"It started as a hobby but the hobby got way out of hand," is how an Anmore heirloom gardener describes her transformation from curious green thumb to sole preserver of some of the world's rarest tomato seeds.
When Tatiana Kouchnareva immigrated here from Russia, where she grew up on a farm and knew the taste of a good tomato, she was appalled by the lack of variety and especially the lack of flavour in the tomatoes she was finding at the grocery store.
So, she began to grow her own, naturally. And when the fruits ripened, she saved some seeds to grow again the next year.
So began an "obsession" that has blossomed into a full-time commitment of growing, harvesting, trading seeds and documenting the histories of different varietals of tomatoes, peppers, potatoes and melons.
She's even started a website, "Tatiana's TOMATObase" (t.tatianastomatobase.com), as a kind of heritage fruit and vegetable Wikipedia where users can write, research and edit articles about every regional variance of fruit and vegetable imaginable.
An "heirloom" or "heritage" fruit or vegetable is, by Kouchnareva's estimation, one that has been grown by the same family continuously for two or more generations, she explained.
But there is some dispute in the heirloom growing community about whether or not that should include commercially grown varieties.
Kouchnareva believes it should, but conceded that those varieties are often interbred to the point that they aren't characteristically unique from one another any more. At least not as unique as her Wonder Light, a bright yellow, lemon-shaped tomato that even tastes mildly citrusy. Or the Bosnian Yellow tomato, of which Kouchnareva holds the only seeds known to be around today, she said. Or the white "Coyote" tomato, the Black Brandywine or Kouchnareva's favourite, the Anna Russian, a small heart-shaped fruit, which she described as "all meat. No juice, no seeds" - and therefore, very difficult to reproduce.
In all, Kouchnareva has grown more than 2,500 varieties of tomato behind her Anmore home and has the seeds from every one - sealed in envelopes, labelled, coded and colour-categorized - to prove it.
Now she grows just a few varieties a year, enough to replenish her seed stock, which, if not sold or traded, will remain active when stored in the envelopes for a maximum of 10 to 15 years.
Kouchnareva mostly trades or sells with other heirloom growers, not for profit but just to keep the different genetic varieties going.
"When people stop growing they have to find the next person to adopt their collection," she said. "It's a lot of responsibility and it's really started to scare me what will eventually happen to mine."
Adding to her worry is what Kouchnareva is already calling the worst growing season since 2006, as the cold and damp summer have so far put a few of her unique varieties in jeopardy of extinction. "Last year it was bad," she said. She lost two heirlooms last year, one an irreplaceable strand from Mallorca, the other a rare breed she hopes she can track down again. "But this year is worse."
And while losing an heirloom breed means having a little less variety in the spice of life, Kouchnareva said she feels it's the responsibility of gardeners and consumers to foster biodiversity in all its forms for an uncertain future.
"Because who knows?," she said. "Maybe some of these genes carry the cure to something we don't know. There's a lot of breeding materials here."
tcoyne@tricitynews.com
