I'm growing a Purple Calabash Tomato in a container (first time growing this variety) and the thing has developed a huge flat stem that looks for all the world like a computer ribbon cable! Anyone ever had this happen?
E-mail me off-list if you want to see a picture of it. If I get a chance, I will post a picture to the garden binaries NG
Craig
Have never grown Purple Calabash, but it is considered a novelty tomato. Many of ihe indeterminate short internode (ISI) tomatoes do have thickened stems almost like several stems growing side by side which gives them their characteristic rigidity. That trait had to come from somewhere so maybe P Calabash is an OP with that trait. Let us know, how it tastes.
You may also be looking at a structural phenomenon called fasciation. It happens when a growing point mutates from a round cluster of cells into a line of cells or when an injury causes the same thing. It can affect stems, inflorescences, individual flowers. It happens rather often in strawberry fruit and gives the wide, flat berries with multiple points. It's harmless, usually.
for fun: fasciated bluebonnet:
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