I've tried both ways, 1) fermented and 2) rinsed clean off the gel. Was only once able to get the fermentation process to work, but that was when I put all the gel in with the seeds and added water to it. The gel rotted and released the seeds. Both worked. However, the seeds/gel in water, shake, strain, and repeat method has always worked well. I still drained, strained and rinsed for a couple days, and found was best at getting all the floaters out. And didn't stick to the plate. They all did germinate when tested between damp sheets of paper towels, put in a small, covered container. I highly agree with collecting seeds from multiple tomatoes from different plants. Only fully ripened tomatoes. TYFS Travis
Yes, try some fall tomatoes. I picked some suckers a couple of weeks ago, and Ive got new little plants with new little roots about ready to get planted.
1 thing to improve germination is to get that gel off the seeds as it is a sprout inhibitor, easy way is squeeze tomatoes into a jar or container and let them rot/ferment for a few days then rinse and dry like you did. the seeds will sprout faster and more of them will sprout if that jelly ( dries on still there) is decomposed off the seeds. or when you plant them that protective coating will need to decompose before it will sprout resulting in less consistent sprouting.
Only try fall maters if that's what you are craving. Otherwise, try something else. I did up-pot some maters up here in MD today for succession, bc I think they might just do dandy. I just know broc, cauli, cabbage, will attract all the critters up here in MD, so I don't bother. If you have luck with other crops, grow what your family craves. You are so funny LDF!
I've been saving seeds since the late 1960s. I always did exactly what you did there. No matter the type of seeds, I just rinse and dry on a paper plate. 🤷♀️ The first time I saw someone on the internet say "you need to ferment the pulp for tomato seeds" I was like, what? 🤨 evidently I've been doing it wrong for decades (so did my parents and grandparents 😆)
You can ferment the seed ro get the gel off. One recommendation, maybe mainly for myself, is to always immediately label the seeds so they varieties don't get confused.
I do very similar in saving tomato seeds. The only difference I do is put the pulpy seeds in a glass of water for a couple days. The pulp dissolves. Any seeds that float I throw away. But I dry them and store similar to you. I have had good success My favorite indeterminates are "Gold Medal" and "Dark Queen". The Dark Queen handles heat and humidity better than most and tastes amazing. I'll often graft them on a hardy rootstock to get them to last longer in Georgia. I'm going to try the Cherokee Carbon next year based on your videos.
Good to see you have a long sleeve shirt and large hat for sun protection. A little sunscreen on the back of your hands is recommended! You will be glad you took these precautions as you get older - I speak from my own experience. I try to keep my dermatologist's pocket knife in his pocket! Great video! Take care and be safe....
By all means, do the fall tomatoes! I live on the Gulf coast. My tomato season is over basically by the end of June. Blooms will not set because of heat. Would love to see your progress with a fall crop.
We are in Montgomery County, Texas We are pulling our determinate tomatoes this weekend and my husband put shade cloth over our indeterminate tomatoes until our horrible August heat leaves, it saves the plants , then come September off comes the shade cloth & we did great last several years, as its just getting hotter * hotter here in Texas . Plus we will start our fall broccoli, lettuce, cabbage about the middle of September. Give it a try . God bless you & yours Mrs j Texas 🙏
Yes. Please do fall tomatoes. I already have some of my starts ready to go into the ground here in central Florida 9b. I keep them until disease and or a frost kills them.
Here in Texas , We are pulling all our determinate tomatoes out this weekend , Our indeterminate my husband put shade cloth over them 2 weeks ago. To keep them going after our horrible August heat , Also planting some more fall tomatoes the end of August ,along with starting more Broccoli, cabbage, another round of potatoes ( just those in 20 gallon pots ) lettuce ,spinach , Then November we plant our sweet onions from Dixondale farms from here in Texas & have purchased them from Hoss tools in georgia ,come April we had 317 sweet onions & red creole onions, great investment as 1 onion in the store these days are like $1.89 a pound . Good luck . Montgomery county, Texas 9a 🙏🙏🙏🙏
Here in farther N. Commifornia lowlands, maters can go into November, only first frost kills them. I can have suboptimal maters, picked a bit green, into New Yr. Was vegi garden lazy this yr so only maters I have were from 3 volunteer Early Girls, they keep on popping up every season so I string them to the cheery tree where they are, cheap crude and easy. :D
I bought an heirloom Mr stripey tomato from ingles last week to try to get a few fruit before it gets cold because the tomato sandwich I made with another was so good. I even contacted the farm on facebook to confirm they weren’t hybrids so I didn’t waste my time growing them lol
I am on Gen 2 of the Turkey Creek variety. Only have two plants this year thanks to an overzealous dose of chicken litter compost. But...they are doing great and tomatoes are trying to start getting a little color to them.
I’ll definitely save some seeds this year. I was under the impression that you had to ferment them to clean all the gel off. Pain in the butt dealing with a bunch of stinky solo cups. I’ll definitely try your method. Thanks for sharing.
getting rid of gel just gets better germination rate and faster consistent germination time so they sprout at same time vs days apart. I'm sure you will find success either way.
Hey trav love your videos man. Gotta question.I did fairly similar to you in collecting seeds from a Cherokee Purple. I had early girl,an brandy wine also in the garden that year in 22. Unfortunately the seeds i harvested grew a watered done version of CP that following 2023 season. I have been led to believe it was b/c there was some cross pollination at work. Are u,or have u also experienced some of this in your tom. seed saving? I have been reading that if i wanna save open pollinated tomato seed ,i can only grow one variety w/i a certain area. Thank u, Zack
Cherokee Carbon is a ceoss between Cherokee Purple and Carbon. It can be fun to plant F2 seeds and see what traits you get. If you are looking for consistentancy it might not be for you. Like Travis said though, you don't know what you are going to get.
I squeeze all the guts of my tomatoes into a small mason jar, add some water, maybe half as much water as tomato goop, put a piece of plastic wrap on top and in 3 days or so it’ll be covered with mold at the top, swirl it around to get the seeds to separate from the goo and let it sit another day. The seeds will finish separating from the goop and settle into the water on the bottom. I then slowly fill the jar with water and pour off the goop and any floating seeds, once the water is clear dump in a strainer and proceed to the paper plate. These seeds are now fermented and the gel is gone. They will dry fuzzy just like you buy from the store and germinate fantastic for you for years if stored properly. The main drawback to other methods is the gel can inhibit germination and lessen the viability of the seed over time. If you’re doing it with each variety every year or 2 fermentation isn’t necessary.
Travis, I have a tomato from my area in Southern Tenn, 7B(8A some years) I would like to send u seeds for you to try in your garden. Big Pink fruits(had a couple 2lbfruits this year), Menonite strand. How do I go about sending them to you?
Nothing like saving your seeds for next year. If you get a mater you like save seed, they become acustom to your area and do well after a couple of years.
i let them soak in water for a few days and then strain them off, any seeds that float are no good. but i pretty much do it the same as you do. Just so happens i saved seeds today from the infamous purple Tomato...few thoughts on the whole thing... of the pack of 10 seeds, which was actually about 20, they started out great, far outpacing the growth of all my other tomato starts. after potting them out, they did ok for a while then i lost a few, then a few more, i only planted ten of the seeds, so i planted the rest, same thing, started fine, then the big die off. in short i ended up with about 3 or four plants worth planting, kinda sorry looking i planted two on the deck in pots, one in the garden, i actually made a few more from suckers, which believe it or not, turned into better plants then from seeds, their in the green house. anyways, the two on the deck are doing well although the fruit is only slightly bigger than your standard cherry tomato, i was expecting golf ball size fruit. but, they are def purple inside. i saved seed from a small handful of them today. i save the dry seeds in bottles i save from protein drinks we get, started that last year, works great. Anyways, great vid, keep up the great work.
Call me an Idiot which I have many times but I took a store bought tomato also cherry tomatoes and planted the seeds indoors way back in Jan or Feb and I ended up with about 30 regular size plants and 15 cherries of which I had no Idea what either one of them were. My wife just brought them home from the grocery store. I kept 6 cherries and 20 regulars and gave the rest away. Now they are about done and I must say they keep forever if you put them in a paper sack. The large tomatoes were indeterminate and were small and didn't ripen on the vine like normal tomatoes, the same way with the cherries. The large never got over tennis ball size and for 20 plants I don't think produced like they should have. The cherries look like peanuts still in the shell. Had to almost pick them green also the cherries which I did get quite a few were hard skinned. They both tasted ok but not what I was looking for. I won't do that again. Now I planted 10 Siletz determinates in June they are about 30 inches tall and under a shade cloth, hopefully by Fall we will have some decent tomatoes. I live in E.Texas and I did the same thing you did to save the seeds.
