Tomato (Hurricane Helene Tomato)

Hurricane Helene Tomato (Solanum lycopersicum)

This new tomato is very special to us because it's the first tomato that we bred! Here's the story:

About ten years ago a friend of ours who farms in the Sandy Mush community of Buncombe County, way out in the mountains, gave us a nameless tomato variety that her family has grown for over 100 years. The tomato had amazing flavor and the plants were very productive. While we loved almost everything about the variety, the fruits tended to be small. We are big fans of heart-shaped tomatoes so we decided to cross the variety with one of our favorite heirlooms, the Hungarian Heart Tomato.

The result of our cross was a larger heart-shaped tomato that had similar flavor to the Sandy Mush tomato and the plants remained very productive. We grew the variety for several summers to be sure that the cross was stable and were pleased that the attributes of the cross remained year after year.

In the late summer of 2024, we were preparing to name and release the new variety when tragedy hit our region of Western North Carolina. We began to recieve warnings of a hurricane heading to our area around the 20th of September. Being in the mountains, hundreds of miles from the coast, we did not anticipate the destruction that Hurricane Helene would bring. On September 26th, we were dreched with over 15 inches of rain and Helene arrived in Western North Carolina on September 27th with 70+ mph winds.

On the morning of the 27th, we were sheltered in our house as the winds howled and soon we began to see dozens of trees uprooted and crashing. A group of pine trees fell narrowly missing our house and destroying fencing and part of our garden. A creek near our property jumped the banks and we eventually decided to leave the house to shelter with neighbors up the hill because the water from the creek was getting perilously close to our house. As we ran up the hill, we saw neighbors below near the creek being rescued in boats by fire crews.

After the storm passed, we were thankful to be safe but then the reality of the situation began to sink in. Thousands of trees in our neighborhood were down, cars had been carried down the creek from where they were parked, and neighbors houses had been flooded with feet of mud and water. Since we had no power, water or internet connection we did not know the damage from the storm until days later when we learned that hundreds of people perished and billions of dollars of property had been destroyed.

After Hurricane Helene, we did not have clean drinking water for three weeks, our power was out for a month, and our internet service took forty days to be restored. While it was surreal to walk throughout our community daily and see the destruction and hear the harrowing experiences of our neighbors, it was also refreshing to see how people from all over the region came together to help one another in any way that was necessary.

During this time, we recieved incredible support from our community of customers. Seed orders came pouring in, and hundreds of concerned customers sent us messages asking what they could do to help. We truly appreciated you all during this difficult time.

Hurricane Helene Tomato - So, we decided to name our new tomato variety Helene after the storm and we will DONATE 100% of sales of Helene Tomato seeds to Manna Food Bank in Asheville. While progress has been made in the past year rebuilding after the storm, many people in our region are still struggling to get back to the life they knew before the storm.

We think you'll enjoy our Hurricane Helene Tomato as much as we do and it will be an honor that the first tomato that we bred will grow in your gardens!

(Approximately 15 seeds per packet)

Germination Rate: All of our seed varieties exceed 75% germination and are tested every 6 months for germination rates.

Planting Instructions: We recommend starting tomato seeds indoors in a bright and warm location 4 to 6 weeks before last frost date in spring. Transplant after danger of frost in full sun and trellis.