All you have to do is buy some seeds for Big Zac or other OP variety that puts out big tomatoes and grow them. Two pound tomatoes from Big Zac, Delicious, and a number of other varieties are not uncommon at all. I kept cuttings alive last year over the winter and it took a lot of effort. I wouldn't do it again as my results from the cuttings are about the same as seeds I started in the spring.

Tomatovator

thanks for the prompt response. Yes I have the book on growing Giant Tomatoes. I just finished reading it. I have Big Zac seeds already.

But I really want to get some cuttings. How big a tomato had been grown the first year on the cuttings you saved. I am interested in saving your plants into the 3rd year if they did well.

I know it is difficult to keep them alive all winter. But it can be fun. I know it is expensive for electricity also. I figure it will cost a couple of hundred to keep them alive. But then it is a hobby.

I would go through this trouble with a big zac cutting even though I have seeds. Just like every human is a little different so is every tomato plant slightly different. I want to get a good one.

Another thing is that a plant that grows 2 pounders with lots of tomatoes on the plant just might grow a much bigger one if it is restricted to only one tomato in the 2nd year.

Can you share some ideas about how you kept them alive over the winter. I know it is difficult but sharing your experience will be good for everyone to learn. What temp did you keep the room with the toms. how many plants or cuttings did you have. etc. what problems did you run into and what went well. What kind of lighting did you use. etc. How long is your winter. what state are you in. I am up in New England and my winter is long. almost 8 months. But of course it can be extended on both ends a little with some work. But the grow here is from about June 1 to Oct 1. I can push from early May to late Oct with some protection on cold nights.

Everyone's help is appreciated.

I am wondering maybe team up with someone from texas or florida or south california to keep the cuttings alive over the winter.

Dan, I would not want to try to keep a tomato plant alive over winter, even here where our winters are not as long or cold as many are. It would take a really exceptional tomato to interest me in doing that and I have not run across one that interesting yet.

According to the experts, there are quite a few varieties that have the genetics to grow really big tomatoes, but that is not all there is to it. If I rooted a cutting from one of my productive plants that produced some good, big sized tomatoes (lets just say Burpee's Porterehouse because it fit that description in my garden this year), there is nothing to say that the fruit that it produces in your climate, soil with the care you give it or don't give it, would be the same. The seeds are available and each seed should carry the same genetics for you, so therefore to buy a packet of seeds would give you many chances of a big tomato.

If Big is your goal, visit The giant vegetable forum where people go to extraordinaire lengths to grow em big.

I know that you probably think that I just do not get the point, or am unimaginative, and perhaps that is true, but I just think that it would be a lot of wasted time and effort unless there were some very strong reason to want to keep a plant alive into the next year. Some plants are Bi-inneal (sp) and are pretty much shot after the second year where they bolt to make seed, but I have no Idea the shelf life or life expectancy of a tomato plant. Some people do keep them over winter for various reasons, like no more seed for them available etc.
That is just my thoughts, good luck with your efforts. If you find some collaborators, let us know how things go with it.
Bill P.

Good comments Bill P.

Thank you for your response.

I guess I should explain a few things.

First of all the genetics on every tomato plant are different. They are definitely not the same. The variations are small enough that they are called the same variety but still different.

Second you can keep a plant alive for 100 years by cloning. When you clone, you take a healthy new shoot and you root it with healthy new roots. the old stem and old roots die but the new stem and new roots are young and fresh. So if you do this say every 6 months or every year depending on conditions you are all set. I believe for example the big money hybrids are grown from the idential two plants which are kept alive via cloning. Big Boys parents have been kept alive for almost 60 years. They do not grow new parents from seeds. That would actually give a different tomato. The same must be true of Jet Star and Supersonic and all the big names. I can only assume that it is true for Big Zac. If not true then the seeds produced every year will be different. This probably also requires them to make say 1000 clone plants for the male and 1000 clone plants for the female before growing them out and crossing them to make seeds. A very big job.

OK lets say one plant in 10 of a certain variety produces big tomatoes without using the special techniques of the Giant Tomato growers. In other words we know it has good genetics just right to grow big. Now say we clone that plant and make 10 copies to grow out. It makes more sense to me to grow out 10 clones of a known good plant then to grow out 10 different plants from 10 seeds. In which case I will really have only one plant with the big potential. Two problems arise. One I dont know which of the 10 might be good. Second I am spinning my wheels on 9 plants that do not have the correct potential.

Besides I see nothing wrong with trying to keep those genetics alive. Maybe it did well for you in hot Texas, and now it comes up to New England. Well maybe it will not perform as well but then maybe it will do better.

I have been in the Giant Veg Forum. Not much participation there. Only getting a few posts in a year.

Anyway Bill, this is a hobby. I get bored sometimes. This seems like a fun project to give me some fun these last few years of life. I am growing tomatoes anyway. so I want to have a little more fun with the project. I do not expect or even dream of growing a world record. But I want to learn and and have some fun.

I will say that I have some Big Zac seeds and I will grow some out next year. But I really hope I can link up with someone with a good plant this year and keep it alive over the winter. I probably prefer something which is not Big Zac and probably not grown for a contest using Giant tomato techniques. I would probably prefer one that just grew a big one of about 2 pounds without any special growing technique.

But I will not turn down anything that is offered. I will try any and all attempts. That will provide more information on if this is a good idea or not. I am convinced it is a worthy idea. But what is saved must be worthy of saving. I want to find something worthy of saving and then save it.

Some difficulty in shipping a cutting to you and keeping it alive while shipping but even if that problem was solved I'd still agree with gonefishin - a lot of expense and effort for likely very little results.

Consider the size and the condition of the plant you would have in the spring if it survived. Indoor plants tend to be long and lanky dues to the effect of using supplemental light. How would you then transplant such a monster? If you took a cutting from it to transplant to the garden what would you have gained?

If 1 giant tomato is your goal then your best bet would be to grow your own spring transplant, plant it, and then do whatever sort of pruning is needed for a giant.

I'd think the Giant Vegetable forum might have some tips for you.

Dave

Sorry, looks like we were posting at the same time.

Dave

It is very easy to ship a cutting. I do not need a rooted plant just a cutting. Basically a sucker. I will root it here. However, shipping a rooted cutting is also easy and is better for the receiver if the shipping person is able to handle that.

Many companies are shipping plants in the spring with little problems. There is some risk but that is the nature of life.

The entire project is expensive. But it is my money. Obviously I have to pay all expenses.

Let me add that people think what I propose is impossible so they are not trying. They are allowing good genetics to die. I want to try to keep them alive. nothing wrong with that motivation.

Financially it is a loss. no doubt about that. However, having fun always costs a few bucks.

Last year or last winter I kept one tomato plant alive through the winter. It was nothing special but it had a good yield. So I thought to carry it through the winter. I planted it out this spring and it did just fine. I learned a lot from the experience.

If I am not successful in getting a cutting to carry through the winter then I will simply practice again this winter with some things from the garden. I learn a lot from experimentation. Sometimes they work and sometimes they fail. But always the experiments are fun to do. I have done all kinds of experiments all my life.

I have some water hyacinths. they are floating pond weeds. they die in the cold. I have kept them going for about 10 years now in all kinds of different ways. I have learned from that experience. I applied some of that learned knowledge from the water hyacinth to the tomato plant last winter and was successful.

I am even having fun discussing this. I want to thank everyone who is sharing in this thread and all those who join in the discussion. We all benefit from sharing information.

Dan
What I did was started some seeds in October of last year just to learn how to do it as I had not tried it before. I used fluorecsent lights which are cheap to operate. Well, after a few seeds germinated and started to grow I decided to try to keep a few growing. I just had them in 9 oz. plastic cups. When they got to about 15 inches tall I made cuttings from them. I discarded the rooted plant and replanted the cuttings (in a new cup). I did that several times till spring arrived and had some decent seedlings to plant out that actually were from seeds started 6 months before. I planted one Bucks County plant that was one of the cuttings and another from a seed started in the spring. The plants look like each other and have been producing about the same as well. I gave the rest away and don't know how they did. I'm in western PA (Zone 6) and the biggest problem I would have with your idea is that by the end of the season my plants are pretty beat. The lower leaves start to turn yellow and brown and different ailments start to show themselves. I'd rather start fresh in the spring. If you want to do it though and can get a healthy cutting it is not difficult to do. Just keep making new cuttings from the plant(s) as they get too big for your lights.

Thanks tomato vator

Good ideas shared here. I think right now is a good time to take a cutting. Most people's plants have not gone down hill yet. Usually the problems are close to the ground. You want to take a new sucker as a cutting. the new sucker should be nice and clean.

Professionals can use special techniques. They can get virus free super tiny cuts from the grow tip. These are just a few cells. they can propagate a plant from the cells. They can also propagate thousands of plants at once in this way. I forget the name. They do this with orchids for example. They do the grow tip technique to get virus free strawberry plants then grow up thousands. then they plant them outdoors and propagate them again. What they sell might have some virus again but only slightly and it will take a couple of years for the plants to get all virus up again.

Of course it makes most sense to start up fresh with seeds. However, I am looking for a good plant that is worth saving. Maybe that one in a thousand plant. Why let it die. Lets try to keep it alive and see what happens.

tissue culture. I got it using google on propagation. Tissue culture is the way they can clone thousands at one time each from a tiny tissue of the plant.

Is anyone in GW Tomato land have a big tomato coming along. I want a cutting from the plant. a sucker to root up and try to keep it alive over the winter and grow it out next year to see how well it does in the 2nd year.

I may have what you are seeking. Does it matter if it is a hybrid or heirloom? I have a hybrid plant that has procuced a 4 pound 9 ounce tomato as well as one weighing 4 pounds 2 ounces. I have an heirloom plant that produced a 4 pound 2 ounce tomato. That plant was not pruned in any special way. The hybrid plant is the best I have ever had. I believe it is special. Interested? The price will be a rooted cutting from the hybrid in May.

Lubadub

You are the Best. I just sent you an email. if you do not receive then send me a blank email and I will respond. My email address is posted. You can email me not going through GW, sometimes the email through GW works but sometimes it does not work.

Hybrid and not hybrid. I love them all.

Dan,

I'm coming into this discussion a bit late but wanted to give you some encouragement.

I've been into tomatoes pretty seriously for at least 40 years, and therefore have had plenty of opportunities to do
some things right and an awful lot of things wrong! At any rate, your theory that a cloned plant should have a better chance of duplicating the performance of a parent is precisely how fruit trees of many types are propigated. It's
done with a tiny bud in the crotch formed by a leaf stem
and a twig. The bud is grafted to some rootstock, usually
from a variety which shows superior characteristics for
root generation and desease resistance, and away we go.

I have been a seed saver for years. I have saved seed for enough years to recognize perhaps 6 specific heirloom crosses which I then tried to stabilize to realize a new and somehow more advantageous variety. Unfortunately, results in every case were less than the parent from which the seed
was taken; the strain or variety was simply corrupted.

I have also experienced trials of much touted varieties with
seed brought in on a trade which simply didn't perform well.
Later, with years passing, more bragging about the variety has led me to retrials, and often with excellent results.

I think you are absolutely right, seeds from the same fruit
do not perform identically. Apart from our gardening experience we only need follow the lives of identical human twins to confirm the logic of that conclusion.

You may want to consider attributes other than size to guide your tests. I would be happy to ship you some cuttings but 3 1/2 weeks of rain most every day in late July and through mid August got me into folliage deseases I wouldn't want to foist off onto anyone.

At any rate, best of luck.

larry

foliage diseases need be no problem. You can sterilize the cutting and then root it. The new plant will be disease free. However, this does not work with virus. WIth virus you need to go to the grow tip and do tissue culture of the grow tip.

The new cells at the grow tip will not have had time to get the virus so they will still be virus free.

I am not able to to tissue culture. But the experts could handle even that problem. This is discussed a lot on strawberry propagation where getting away from virus is the critical problem with strawberry plants.

Good to have a hobby that keeps the mind and body active.

Everyone thinks that if you make a hybrid it will be great. But that is not true. Most hybrids that professionals make dont really work the way they are desired. But a few work and that is why they keep trying. Genetics are very complex because the genes combine somewhat randomly and we do not see the genes we see only the expression of them. And it can be very hard to tell exactly what one has. Of course the professionals probably use some scientific methods to try to monitor the genes to speed up the breeding process.

Anyway, dont ever let problems stop you. I am sure I can make good plants from those plants you have. email me if you want to try to clean them up. my email is very available.

Dan