What do the string of letters mean after tomato variety listings in seed catalogs?
I thought I remembered that V and F had something to do with diseases but I’ve also seen other letters as well. Tomatoes are the most popular homegrown vegetables, but they’re susceptible to an array of diseases. Since natural resistance — or at least tolerance — to a disease is more preferable than using pesticides, gardeners often seek out disease-tolerant tomatoes. Tomato breeders seek to incorporate tolerance to major diseases when they develop new tomato cultivars, and these tolerances are indicated by certain letters. Here are the primary letters listed in many seed catalogs: V indicates tolerance to verticillium wilt, a soil-borne fungal disease that can affect many edible and ornamental plants. F indicates tolerance to fusarium wilt. Since there are two main races of fusarium wilt, tolerance may be further indicated as F1 for Race 1, F2 for Race 2, or FF for tolerance to both. There are no pesticides to treat verticillium or fusarium; the solution is selecting tolerant tomato
