Sunday, January 30, 2011

Mutant 'matoes and Plan 9 from the Frankenspace

I love B grade horror films of the yesteryear. Not 1990s ones though I guess in 2011 we can almost count that yesteryear. While the zombie runs in the 1970s are almost there it is not quite the era I am meaning. These films, almost more z grade than b grade populated the screens in eras earlier, where black and white were the order of the day. These I find to be pretty good on occasions, particularly when watched in the dark on a stormy summer night with popcorn and a sav blanc for good measure. Viewing triffids invading the earth, or Bela Lugosi doing all that he can to be typecast in his most senior moment of life or going even further back to Boris Karloff in his Frankenstein turn. And it is with these types of films in mind that I bring you the attack of the mutant tomatoes. Late one night, in a garden not unlike your own, these creatures are lurking ...



Ok they aren't in your garden. They're not even growing on the balcony. They are in a friend, Miss R's garden in Adelaide. It was, at one point, a tomato seedling but now it is unlike anything I've ever seen. The other seedlings from the same punnet are growing fine, though suffering a bit from the heat whereas this little man, well, he is growing in a uniquely grotesque way. Miss R feared it was a disease and worried for her other tomatoes but I am pretty sure this is just a seed gone wrong, mutated into the frankenstein of tomato plants and harmless though fascinating. A mish mash of plants, supposedly a tomato but with the growing habit of something entirely different. The other option is that it is a triffid come to claim the earth, the first in a wave of many, but that might be wrong too. So who is right? Odd new disease or mutant 'mato? Does anyone have any other suggestions? Should she pull it or should she leave it to see what mutant offspring it will probably never have?

3 comments:

Megan said...

Weird! That looks like a cross between a zucchini plant and a tomato, the way the buds are forming! I can't wait to see what some more experienced gardeners have to say about this one!

Lisa said...

Totally leave it!!

Anonymous said...

I haven't ever seen anything like that. I really hope it gets to grow. I am curious to see what those flowers develop into.