Seed sprouting in canning tomato fruit

Sprouting of seeds, a physiological disorder in ripe canning tomatoes, has been observed in fruits harvested from various growing areas of California during the past several years. This disorder is of particular concern in the canning of whole tomatoes because the germinated seeds appear as, foreign materials. Green or pink colored fruits have not been observed to contain sprouted seeds. Fruits from the mechanical harvesting varieties VF 145 and VF 13L and selections from these lines have shown sprouted seeds. With some of the other varieties, reports of occurrence of the seed sprouting have been quite infrequent (table 1).