Bridging the Gap Between Heirlooms and Hybrids
By Vanessa Richins
As anyone who visits Tomato Casual on a regular basis knows, we are very fond of the heirloom tomatoes.
These old-time beauties bring amazing colors and tastes that you simply won’t find in hybrid tomatoes.
Planting them also helps preserve tomato variety diversity and heritage.
However, one of the problems inherent in heirloom tomatoes is that they can be very susceptible to tomato diseases such as Verticillium wilt and tobacco mosaic virus. This is one of the main reasons that people choose to grow hybrid tomatoes.
However, did you know you can have the best of both worlds? All you have to do is graft your tomatoes. Use a hybrid rootstock to give heirloom tomatoes disease resistance.
A recent study confirmed that grafting works. “Researchers at NC State studied whether heirloom tomatoes could be grafted onto more disease-resistant tomatoes to reduce disease problems and found that the grafting indeed worked. This is very important, not only to backyard gardeners, but also to organic growers who want to reduce pesticides.”
Choose a hybrid tomato that is resistant to as many diseases as possible for your rootstock. If you choose a type that is indeterminate and keeps growing, it could be possible to graft on more than one heirloom variety.
Are you interested in grafting your tomatoes? Here are some instructions from UC Santa Cruz’s alumni site.
If you are feeling adventurous, you can experiment with other members of the Solanaceae family too, such as potatoes, peppers and eggplant.
Have you ever tried grafting on your tomato plants?
January 21st, 2009 at 11:30 am
I’ve never tried in the past, but if I had the room to grow a few varieties, it’s an experiment I’d certainly try. Good luck.
January 21st, 2009 at 1:23 pm
This is great information. I didn’t know that it could even be done. Now I can’t wait until spring to give it a try. Thanks for the info!
January 21st, 2009 at 7:03 pm
I’ve grafted a lot now and have several plants growing successfully. It takes a bit of practice to get good matching cuts and to optimally control healing conditions, but once you get the hang of it it’s not too bad at all.