruit in the early spring. I scrunched all the seeds into a small (1 cup?) pot... which had store-bought potting soil ("sterile") as a growth medium. I kept this thing in light shade and kept it damp-wet. The seed germination was fantastic. I got dozens of seedlings within a couple weeks, and many fantastic plants. Needless to say, as soon as those seedlings started to become evident, I carefully transplanted each one to a separate 2 cubic inch plot, in plastic six-pack carriers I had salvaged. The best results were all accomplished in store-bought potting soil, not amendment, not home-grown compost, etc.

The seeds I have stored by fermentation, etc., can take months to germinate, by comparison.

I paid no attention to gel coating, etc., with that fruit last early spring. Our temperatures are mild at that time of year... spanning from lows of 45 deg. F to 80s as highs. All this was done outside in a suburban backyard, not in the house or garage, etc.

The seeds I have stored by fermentation, etc., can take months to germinate, by comparison

****

You're the first person I've ever encountereed who said that fermented seeds can take months to germinate. ( smile)

I don't know how you do your fermentations and I don't know how you store your seeds and I don't know specifically how old your fermented seeds usually are, but that hasn't been my experience after fermenting seeds for close to a 2,000 tomato varieties over the years and same for my tomato friends. Fermented seeds that are fresh, meaning maybe up to 3 yo should germinate at close to 100% within a week, often sooner, it just depends on whether bottom heat was used, etc.. And at 3-7 years old almost always higher than 50%, usually much higher, and again, within a week or two.

I prefer to ferment my seeds, others use different methods, not just to remove the gel coat, b'c as I said above, that isn't an issue other than the inhibitor in the gel coat being a part of the tomato life cycle, rather, I ferment my seeds to help rid the various tomato pathogens that can and do adhere to the seed coat.

Carolyn

One fast way to remove the gel coat is to rub them lightly on a clean cloth or towel or paper towel etc. the gel coat will absorb onto the towel and you can immediately plant the seed.

I had no idea you had to do anything special with seeds. I spread a teaspoon of cherry tomato seeds (from Kroger or WMart) on a paper plate, and let them dry. I scraped some off in the spring, and most came up.

When I get a rotten tomato, I take it out to the garden and put it in a pot and cover it with soil. I have had some amazing results. I had some seeds sprout inside an overripe tomato once.

I had some sprout in an old cardboard box after it had sat out in the rain. I didn't find the plant til I threw the box out. The plant is doing fine out in my garden now.

I broke the skin and then planted the whole cherry tomato, then separated out the seedlings once they came up. Lots to separate out but I wonder if the nutrient from the fruit gave the seedlings a bit of an extra umph because they germinated really well! I did it end of summer (just on a fluke) I'm overwintering the plants now inside. I'm curious to see how they fruit though. I thought I read somewhere that sometimes they won't fruit well from normal store bought tomatoes (maybe if they're bred not to?) I hope they do because I have a ton of them...

"I thought I read somewhere that sometimes they won't fruit well from normal store bought tomatoe"

I think you are referring to the fact that they probably won't breed true, not that they won't develop fruit. Most store fruit are hybrids and hybrid variety saved seeds often won't reproduce the same fruit they did originally. So you will likely get fruit, they just won't be like the fruit the seeds came from in size, shape, color, or taste.

The store cherry I sprouted and grew was actually much tastier grown at home than the original. I was guessing it was a stabilized OP variety, cherries having been around so long.

-Ed

I have seen tomato seeds germinated inside fresh tomato. What that means ? Answer is that you can plant tomato seed taken right off a fresh tomato, whether from grocery store or from your garden. The gel on the seed will naturally break down at certain minimum soil temperature.

Interesting thread. It must have been at least 15 years ago when I ate some store-bought grape tomatoes in the middle of winter... they were the best-tasting grapes I'd ever had, so I saved the seed to give it a try in the garden. No idea what the variety is, but they were stable -- they're a large grape, taste great, produce tons, and I still grow them every year. :)

They could well be the variety "Santa" which is known to grow true 99% of the time :)

Linda

Thanks, Labradors! I'm off to check on that.

ETA: you're probably correct! gee.... based on info in one article I read, it's amazing to think that grape tomatoes have only been available in the US since 1996!

Yes. I remember when they first hit the shelves and were SO tasty. I went to a nursery to see if I could buy some seeds and they sold me Juliet F1 which I grew out, and they tasted acidic and nasty. I wish I had known that I could have saved my own seeds from Santa's back then!

Linda

Now and then I buy cherry/grape tomatoes from grocery store. They taste good. Right now I have some . The Label says :

"Fresh from the Farm Grape Tomatoes

Produce of USA , Packed by FFGP , Horse Shoe , INC.

Sey

many of the store purchased tomatoes will grow true. they are sold as hybrids to get people to NOT try to grow them from seeds. Loook tomato seeds will not grow into hot peppers. all OP tomatoes at one time were Hybrids. I encourage everyone to grow hybrid seeds. it is fun and the plants will have hybrid vigor. not as good at an F1 but as good as an F2. hahaha. OP are F6 or higher. it is just that if you grow a dozen f2 you will find that some are better than others. just take seeds from the better plants for the following year. voila. free seeds and great crops. and as an added bonus you have a new variety and you learn how things work in life. I think this is the best part of gardening. the fun of exploring into the unknown and finding gems to eat. haha.

If the vigor for the F2 is not as good as the F1, then the seeds aren't breeding true.

Hybrids aren't just some scam. In many cases, though, the major traits that we notice most--shape, color, taste--may be fairly stable. Things a small-scale grower is less likely to notice or be able to compare well with just a small number of plant in the typical home garden, i.e. traits like productivity, disease resistance, ability to stand up to commercial harvesting and shipping, etc. may not get passed down reliably. However, if you don't really care about those other traits, then you can go ahead and save seeds and grow those out.

Some hybrids will NOT produce plants with the same fruit shape/color/taste. Sungold, for example, is notorious for being almost impossible to dehybridize. Many have tried, and, AFAIK, nobody has come up with a stable, open-pollinated strain that people find as good as the F1.

I have taken Kumato to F4. No difference in any aspect.

Many here and in the other board have taken Brandy Boy to F11. Again no difference. They have grown it along the F1 for years, side by side, no difference.

I am sure that there are hybrids that their F2 will not grow true but there are some that will. You have to try. I look at it this way : You will get some decent tomato anyway. I bet the parents of hybrid had been a decent tomato to begin with. They wouldn't use a lousy tomato as parent. JMO

Sey

I'm fully in favor of trying to grow F2s and so forth. In fact, I plan to do so with a couple of my F1s this year if I like how they grow. As you say, even if they don't produce true, you may get some unexpectedly nice results that are worth stabilizing.

I just think there's no need to invent conspiracy theories about how F1s aren't really F1s.

I don't think it's ALL conspiracy theories. For example Sweet Aperitif is called F1 by some UK seed houses and it isn't! I already mentioned Santa, and there are others like Sweet Million, that grow true. Unfortunately, Sungold IS a hybrid which seems very difficult to dehybridize :(

Linda

Talking about grocery store (hybrids ) Who would want to grow them , even if they were OP ?. Exceptions (to me ) are some grape and cherry varieties that taste fine.

Sey

Same reason as growing any common variety such as Early Girl, Better Boy or other nursery plants and seeds typically sold at box store garden centers. Chances are they'll taste better in a home grown environment than the gas-ripened fruits from the store.

-Ed

yeah, probably some people do that. But Better Boy is one of the good varieties, IMO. Early Girl is about average but popular.

Recently BBS sell a lot of good varieties of plants too. They are mostly grown by Bonnie. And some smaller local growers.

Sey

yeah, probably some people do that. But Better Boy is one of the good varieties, IMO. Early Girl is about average but popular.

Recently BBS sell a lot of good varieties of plants too. They are mostly grown by Bonnie. And some smaller local growers.

Sey

I have been gardening all my life. I make my own compost etc. Why do so many people say you have to go through all these steps. I throw all my vegetable scraps including tomatoes in my composte. OMGOSH, I start alot of plants in pots using my compost. Guess what, I get hundreds of volunteers, Tomatoes; Squash even AVACADOS. I don't ferment the darn seeds! If I can't identify a volunteer, I plant it away from others and put a cute sign by it with "??" on it. It's exciting to see what it is!! Have fun and don't make it A JOB just FUN LEARNING.

Some of us like to learn how to do things in more efficient, controllable, repeatable ways. It wasn't some kind of ordeal for me to learn how to do things properly--it was great fun. If you're the kind of person who gets joy out of growing mystery unstablized tomatoes from your compost scraps and don't mind taking the risks that come with not fermenting seed, then all power to you--whatever gives you joy. But don't make it out as though experienced people on here who try to teach others best practices and point out realities such as the fact that you might get a dud from the offspring of a hybrid commercial tomato or that some varieties don't do well in some places or that tomatoes need time and care to produce *optimally* are sucking the joy out of anything for anyone. They're just trying to give people a way to maximize their harvests, avoid diseases, and avoid unwanted genetic surprises in their tomatoes. People are free to learn from their advice or not--nobody is sending in stormtroopers to arrest them for using compost to start plants. I don't always follow everyone's advice here, but I do appreciate that they take the time to give it.

BTW, the big reason to ferment seeds is that the fermentation process can help kill some disease organisms. This is especially important when sharing seeds, since you don't want to introduce a pathogen to someone else's garden via your seeds if you can prevent it. Probably makes storage more reliable, too, since you don't want a lot of highly nutritious organic matter around your seeds--too much humidity, and that could be a mold magnet. Tomato seeds aren't hard to germinate, even with the seed coat, so the claim that it's to speed germination is only slightly true. Probably a matter of a few days difference, max, if any.

Good information Thank You. Here's something you can do as well. If you drink Tea, you can bury the used teabags around your tomatoe plants (and other plants). They help keep the pests away as well as help the soil hold moisture to save water. You can put them in your compost, bad bugs stay away or die in your compost. Also when you transplant your tomatoes, put 1 tablespoon of Epsom Salt in the hole. OMGOSH, it does Wonders!! To KEEP BUGS from eating tomatoes etc. Mix in 2 gal. Lukewarm water, 10 tablespoons Baking Soda til dissolved and 10 tablespoons of light olive oil. Shake it up in your sprayer each time and spray your tomatoes. Only in the evening. If bugs lay eggs it kills them and the eggs. HAPPY

I put the seeds on a paper towel let them dry fold it up a few times and put it in my frige door too. Then tear off pieces in Spring and put them in pots. Have never had any diseases.

Unless you know your soil is deficient in magnesium, epsom salt is not a great addition. If you have adequate magnesium, the extra could throw off the calcium-magnesium balance and aggravate BER in susceptible varieties. Early in plant growth, epsom salt is a good trick to boost chlorophyll and "green up" starts cosmetically, especially if you're selling them, but it doesn't do much unless the plants are actually mag deficient.

Tea bags won't hurt anything unless you overdo it, but they don't do anything for pests.

I've had a few DUDS but really very few.

As I said, you do what makes you happy. Personally, I've never met a grocery store tomato I wanted to grow over a variety bred purely for taste and not for qualities like storage and shipping. My garden has limited space, and I want to grow varieties I know will blow me away or varieties that I can't experience unless I grow them myself because they're not grown large-scale commercially. But I know a lot of people find it fun to save seeds from supermarket tomatoes and grow them out. There's nothing wrong with it as long as you know what you're getting into and are good with using your garden space for that. Uncertainly and experimentation can be great fun.

I like to use the small tomatoes. Usually you can't find seeds for them and they do come true to type. I buy that mixed box that Publix sells. I don't grow the big tomatoes from grocery store ones. I have heard that people have success with those baby sweet peppers.

I plant seeds from store bought tomato. They grow. I get tomato. I eat them. Then plant those seeds as.well. All year long, there are different tomato plants in the yard, at various growth stages, and I harvest them. Luck of the draw. I get big, small, Roma, cherry, slicing size.....whatever happens to grow. And by now, some of this store bought tomato may have cross pollinated in the yard, or the hybrid has mutated. I don't know. Don't care. I keep eating them. They are still tomato for free.