Heirloom Tomatoes

Whether you call them “Heritage” or “Heirloom," these are still the varieties you will want to grow for taste. Heirlooms come from seed that has been handed down for generations in a particular region or area, and hand-selected by gardeners for their taste or specific growing characteristics

Heirloom vegetables are open-pollinated, which means they’re non-hybrid and pollinated by insects or wind without human intervention. How experts define heirlooms can vary, but typically they are at least 50 years old, and often are pre-WWII varieties. All heirlooms are open-pollinated but not all open-pollinated are heirlooms. How's that for confusing?

In addition, they end to remain stable in their characteristics from one year to the next. What that means to you is that you can save the seeds and if they don’t cross pollinate they will come true. Your “Aunt Ruby’s German Green” tomato seed will produce an “Aunt Ruby’s German Green” next year. Tomatoes are self pollinating and if you want to be relatively sure they haven’t “crossed the road,”  bag the flowers after you hand pollinate them or plant them away from other tomatoes. Remember that wind, bees and other things can pollinate the flowers. too.

Many gardeners agree that heirloom tomato varieties boast greater flavor than the hybrids. After all, there is a reason they’ve been around for so long. In general I agree although I’ve had some tasty hybrids such as the cherry tomato, “Sungold” and “Sweet Treats” a larger pink cherry tomato, which are fabulous. 

Another fun thing about heirloom tomatoes, they come in a rainbow of colors:, pink, black, yellow, orange, purple, burgundy etc. Some are evne green when ripe. They come in different shapes: flattened, fluted, egg-shaped, heart-shaped, to name a few. They can be hollow (for stuffing). Stripes and spots and flushes of color make them beautiful and interesting.

While hybrid plants typically yield a crop that is uniform in both appearance and timing, heirlooms produce a “mixed bag” harvest. The harvest may come in less predictably, and fruit size can vary greatly even on the same plant but it is still worth the real estate that they take up. Heirlooms, especially the larger ones, can be prone to cracking and cat facing which is not their most endearing quality but beauty is skin deep in my book. I have never found a beauty queen tomato, perfectly round, consistently red that can compare with a fat, juicy, sweet slice of, say, “Aussie” or “Rose” on my BLT!

Heirlooms typically come with a story that is as wonderful as the flavor. The Amish heirloom tomato Brandywine Pink yields fruit with an unbeatable flavor in shades reminiscent of a glass of Cabernet. Mortgage Lifter paid off a man’s house in the depression years. Amana Orange takes its name from Amana, Iowa. Paul Robeson, a Russian heirloom tomato was named after the operatic artist who won acclaim as an advocate of equal rights for Blacks. His artistry was admired world-wide, especially in the Soviet Union.

Remember that  ripening times are  from the time of transplanting into the garden.

Click on the picture for a little more detail.