Goose Egg (Gusinoe Yaytso) Tomato Review

Goose Egg.

Breeder’s description (Siberian Garden): An ideal variety for pickling and canning. The plant is tall, the truss is complex, with 6-8 large egg-shaped fruits. The fruits are bright red, dense as stones, weighing up to 10.5 oz (300 g).

This time SibSad did not deceive us – everything proved true. The only thing I doubted was the claim that “the fruits are dense as stones”. I cannot confirm that. It is a very tall tomato plant. The yield is average, the taste is very good, the fruit is juicy, not mealy or mushy, but quite firm. The fruits are beautiful (well, personally, I just love this shape), and the clusters are festive. The plant is simply a joy to look at. The first truss is very branched and large, the ones higher up are smaller. The 3rd, 4th, and 5th trusses hold 3-4 fruits each, but the size of the fruits on the upper trusses is not smaller, and perhaps even larger than on the lower ones. The foliage is wispy (drooping), but the bush itself is not weak.

Edited January 29, 2015 by Drosera

We planted it in 2012, its shape and size really do resemble a goose egg. That past summer was quite dry, but despite this, and unlike my other tomatoes, it actively cracked and split right on the bush.

But the tomatoes were quite large. Unfortunately, I can’t find the photos.

This variety was recommended to me as the best one for dehydrating/sun-drying, and it totally lived up to expectations 😉 Very high yield, the first fruits are the size of a good fist. Firm, truly like stones, there is almost no liquid inside, just solid meat. It doesn’t turn to mush when you cut it; it stays perfectly cubed. The skin is thin and peels off easily when ripe. The color isn’t bright red, but rather a dark pinkish-red.

If they were just a bit smaller, they would be perfect for Hungarian-style “tomatoes canned in their own juice” – they are such sturdy nice tomatoes, not mushy at all. The taste is pleasant, and they can easily be eaten fresh. I really loved the variety, I will be planting it mainly for processing (dehydrating, freezing, canning winter salads, and stewing).

Oh man, how much I loved this variety!!! Heavy yielder, tasty, the green shoulder (which I initially thought it had) completely ripened out… I will definitely keep planting it! Thanks to Olya (Leka) for this gift!

And where did you grow this variety?

Lyubov. said:
And where did you grow this variety?

I had excellent results both in the hoop house and out in the open ground, but it performs better and produces larger fruits in the hoop house since it’s much warmer in there.

Lyubov. said:
And where did you grow this variety?

I grew it in a greenhouse…

The bush is tall, the first truss is set quite high off the ground. The egg tomatoes are huge, still green for now. It was the only variety in my first greenhouse to get hit with BER (blossom end rot), affecting about half the fruits 🤕 (you can see it on the tomato furthest back).

Our family absolutely loves this variety — tasty, heavy yielder. But it does have its drawbacks: it is prone to cracking, and once ripe, it doesn’t store for very long. I grew it in open ground, didn’t notice a single case of BER during the whole season. Photo from last year:

I didn’t get any BER either. Grew over 6.5 ft (2 m) tall in the greenhouse, pruned to 2 stems, pumped out 25-28 fruits total, in small clusters, but the eggs were absolutely massive (more like ostrich eggs, probably). Mid-season, productive, juicy, good flavor. But definitely not for whole-canning like the breeder claims, I mean, how huge would the jar have to be 😲

Some people pickle them in a giant pot or barrel.

The Goose Egg variety turned out to be incredibly productive in my hoop house. The height was over 6.5 ft (2 m). The fruits are quite meaty. They actually get much tastier if you let them slightly overripen (in my experience).

For me, Goose Egg performed much better outside in the open ground. Inside the greenhouse, fruit set was noticeably worse. The fruits are firm and sweet. Overall, not bad.

I wonder, are “Gusynya” (The Goose, bred by Medvedev) and “Goose Egg” actually the exact same variety?

I confirm everything that was said about it last year)) an awesome little tomato 👍 Truly all-purpose: just eating it fresh is delicious, it’s convenient for making juice or sauce, and it even fits in a jar for pickling. The only downside—intense heat followed by heavy rains caused the skin to crack, but it wasn’t the only variety to do that, so I can’t really fault the genetics. My original seeds came from SibSad, but the ones in the photos are grown from my own saved seeds this year.

I grew it two years in a row. Very heavy-yielding variety. I trained the bushes to 2 stems, and it is an absolutely manageable plant when it comes to pruning suckers. The fruits are large plums, slightly smaller on the top trusses. A very versatile all-purpose variety, great for salads, juicing, and canning.

One of the absolute best varieties I grew this year. The trusses hold 5-6 fruits. They are quite large, but the trusses are strong and hold up without needing extra support ties. Very tasty. No hard green shoulders or white internal cores. I will definitely repeat it.

This year I grew Goose Egg in the greenhouse, seeds from Siberian Garden. The bush is massive, over 6.5 ft (2 m), I had to lower it on the trellis. The tomatoes are very large, and there are a lot of them. For me, it was a late ripener. The color was dull, closer to orange, and the taste was mediocre. Ended up tossing them all into processing sauces. I won’t grow it again.

Galka said:
This year I grew Goose Egg in the greenhouse, seeds from Siberian Garden… The color was dull, closer to orange, and the taste was mediocre.

It sounds to me like you got an off-type, or crossed seeds (peresort). Nobody else’s ripened to an orange color. And the taste is normally fantastic, definitely not mediocre… Also, it should grow in large clusters, not just two tomatoes per branch. Based on the shape it sort of looks right (but not on the scale), but based on everything else — it’s not the true variety. 🤷

Nataly said:
It sounds to me like you got an off-type, or crossed seeds (peresort)…

I agree, I think it was crossed seed. I compared your description to mine. Seeds were from “Siberian Garden” batch #1058. I’ve planted them for three years outdoors and in the greenhouse. The shape is egg-like. The color is red, deep and saturated. It was heavy, truly feeling dense like a stone. The flavor is sweet. Yield was medium. Found one photo from this year outdoors.

Natalya, there was only one fruit that looked like a fused double, the rest of the eggs were heavy and dense. There were about 5 fruits per truss, the photo just showed one long branch. But you’re right, no one is immune to crossed seed mix-ups.

Longboat said:
I agree, I think it was crossed seed… Seeds were from “Siberian Garden” batch #1058.

My SibSad seeds were also batch 1058 🙂 Matched the description perfectly. I’m growing it from my own saved seeds now, and it comes true to type 100%. Very happy with this variety, I plant it every year mainly for canning and processing.

“Goose Egg”—I loved this variety. Its only flaw was my total neglect of it ((( I completely ignored it early on, the seedling was weak, and I just shoved it in the dirt hoping for the best… wondering if it would survive or not… And it survived!!!

And on top of that, June was absolutely brutal for us weather-wise, I didn’t even transplant my tomatoes until around June 17th… 🥶 So my harvest was very late (but that’s my fault) and the yield wasn’t huge. Honestly though, if I were a tomato in those conditions, I wouldn’t have produced a single fruit at all 🤦 I will definitely be planting it again!!!

Edited February 10, 2019 by Lena Vanyushka

Yes. An excellent variety. Siberian Garden doesn’t release bad seeds. But out of their entire collection, you could probably pick just one variety of each shape and color, and everything else is essentially just old heirloom varieties repackaged with brand new names.

On 2/4/2017 at 12:56 PM, Radomila said:
I wonder, are “Gusynya” (The Goose, bred by Medvedev) and “Goose Egg” actually the exact same variety?

That exact thought crossed my mind too, knowing Valery’s love for short names (as the old joke goes, a name should be short like a gunshot, otherwise you’ll have no time left to relax 😁).

I grew Medvedev’s Gusynya (The Goose) this season, it’s a serious tomato.

It gave me 18 lbs (8.15 kg) out in the open ground! And that’s considering that it’s a true indeterminate, yet I shoved it under a low 3.3 ft (1 m) rain shelter.

The largest “egg” weighed in at 21.6 oz (613 g).

On 10/25/2019 at 1:32 PM, grawicapa said:
It gave me 18 lbs (8.15 kg) out in the open ground! And that’s considering that it’s a true indeterminate, yet I shoved it under a low 3.3 ft (1 m) rain shelter.
The largest “egg” weighed in at 21.6 oz (613 g).

Wow, what a result! Mine only pumped out one good first truss. But honestly, I always struggle the very first year I grow Medvedev’s seeds. If I grow them a second year, they do great. I kept seeds for The Goose to repeat it. But I grew The Goose and Goose Egg side-by-side in the same year. The fruits and the bushes were absolutely identical, one-to-one. They even gave the exact same poor yield for me.

In your photo, which truss is that, and how did it set fruit — did it drop any blossoms?

Edited January 4, 2020 by Drosera

On 10/25/2019 at 5:52 PM, Radomila said:
In your photo, which truss is that, and how did it set fruit — did it drop any blossoms?

The thing is, the variety ran out of room under the high part of my shelter, and under the low part, I had to let it grow out into 6 stems just to curb its crazy vigor!

With that pruning method, the bush stayed around 4 ft (1.2 m) tall.

There was only one massive truss like that, the second one up (on either the main leader or the primary sucker, I can’t remember now).

Here is an overall shot of the bush from July 15th.

And I didn’t have to worry about dropped blossoms at all — that 18 lbs (8.15 kg) yield was spread across 41 fruits, how much more could I ask for?

On 10/25/2019 at 6:46 PM, grawicapa said:
The thing is, the variety ran out of room under the high part of my shelter, and under the low part, I had to let it grow out into 6 stems just to curb its crazy vigor!

It turned into a literal tree! Good idea. 📝