Zolotaya Rybka (Golden Fishie) Tomato Review

Description from the seed packet: Mid-late (111-120 days) variety for hoop houses and open ground (in southern regions). Indeterminate plant, 6-6.5 feet (1.8-2 m) tall. Requires suckering and staking. The fruits are uniform, cylindrical with a “nose”, bright yellow-orange, weighing up to 3-4 oz (90-120 g), with firm, meaty flesh and high beta-carotene content. Excellent flavor qualities. Valued for: resistance to adverse weather conditions, abundant and prolonged fruiting, original fruit shape. Recommended for fresh eating and whole-fruit canning.

Can anyone add to this description based on their own growing experience? I have a packet of seeds and I’m debating whether to plant it.

I absolutely loved this variety! Out of all the yellow icicle/paste types I’ve grown—Golden Rain (Zolotoy Dozhd), Golden Canary, and this one—I would choose the Fish! Both for fresh eating and for canning. Grew it in 2013, I’ll have to dig through my garden journal for the photos.

Is it a heavier yielder than Canary? Because I can’t decide between the two of them yet.

Elena, it was a very heavy yielder for me, but it grew in the greenhouse and kept fruiting right into October when I had already ripped most of the other plants out. I can’t really compare it fairly to Golden Canary because that one grew outdoors in the dirt. Canary yielded great too, just less overall volume, and taste-wise it lost out to the Fish!

Is it really closer to a late-season variety in terms of maturity?

Lenochka, the Fish really is quite late, which is exactly why it kept fruiting until October. It definitely does better in a greenhouse, whereas my Canary ripened almost completely outdoors in the dirt!

Anzhel, it is late, but man is this Fish tasty 🙂

Quote from elena1984: …Ninulechka, when is the best time to start seeds for it???

Lena, start it a bit earlier than usual. I sowed it at the end of February, while my normal seed starting date is after March 8th 😂

I’ll throw my two cents in. This is my absolute favorite – it’s the only variety that makes the cut for my garden every single year. I planted Golden Canary this year too. I like Golden Fish much better. Golden Canary seemed a bit too dry to me.

I always grow the Fish to two stems, and I pinch off every sucker up to eye level. Even then, it manages to push out a bunch of new suckers right under the greenhouse roof and sets a sea of fruit. This year I came to the conclusion that you can easily grow it to 3 or 4 stems. I also planted it outdoors in the dirt to two stems, but I topped the growing tips after the fourth truss. Almost the entire harvest ripened on the vine.

Here are photos from 2013. The last one is from September 27, 2013. It was the only variety left in the greenhouse, and we had already had frosts by then. The bush was completely beat up by leaf mold, and it just didn’t care at all.

I just want to highlight how exceptionally sweet it is. Throwing just one of these little tomatoes into a salad really elevates the flavor of all the other tomatoes!

Ninulia, I really liked the fish. I sowed it at the end of February, around the 27th, and it started fruiting later than the others. But man, there was soooooo much yield on it. Even though it’s a bit late, it’s incredibly productive for canning and tastes great. Really liked the variety. Now I just need to test how it holds up in the jars.

It’s also great for dehydrating, though it does get incredibly sweet once it’s dried.

I planted Golden Fish too. I can’t say it was super prolific for me, but it definitely has potential because compared to some other icicle varieties I grew, it yielded better. It wasn’t particularly late for me either, but I did start the seeds in February.

I didn’t like the shoulders on it, they stayed green and wouldn’t ripen properly on the bush or indoors on the counter. The flavor of the fruits themselves is great both fresh and canned, but those green shoulders turned out tough. Might repeat it again, maybe the summer will be warmer next time. Grew it in the greenhouse.

Really loved this variety! I bought the seeds late and sowed them at the end of March, so the harvest was much smaller than I would have liked. This season I’ll sow it earlier, I really loved the taste of the tomato.

Good time of day to everyone. My mom grew Golden Fish.

I agree, Golden Fish is a fantastic little tomato!

I saw photos of a RED Golden Fish 😲 😲 😲

Does that actually exist?

Mine was shaped like a spindle, about 4-4.7 inches (10-12 cm) long, thin, light yellow, and tasty, but not very prolific.

Quote from Galina Vasilievna: I saw photos of a RED Golden Fish 😲 😲 😲 Does that actually exist?

The “Red Golden Fish” is a family heirloom variety from Igor Pechurin. Seeds from him made their way onto the forum, so the name is basically just a placeholder nickname. The shape of the fruit looks just like the fish.

My Golden Fish was very prolific and sweet. It grew in open ground right up until October. During the summer it got hit with Blossom End Rot, but I was away for a month and there was a massive heatwave… The kids loved them for their sweetness, they actively hunted down these little icicles and ate them by the handful.

We’ve been planting Golden Fish for three years straight now. And we will keep planting it.

It usually grows right up to the greenhouse roof. I have to top it, which I think is a bit early because it’s still flowering and setting fruit at that time. Pruned it to 2 stems. I’ll do 3 next time.

The bush isn’t exactly frail, the stems are pretty normal. But the leaves look exactly like the tails of goldfish 😂 there is a reason it’s named that. Lacy, long, and drooping downwards. They wilt immediately in the heat.

But the most important thing – the fruits! Very tasty! Sweet, meaty, and firm. My family devours them instantly. Great in salads, great for canning.

Bright orange color, 3 to 10 fruits per truss: the later in the season, the more fruits it sets.

Quote from NatashaNN: Bright orange color, 3 to 10 fruits per truss…

Natasha, Golden Fish is definitively bright yellow! An orange one that looks like a fish sounds a lot more like Orange Icicle (Oranzhevaya Sosulka). They look similar, but they definitely differ in color and taste!

Color perception is complicated 😉 maybe I didn’t phrase it accurately, I guess you could call the color yellow-orange or deep yellow.

All the years we’ve grown it, the color has been identical, and the seeds were from different commercial packets. And it always said: Golden Fish.

Ninul, in the Gisok company’s description, the fish is listed as orange.

I grew Golden Fish for several years, really want to get back to it again. The color was a deep yellow, leaning towards orange. The leaf is lacy, long, stems are thin. I grew it outdoors in the dirt next to a chain-link fence and didn’t even need to tie it up, it just weaved itself into the fence. The taste is sweet, the fruits are firm, sugary, with thick flesh 😋

I’m torn… I wanted an “Orange Icicle” and ordered it from Hupta. But Ninulia’s post has me second-guessing…

Nina, give me some advice on which one to pick, I only have room for one bush, not two. 😞

Tanyusha, then definitely plant the Orange one – it’s sweeter. Otherwise, they are very similar in terms of bushes (tall) and trusses. The only real difference is the fruit color – the Fish is bright yellow and absolutely not orange, despite what they wrote on the previous page, while the Orange one is very orange, slightly softer than the Fish, and tastier. But I successfully canned it too.

I just don’t get one thing… why are you ordering from Hupta? I have seeds for it, even if they are from 2014 😂

Ninulia, which of those two are you planning to plant next year?

In the greenhouse, it stands out immediately because of its long, drooping leaves. Yield is decent. Taste is perfectly fine. I usually use it for canning. But come autumn, the variety just takes off and starts partying right up under the greenhouse roof right alongside De Barao Black. You have to keep pinching suckers even under the roof. I always have tomatoes late into the fall thanks to it.

What I’m seeing in the promo photo right now doesn’t look anything like the Fish I grew. Those fruits are much wider, the branches are thick, and the leaves are huge. Mine was completely lacy and delicate.

Golden Fish took up residence in my greenhouse back in 1994, and I’ve been growing it from my own fresh saved seeds ever since. My impression is that the fruits have gotten larger and they ripen earlier now, thanks to selective breeding over the years. What I especially love is that the fruits on the uppermost trusses are just as big as the ones on the bottom.

Growing the Fish for my second season, and while I was really happy with it last year, this year the variety completely failed me. And the reason was a lack of water at the garden plot. I have 5 or 6 varieties with this exact shape growing today, and Golden Fish was the absolute only one to get hit hard by Blossom End Rot. So, I’m culling it from my collection as a variety that is way too sensitive to underwatering.

For comparison, these varieties performed beautifully under the exact same drought conditions: Wessel’s Purple Pride, Domashniy Perchik, Black Icicle, Chukhloma, Scarlet Candles, Chile Verde, and Andine Cornue.

Quote from NatashaNN: …Lacy, long, and drooping downwards. They wilt immediately in the heat.

Oh! Exactly, exactly. I completely forgot about that. This just confirms what I said about its poor resistance to a lack of water. Seriously, in the heat, the growing tips on the Fish were constantly wilting, only straightening back out by the morning. The exact same thing happened to a friend of mine who I gave seedlings to, and she was the first one to notice it. Even though she had drip irrigation set up in her greenhouse from day one.

I grew Golden Fish last season and really loved the taste. Sweet, firm, and very cute little tomatoes. My Golden Fish turned out to be mid-late season, didn’t suffer from Blossom End Rot at all, and the color was a deep yellow, bordering on orange. The bush gets quite tall, I grew it to 2 stems. I think you could easily do 3. This year I planted Golden Rain, and while it definitely beats the Fish in yield, the Fish is much tastier and sweeter.