Strategies to produce tomato seeds during regular tomato harvest

Summary

Tomato production can be time consuming especially when it is done to produce and keep small amounts of seeds. In a trial conducted over two seasons at FiBL, CH, two harvest regimes were tested on 8 tomato genotypes. One regime consisted of a regular harvest of fruits twice a week followed by seed extraction, while the other consisted of a harvest of fruits every three weeks for seed extraction. The main difference between the fruits from the two regimes is their stage of maturity i.e. all fruits are at the optimal stage for consumption with the frequent harvest while fruits are at various maturity stage – from optimal to overripe – with the less frequent harvest. Seeds were also extracted from fruits regularly harvested and stored in a cool chamber (ca. 7°C) for up to 4 weeks prior to extraction.
Using fruits from irregular harvest including overripe fruits did not negatively affect seed viability and seed production /Kg fruit. However, fruits or part of fruits with clear disease symptoms should be removed prior to seed extraction. Plants frequently harvested produced a higher fruit yield than those harvested every three weeks which indirectly increased the seed yield. Cooling of the fruits had no impact on seed production and viability. A way to save on time, space and resources while enhancing production, is thus to pool fruits from several regular harvests and store them in a cool room until the quantity is enough for the seed extraction. This also allows to have a small side production of seeds in parallel to the regular production of fruits. In cultivations aimed only at seed production, a less frequent harvest procures a large quantity of fruits at once for the extraction and have no negative impact on seeds.