Quick Summary of Zolotaya Klusha
📌 Quick Summary (TL;DR): Zolotaya Klusha
- 🌍 Origin: A commercial Siberian variety developed by the SibSad (Siberian Garden) seed company. The name translates roughly to “Golden Broody Hen”.
- 🌿 Plant Habit: A very compact, sturdy determinate bush (dwarf type). It rarely exceeds 2 ft (60 cm) in height, making it an absolutely perfect candidate for growing in pots, containers, or small patio spaces. Very low maintenance.
- 🍅 Fruit Characteristics: Bright yellow-gold, round fruits weighing between 3.5 and 7 oz (100-200 g). They have a good, thick skin which makes them crack-resistant and great for storage/transport.
- 👅 Flavor: Moderately juicy with a very pleasant, sweet-leaning flavor profile. Excellent for early fresh eating.
I got my seeds from SibSad. This compact tomato finally started setting fruit recently. We planted the seedlings outdoors very late because of the coronavirus quarantine, so they got a bit leggy. The tomatoes aren’t ripe yet. I’ll post an update later, assuming late blight doesn’t wipe them out before I can taste at least one of them.
Vladimir, it sucks that you had such a rough start with this variety. It’s a shame.
I’m also growing Zolotaya Klusha this year. Testing it out in the north of the Leningrad region, outdoors in the open ground.
Yeah, a lot of things didn’t go according to plan this year. However, my plant set fruit really well, and they are getting ready to ripen. The weather is really letting us down, though.
It’s a compact little tomato, up to 2 ft (60 cm) tall. You can easily grow it in containers.
We didn’t prep for a photo shoot 😁 but right now the bush looks like this.
Raduga wrote:
Vladimir, it sucks that you had such a rough start with this variety. It’s a shame.
Well, on top of everything else, we didn’t even prep the soil. I planned to dig in a lot of compost before planting, but then the quarantine hit, and our native soil is really poor for tomatoes. I plan to bring in some composted horse manure for the greenhouses next year, but honestly, right now finishing the well, the septic tank, the outdoor shower, and the house itself are taking priority. There probably won’t even be any money left for manure. Sure, we make some of our own compost, but it’s a laughably small amount. But honestly, if it managed to produce tomatoes under these harsh conditions, it definitely passed my stress test.
Here is what Zolotaya Klusha looks like.
This is with very minimal care. The fruits are between 3.5 and 7 oz (100 to 200 g), moderately juicy with sweetness definitely dominating the flavor. They hold up very well to transport without bruising.
I am also growing Zolotaya Klusha this year. This is what the bush looks like right now, we already picked the bottom 3 ripe tomatoes. I started my seeds on April 20th, which I think was a bit too late. I should have sown them about 10 days earlier, the plant has really good potential.
Zolotaya Klusha. I just bought a tiny seedling growing in a little 1.7 fl oz (50 ml) cup. I just needed one more plant to round out my numbers for the garden. I honestly expected absolutely nothing from it, but the variety turned out to have massive potential. Out in the open ground, it was one of the very first ones to start ripening.
If you’re wondering about the quirky name, “Klusha” is a colloquial Russian word for a broody mother hen that sits low to the ground to protect her chicks. The SibSad seed company has an entire line of these tomatoes (including Klusha, Zolotaya Klusha, and Superklusha). They were given this name because the bushes stay very short, squat, and incredibly dense, hiding a massive clutch of tomatoes underneath their canopy of leaves, just like a mother hen hiding her chicks!
