Quick Summary of Scabitha
- 🌍 Origin: An exotic novelty variety bred by Brad Gates (Wild Boar Farms, USA).
- 🌿 Plant Habit: Indeterminate (tall), reaching up to 2 meters (6.5 ft) in a greenhouse.
- 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Small, predominantly round tomatoes weighing up to 100g (3.5 oz). They are red, heavily adorned with striking gold and silver stripes and speckles. Note: The stripes are a genetic mutation that causes a slightly raised, “corky” or scab-like texture on the skin (similar to the mutation seen in Silvery Fir Tree).
- 👅 Flavor & Texture Debate: Reviews are very mixed. Some growers praise its sweet, juicy flesh with a fruity tang. However, others report that it turns excessively soft upon ripening and note that the rough, textured skin can be unpleasant to eat.
- ⏳ Maturity: Mid-season.
Scabitha (USA). A novelty! A variety from Brad Gates. Indet. The fruits are round, red, painted with golden stripes and speckles, good taste, weighing up to 100g (3.5 oz). The variety is highly productive. The bushes look very decorative.
The seed vendor (Popenko) stated they are round, but mine turned out heart-shaped.
I really liked it, yummy. Maybe a completely different variety grew for me? I need your help to identify it.
Lidia said:
The seed vendor (Popenko) stated they are round, but mine turned out heart-shaped. Maybe a completely different variety grew for me?
Beautiful variety 👍 Probably no one else has it yet 🙈. It looks a lot like Silvery Fir Tree; that one is also supposed to have oblate fruits, but they grow in all sorts of different shapes, including heart-shaped.
Mind-blowing!!! What a beauty 😛 😛 😛 😛 😛
Svetlana said:
Beautiful variety 👍 Probably no one else has it yet 🙈. It looks a lot like Silvery Fir Tree…
Svetlana, I grow Silvery Fir Tree and Fireworks, they are different.
The fruits are round, only one turned out from a mega-bloom (fused blossom), which is in the photo. During this very hot summer (2.5 months of straight heat), it became completely soft the moment it ripened; everything literally squished out as soon as you bit into it. It finished fruiting very quickly, and there haven’t been any tomatoes on the bush for a long time.
The “crust” that protrudes in stripes and dots on the skin really ruins the taste; you don’t want to swallow it, it’s better to spit it out. Because of these qualities, no one in my family wanted to eat this variety.
Aside from the exotic appearance of the fruits, the variety didn’t impress me at all. The yield is low, it overripens very quickly, and the taste is significantly worse than Silvery Fir Tree (which has a similar skin mutation).
I liked the Scabitha variety for its pure beauty. In the greenhouse, it was tall (2 meters / 6.5 ft), mid-season ripening. The fruits are small, round, red with light stripes. Very tasty, sweet, and juicy with a nice fruity tartness.
