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Weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them - A. A. Milne, Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh Seeds of Diversity thanks the George Cedric Metcalf Foundation and the Ontario Trillium Foundation for their support. Design by Allison Prindiville | Canadian-Bred TomatoesChristene Rafuse [This article originally appeared in the Heritage Seed Program magazine, August 1990.]
With Meech Lake constantly in the news over the last year, most of us have had cause to ponder what it means to be Canadian. When I joined the Heritage Seed Program, it seemed to me that one way we could distinguish ourselves from our friends in the Seed Savers Exchange in the States would be by placing a special emphasis on preserving varieties developed or formerly popular in Canada. My hobby is growing different tomatoes. Last winter I decided to research the history of tomato breeding in Canada and find out what originated here. Tomatoes are the most popular home garden vegetable in North America today. With the hundreds of varieties now existing, it is easy to forget that they were not widely grown before the 1860s. This makes researching the history of tomato varieties somewhat easier than that of other vegetables. From the time of Confederation, Agricultural Research Stations have been testing varieties on the market and making recommendations for home and market growers. Early reports are filled with the struggles to make tomatoes grow — period — with discouraging comments from Brandon, Manitoba and Swift Current, Saskatchewan stating, “None ripened this year.” Tomato breeding was definitely not a science in the late 1800s. The laws of genetics were poorly understood. Seedsmen would often select only the largest fruit in the field for saving seed. It was the American Alexander Livingston who first realized that one had to look at the entire plant, as well as the fruit, when making selections. Within a short time, the market was filled with varieties showing the merits of his system, all of which bore his name: Livingston’s Perfection, L. Aristocrat, L. Magnus, and L. Beauty. One of his varieties, Livingston’s Globe, was still in Stokes catalogue in 1975. It was no wonder that early seedsmen had trouble fixing their lines. Today, we know proper isolation distances (150 feet for potato leaf varieties, for example), while they would often plant one row next to another. A common complaint was that varieties would not come true as advertised. Another was the blatant use of duplicitous names — a practice not fully stopped until 1924 when the Canadian Seed Growers Association set standards for vegetable seed production. Even today, unscrupulous bedding plant growers have been known to tag the latest hybrid as Bonny Best. These were just a few of the problems faced by stations doing trials in those early years. The objectives at all the stations were the same — to find varieties that produced good yields of early ripening, medium to large, smooth fruit. Reports from the 1870s and 1880s described seedy and lumpy failures. Tomato breeding can be said to have originated in Canada in 1900. W.T. Macoun, at the Central Experimental Farm in Ottawa, began making selections from Spark’s Earliana. The best of these selections was dubbed Alacrity and released across Canada via the other research stations and local Department of Agriculture branches. Alacrity was not a static selection —improvements continued to be made to the variety, which was a top producer in trials across Canada until the 1930s. As well, different Alacrity selections were made for different purposes — some for earliness, some for higher yield and uniformity. A 1926 quarter-century retrospective described the development of Alacrity and its importance to settlers in isolated northern regions. Even in 1926, maturity for the earliest strains was still 104 days from seeding. Eventually, these different strains became the numbered Ottawa lines as different crosses were introduced. From the start, stations concentrated on the production of open-pollinated varieties. As the producers of Monarch and Mustang hybrids at Morden, Manitoba found in the 1950s, people did not want to pay more for hybrid seed. But more important, the stations encouraged the use of home-grown seed. It was hoped that people receiving samples from stations would multiply them for their friends and neighbours. A report from 1894 states, “Home-grown seed gives better yields than boughten.” Breeding programs did not get started in a large way until after the Second World War. Research was disrupted first by the First World War and then by the Great Depression. Breeding over the years has centred in a few areas. Morden has been a centre for the Western program, with affiliated projects in Saskatchewan and Alberta. Ontario has produced the bulk of varieties, with large programs at the Central Experimental Farm and Simcoe. The contribution made by Quebec is often ignored, mostly because their research is not readily found in major Canadian English scientific journals. The small program at Kentville, Nova Scotia, yielded Scotia, still the best variety for the Atlantic provinces. Despite the onslaught of so-called bigger and better hybrid tomatoes in the post Second World War period, many of the station varieties have stood the test of time. Many have disappeared. The stations lacked the budgets and means to promote their varieties and depended upon their being adopted by seed companies, to which they might give exclusive rights. Small seedsmen, like Edward Lowden, made it their policy for many years to promote local varieties. But in the last 20 years, the amalgamation of the seed business has eliminated most of the smaller companies and encouraged the selling of fewer varieties.
Varieties developed in Canada
Note: This is a list of field varieties and it does not include greenhouse ones
This list of varieties is not complete. Information on varieties has been gleaned from station reports, scientific journals, trade papers, and seed catalogues. Any further information would be greatly appreciated. Many of the Simcoe varieties (all the “Vee” ones) are available from Stokes Seeds (39 James St., Box 10, St. Catharines, Ontario, L2R 6R6). These were developed mainly for the canning and processing trade. Dr. Kerr, former plant breeder for Simcoe, now works for Stokes.
Varieties recommended over the years 1880s: Livingston’s Favorite, Livingston’s Beauty, Dwarf Champion*, Perfection, Conqueror, Canada Victor, Pear* (a.k.a. Fig) 1890s: Early Ruby, Atlantic Prize, Everbearing, Livingston’s Aristocrat, Potato Leaf, Henderson’s 400 (Ponderosa)*, Golden Queen*, Earliest of All, Mikado, Electric 1900s: Dominion Day, June Pink*, Sparks Earliana*, Early Leader, Imperial, Stone* 1910s: Alacrity, Prosperity, Bonny Best*, King Edward, First and Best, Crimson Cushion *, Extra Early, Wealthy, Chalks Early Jewel 1920s: Burbank*, Early Atlantic, Early Prosperity, Sunnybrook Earliana, Viking, Herald, Fargo, Livingston’s Globe, Earlibell 1930s: Livingston’s Beauty, John Baer*, Farthest North, Bounty, Abel, Early Chatham, Harkness, Bison, Marglobe*, Princess Mary, Polar Circle, Bestal 1940s: Stokesalaska*, Carleton, Valiant*, Redskin, Morden, Red Cloud, Victor*, Stokesdale 1950s: Fireball*, Scotia*, Harrow, Meteor, Valnorth
* varieties still available today
Bibliography American Society for Horticultural Science. New Vegetable Variety Lists, 1–18. These are published periodically in Horticultural Science. Fell, D. (1977) Everything you always wanted to know about the tomato. Horticulture. Feb: 16–23. Yearly reports from these stations and others: Morden, Manitoba; Central Experimental Farm, Ottawa; Beaverlodge, Alberta; Kentville, Nova Scotia; Charlottetown, PEI; Melfort, Saskatchewan. Canadian Horticultural Council yearly reports. |