Tomato Crimson Crush

A Blight Resistant red F1 hybrid tomato on Indeterminate plants.

Description

We have found that these were bred by Burpees Europe (and have a different name in the US – Cloudy Days).

Following my diatribe against F1 Hybrid tomatoes in Country Taste you might be surprised to find another F1 Hybrid tomato in my list.

Well Crimson Crush is advertised as “Blight Resistant” which therefore means I had to try it at the allotment to see whether it would give me the opportunity to grow tomatoes outdoors at the allotment.

I have to say that it was only limited success. We grew Crimson Crush at the allotment in 2015 from plants provided by Suttons Seeds and from seed in 2016.

We also grew them at home in 2015, outdoors but where we don’t normally experience blight.

In both years, the plants at the allotment survived without blight (in both years there was a small amount of blight on the plants and leaves but the plant survived unlike the other cultivars we grew at the allotment which caught blight in 2016 and died off). However, whilst the plants survived, the fruit were more of a problem.

In 2015, none of the allotment fruit ripened on the plant and in October, before the frosts, we picked all the green fruit, both from Crimson Crush and the other cultivars and took them home to ripen. The fruit developed blight and couldn’t be saved. Foolishly we hadn’t separated the fruit of the Crimson Crush from the Heritage cultivars so, whilst there were a few tomatoes that didn’t appear to developing blight, there was no way that we could work out which were Crimson Crush and which were heritage.

In 2016 we were more careful and labelled the plants and separated the fruit. The results were still “ambiguous”. The plants developed some blight (but the heritage variety plants died). Some of the fruit ripened (but not many) and about 20-40% of the fruit developed blight. The reason for the wide percentage is because some developed blight on the plants and so were not picked and others developed blight after being picked.

As regards the plants we grew at home, these did reasonably well, producing a reasonable quantity of ripe fruit, but then so did other non blight-resistant varieties.

Finally, in terms of taste, they were nothing special, an “ordinary” tomato though whether that is because only a small number of the fruit ripened on the plant because they were grown outdoors or just because selecting for blight resistance is a “bad idea” in terms of taste, I don’t know.

So, overall, there seems to be no particular reason to grow these. In the greenhouse and at home (where – touch wood – we don’t get blight), there’s no reason to grow them and at the allotment, whilst there are some fruit, they don’t taste of much and don’t ripen easily.

In 2020 we grew them in the greenhouse where they ripened better and were more tasty. However, it seems a bit pointless growin tomatoes which are resistant to blight in a space where blight is not present.

Here are pictures of the plant grown at home: