Because the snails don’t take the seeds and propagate more tomatoes. Bigger animals do. But bigger animals like nicer fruits, not slug-infested, rotten fruit. So, from the plant’s perspective, inhibit snails, encourage large foragers.
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We’ve analyzed their attack pattern sir; and there is a danger.
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Tomato plants can detect an imminent animal attack
That’s why I always dress as a zucchini before I attack a tomato.
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Nooo, selectively bred is different from GMO. Vastly. My garlic that I’ve been growing and selecting for 11 years is selectively bred, not GMO. It’s dealing now (generations later) much better with my damp, rainy climate, but I did not go in and cross dolphin genes with it to accomplish it.
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Oh, it’s GMO, all right, it’s just been ‘modified’ by selective breeding, not enzyme cutters and DNA splices. You know - cheating.
Interesting…we should exchange plant material. My garlic is… potent. It’s origins might be sunny and hot, but I don’t think it likes high-altitude sun. Maybe in your climate it wouldn’t blaze new trails through your sinuses. Even the squirrels leave it alone.
I’m curious about what would happen if you grew this in your climate. It gets called ‘bird pepper’, because only the birds can eat it.
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I will fuss about this; GMO is instant meddling. SB is having the patience to wait for the plant to decide how to navigate new terrain. I’m not adding pork skin cells to tomatoes, I’m picking the ones that survive my crappy tomato climate and giving the survivors another chance (jesus that sounds cold).
Peppers? They do ok but the really awesome ones need greenhouses and fiddling. SB also gives up after a certain fiddly border is hit. Like, maybe, avocados just won’t goddamn fruit in the PNW… 
(ETA I’m a typo bonehead)
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Also, the bird pepper is SO far away from my zone I wouldn’t bother. But awesome to have this discussion.
I do agree with you, I’m just trying ot draw you out.
The other plant boards won’t chat with me at all. They’re a bit…ummm…I can’t even describe it. I can just tell they’re always yelling at kids and dogs.
That’s why I’m curious about the peppers - in their natural climate, they’re inedible by mammals. Maybe if they’re coddled a little, they won’t be so mean.
I don’t what to tell you about avocados. Just yesterday, I was describing an ugly, unhappy lemon tree I deliberately left out to die, DIE ALREADY in a late hard freeze as looking like “…one of those avocado trees that’s just a couple of flaccid yellow sticks and one leaf.” They grow easily in Chihuahua, Mex., but they’re at least a Zone 11, even at altitude.
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Ha! So I’m in the PNW, though in my country we call it ‘south’. there/s an amazing amount of faffing about with things like citrus, in greenhouses…
I’ve also seen plants get snotty and decide to carry on. Not sure what to theorize about that, except some of us are snarky, stubborn bastards, and it may well extend to plants.
Now, d’ya want some seeds…? 
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Oops…I didn’t mean to give the impression that I live in Chihuahua, I just live in a neighborhood in Denver that’s overrun with ex-patriots from there. They all come from the same city, too.
I just scraped out and dried some guava seeds, just for giggles. Do you like cactus? They like my yard.
I didn’t think you did, but you’re dry, yeah? Not so much here. Though with the woodstove cranking all winter (read: sevenish months), hmmmmm…
I love trading seeds/starters with folks in different climates, who are actually interested in tracking over years…
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Tabloid headline: Psychic salad.
I’ve never liked tomatoes - now I know they’re playing with my mind.
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They actually mention the specific tradeoff involved in the abstract of the paper itself (since the entirety is behind the Springer paywall grumblemumblegrumble). It turns out that the plants exposed to the slime or other defense-eliciting signals grow much slower due to the investment in the defensive chemical cocktails.
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Yeah, they just skate on their good looks.
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Came here for a reference to this.
Leaving satisfied.
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We may have our danger-sensing self-ejecting tomatoes yet.
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You are Mr Pither, and I claim my £5.
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