Seed production

For the growing tomatoes to produce the seeds, fruits are generally picked by hand when they attain full red color. Then the tomato fruits are cut across the equator, squeezed and the juice with the seeds are poured into a container. The seeds are separated by three methods; fermentation, with sodium carbonate and with hydrochloric acid. The rest of the fruit after squeeze will be thrown. Over-ripe fruits should not be selected for the seed extraction since the over-ripening of the fruits in the tomato plants lowers the quality and vigor of the seeds (Kerr, 1962.).

In the fermentation method, the pulp with the seeds is left for fermentation for about 1 to 4 days. The number of the days required for the fermentation of the tomato seed depends upon the temperature of the environment. If it is low temperature, longer duration is required to break the gelatinous coating of seeds. The tomato seeds cannot be kept for fermentation for longer duration if the temperature is above 320C since it reduces the germination percentage of the tomato seeds. After fermentation the seeds are then washed and separated with the help of water. The wet seeds should be shade-dried.

In the sodium carbonate method, pulp with the tomato seeds is mixed with aqua solution of 10% sodium carbonate in equal volume and kept overnight. Then the seeds are taken washing out water, sodium carbonate and gelatinous coating of the seeds in a sieve. The moist seeds should be shade-dried. This is a quick and safe method of the extraction of the tomato seeds.

In the hydrochloric acid method, concentrated hydrochloric acid is mixed in tomato pulp at the rate of 250 ml hydrochloric acid into the 10 Liter tomato pulp with the seeds. The mixture is stirred and left for half an hour. Be careful that the acid should be poured into the pulp. Don’t pour the pulp into the acid. After half an hour the tomato seeds are washed in clean water and they should be shade-dried. This is very quick. The tomato seeds extracted by the method are very bright and clean.

Reference Kerr E. A. 1962. Germination of tomato seeds as affected by fermentation time, variety, fruit maturity, plant maturity and harvest date. State Prod. Lab. Dep. Agric. Ont. Can., pp 79-85.

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