The Crafty Cultivator

With all this time to be at home, I have been doing a little more research into the different tomatoes I am growing. You might have seen the one I’ve already posted about one of my favourites. Tiny Tim…. This one has been a lot harder to google for more information than the seed packet provides. Mostly because when you google “Chernobyl Tomato” the first page is just full of  links to the mini-series “Chernobyl” or the Rotten Tomatoes page about the mini-series.

So lets start with what they say on the seed packet.

“Days to Maturity: 85; Indeterminate – This beautiful pale yellow Virgina heirloom is perfect for canning and preserving. It’s thick walls and tangy sweetness make the perfect addition to sauces, salsas and pastes. Plant will grow 4-5 feet tall. Fruits grow from 6-10 ounces each. Plant will require caging for best results.”

The only link actually about these seeds that I found, was the one to MI Gardener (where I got the seeds). And I’ll throw in the link to the seeds here so you can try them for yourself if you want.

From the Website:

Days to Maturity: 80; Indeterminate; “This variety has a rich combination of sweet and spicy flavors. Extremely productive with heavy yields of lime green fruit. High in calcium and vitamin C. Disease and heat resistant.”

However, part of the fun of growing Heirlooms is the story and the history behind them. So I wanted more.

In October 2019, the MI Gardener Facebook page teased the variety saying “VERY rare. Bright neon yellow skin, bright neon yellow meat, and get this… the gel inside is bright neon yellow.  We are so excited about this one because it was bred using traditional cross breeding over in Ukraine, brought to the US by our friends at Sweet Peach Farms and collected so you can enjoy this insane heirloom variety.”

That is about all I could find. I do wish it was more consistent, since the seed pack says “virgina heirloom” and the tease he did on facebook says it comes from the Ukraine. I didn’t see anyone else selling the seed, at least not in my quick searches. So I would be interested if you have anything to share in the comments. I am excited to see how it does here. It should be ok with 80 days to Maturity. With my patio being an excellent heat supply over night after soaking up the sun all day, I think the “Disease and heat resistant” part, and the “container friendly” part, could all work in my favour. Now we just need mother nature to co-operate and give us a nice decent growing season this year.

I would also like to mention that if you have a slight heirloom seed addiction, searching for information on tomato seeds does not help you. I now have an additional 9 tomatoes on a list to ‘keep an eye out for seeds’ of before I managed to stop myself from going down the tomato rabbit hole on the internet. If anyone has seed they want to share from this one… please let me know, I’m open to trades! {maybe once the global situation calms down a bit… unless you’re local}