Concur: Hearts of Gold does not have deep orange flesh.

The expert plant breeders at the Oregon research station state that this phenomenon is UV (sunlight) caused. Triple Crown berries are very susceptible to UV damage. The solution is patience (the sun angle decreases rapidly in coming weeks); often the later-ripening berries are less damaged. Shade cloth is effective for prevention. Aligning the rows north-south avoids one side of the row getting all the sun. If a damaged berry has a few bad drupelets, allow them to dry out and enjoy the resulting "crunchy" berry. Slightly damaged berries can be used for juice and puree. When the berries are in the "fleshy" mode, there is an off flavor. Your berries are not defective, they are just a variety prone to UV damage. Here it occurs above 90 degrees and 30% or lower humidity.

Agree that the Seed Saving forum Albert linked is your best source of info. Check out all the "How-to" FAQs there. The general method for de-gooing seeds is a brief 5-6 day period of light fermentation with a bit of water added. There are meany discussions available about how to do it that the search will pull up. Dave Here is a link that might be useful: How to ferment seeds for saving

The smudge characteristic is variable both due to genetics and enviornment. So what one might observe plant to plant or year to year and under different environmental conditions will influence how much of that black/purple is expressed. Orange color As far as the orange vs red, I think simply the higher contrast of purple against orange vs purple against red is going to appear to be more vivid simply due to the nature of color perception. The orange is likely from the tangerine gene. So it means that either this variety is the result of a cross or the result of a mutation at the t+ wildtype loci. At least one of the parents in the background of 'Purple Smudge' is documented to have a tangerine mongenic mutant documented. A revision due to the grafting alone is dubious. Variable expression The person who released 'Purple Smudge' notes several times in reports that the expression of the purple is enhanced by higher light. He also notes several other environmental factors that can ultimately effect the expression of the purpling. From Young, TGRC 13:33-34 Plants with the smudge character showed purple to black smudge in the peel of the sunny sides of few to many fruits per plant, especially when the plants were exposed to temperatures of 35 to 50F. [note- P20 does this as well] furthermore ... so light appears necessary for development of the purple or black color. Cool fall weather or soil deficient in nitrogen and phosphorus apparently increased the development of the purple or black color. The report also mentions that the trait does not fit simple Mendelian inheritance patterns. I won't go into that part. Suffice to say both the genetic expression and expression due to environment are responsible for how much purple there is (or isn't). The pedigree of 'Purple Smudge' is rather complex. I traced it this way. Purple Smudge/LA2377 (TGRC) = PI 290858 (USDA) which is G 2157-8 There used to be a listing titled 'Purple Smudge' but it has been changed to it original entry from the donor - 'G 2157-8'. The Ames USDA site used to hold tomatoes and there it was called Ames 619. Here is the current USDA record. http://www.ars-grin.gov/cgi-bin/npgs/acc/display.pl?1220049 I then traced the lineage from Young's research notes in several issues of The Reports of the Tomato Genetics Committee. Colored areas are attributed to the contributing breeders and so noted. Some of the initial crosses probably go back to the early 1940's. (Young's G1219[F3] x Stokesdale cross is noted as 1949). I might note also the PA Young observed and documented many so called "heirloom traits". For instance the one line received from Dr Porte of the USDA also segregated out "pink-gold" fruits with yellow peel, orange rind, and orange and pink flesh�.. Seeds from these fruits produced mostly red-fruited plants, but some plants had the typical pink gold fruits. Inheritance of fruit color is peculiar in crosses with Lycopersicon peruvianum (Lesley & Lesley, Jour. Hered. 38:245-251, 1947). He also described blacks/purples, other bicolors and superpuff (bell pepper shape). I did not care for Purple Smudge myself. I care for few tangerine fruits (most are bland to me). From what I have been observing in crosses with orange, I can only imagine that the orange trait only took something down in quality rather than up. It is an interesting novelty though.