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Defining Heirloom

What, exactly, is an heirloom vegetable? To qualify at all, a variety must be open-pollinated (i.e.. it must be pollinated naturally, without human help). In the absence of other varieties of the same species nearby, open-pollinated plants will breed true to type (i.e., seeds replicate the parent). This is not so with manufactured hybrids. Seed from a first-generation (FI) manufactured hybrid will either be sterile or will grow into a variety that looks nothing like the Fl, but rather is an odd mix of traits inherited from either or both of the Fl's parents. To be sure, hybrids can be stabilized so they grow true to type, but given that seed producers have a marked interest in insuring your annual seed purchases they seldom, if ever, are.

Technically, when two open-pollinated varieties cross, the result is a hybrid. But unlike the manufactured Fl types, these new varieties, through rouging and other growing technique, can be quickly stabilized - often in as little as two or three generations - and will then breed true to type (Rouging is the process of saving seed from only the best plants of a variety, as defined by the individual grower. He or she may choose only those plants that bear early, have the largest fruit or taste the sweetest. This process can be used over successive generations to train open-pollinated hybrids, thereby forming a new and predictable variety.)

Mammoth Red Rock cabbage dates to 1889.

Aside from being open-pollinated, the other defining traits of an heirloom are open to discussion. Most authorities apply the term to an open-pollinated variety that has been grown for at least 50 years. Craig Dremann, among others. believes this definition is too loose. He says an heirloom is an open-pollinated variety that is not commercially available, and prefers terms like "heritage," "historic," "old-fashioned" and "traditional" to describe old, open-pollinated varieties that can be bought through seed sellers. "We don't want any old variety to be called an heirloom," he says. If you actually acquire an heirloom, you take on the responsibility of keeping it going."

Perhaps the best definition is provided by Benjamin Watson in his book Taylor's Guide to HeirloomVegetables. Watson uses three criteria:

1) The variety must be able to reproduce itself from seed. That is to say, it is standard or open-pollinated variety.

2) The variety must have been introduced more than 50 years ago, This would include those varieties recently introduced by seed companies, but which were previously unavailable through the seed trade. Instead, they w ere preserved over the years by families or by ethnic, religious or tribal groups who handed down the seeds win generation to generation.

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