I've also heard that soaking the peices in rooting hormone will increase the "catch rate"
You will not need a rooting hormone for tomatoes. Just take a piece of the younger section that is a foot long that has a head on it. Strip all of the leaves off except the head. Bury everything side ways at a 45 degree angle up to the head. Keep very moist. Within two week it will have plenty of roots.
So, technically, while the offspring tomatoes could very much be of lesser quality, or sterile, it is also possible that the new strain would be especially hardy or productive, correct?
Yes; Maybe; No.
Yes the next generation will be of a lesser quality. The reason they are cross bred is to take the best of the "parents." Each parent being a cross breed itself.
Hybrid tomatoes are developed to give growers the best characteristics of all varieties. Fruit size, crop yield and disease resistance are all traits of hybrids.
On the
plant tag or container you may see some letters. They indicate resistance to various diseases.
V = verticillium wilt.
F = fusarium wilt. Two Fs on the label indicate resistance to both types of fusarium.
N = nematode.
T = tobacco mosaic.
A = alternaria stem canker.
S = stemphylium (gray leaf spot).
Maybe your next "generation" will be of a lesser quality but not in the area of taste, size, or coloring. Perhaps the last cross breeding was to add
T and not flavor or size or coloring.
No you will not be creating a new strain. What you will do at best should they geminate--which is possible--is re-create a previous parent. In the progaming world what you are talking about is called backwards engineering. I don't believe this is the direction you are wanting to go.
I really like the way your mind works here. It is refreshing! May I suggest you look into creating your own tomato.
I going to help you with just a little information. All tomatoes today orginated from Central America, Peru-Ecuador-Bolivia area of the Andes pre-Mayan. The Indians began to propagate the tiny fruits, and the Aztecs called the fruit tomatl. These are Tomato Currants. Most are the size of a pea. There are eight known wild species. Today the Tomato Red Currant is an off shoot as an example. Many folks call them Ornamental Edibles. If I was going to create my own tomato I would start with the wild Currant of South America as my base building block.
Years ago I grew them. Don't remember how I came by the
seeds. I had some that where pear shaped. Others were round, that where green-yellow, yellow, red white, purple and black. I had 10 of these
plants that year.
If you take this project on your records will have to be perfect. i.e. times of feeding, types of soil, types of fertilizers,how much rain, how much sunlight, temperture, how you protected a hand pollenated
flower. You will have to go at least 5 generations after you have what you think is the last step before you can even present it. However, you can create your own tomato. It will take much research on your part. There will be failures, set-backs, but there will also be the rewards.
Do you know the story of the Determinate Tomato? It was called, when found, a freak of nature. It almost ended up in the trash pile. Yet from this one
plant every commercial grower today is grateful as it bears all of its fruits at one time!
Do you know the stories of the Money Maker and Mortgage Maker tomatoes? Look them up! I think you will find them interesting reading.
You might start here to look for the base wild Currant
seed. The place is called
seed Savers.
Seed Saver Exchange Or here:
Seed Saving Resources This one is a International Effort,and maybe your best bet.
International Communities The first step in this interesting venture is you have to decide what your goal of a tomato is to be.
In closing this somewhat long posting I will leave you with a picture of a wild Currant, and a very strange
pepper Tomato.