What tomatoes will you grow in 2018?

I don’t have enough to make what I need today so I went to Amazon and found this great deal. Says the bags can also be used to bag fruit.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B078N75MG8/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

There are many choices in these bags but this was by far the best deal I found. Other Prime options were up to 15$ for 100 bags alone of the 16cm x 20cm bags.

Didn’t even know they made these.

Dax

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I used the tomato sized Jiffy peat pellets that have a type netting that expands as the peat swells. Do I need to remove that mesh prior to planting in ground or is that stuff degradable?

No need to remove it

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I can see the point of starting seeds in these. It took a few hours for me to transplant 30 tomatoes to these root pouches but they’re perfect. I would start my seeds in them from now on forward.

I mentioned other that I’m growing my buddy’s tomatoes for him this year instead of him purchasing them online, so these are 28 I potted just for him. That’s two of each variety… which is what he wanted…

I bought (2) orders from Amazon:
There’s 28 missing from the (2) stacks of the longest pouches. And (100) of the other three sizes.

The mouse trap is for reference:

I’ll just keep mind in these rootmaker cells until planting time.

Dax

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Well, I got my veggie seeds started. I put them in my 72 pod planter and got them on a heating pad for now. It’s been a busy day, I planted 4 blackberries earlier.

Anyways, here’s a list of what was planted:

Tomatoes:
Orange Kentucky beefsteak (3)
Gordost Sibiri (3)
Siberian Pink Honey (3)
Dr Wyche Yellow (3)
Chocolate Cherry (2)
Jaune Flammé (2)
Russian Queen (2)
Watermelon beefsteak (2)
Indian Stripe (2)
Girl Girl`s Weird Thing (2)
Boxcar Willie (2)
Pruden’s Purple (2)
Romeo (2)
Paul Robeson (2)
Abe Lincoln (2)
Warren’s Yellow (2)

Peppers:
Jalapeño (5)
Calwonder Bell (4)
Quadrato d’Asti Rossi (3)
Beaver Dam (3)
Conquistador (2)
Aconcagua (2)
Balloon (2)
Ancient Sweet (1)

And various herbs.

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Nice selection. Isn’t this fairly late to start seeds? You don’t anticipate having maturity issues?

Yeah, it is kinda late. But, these will be going straight into the garden when they get a few inches tall. I’m bypassing my usual transfer to cups this year, takes too much time and isn’t really necessary.

Plus, with the ground still being pretty cold, its better to wait until it warms a bit. I still need to turn my plots, so I might do that today before it rains tomorrow.

As far as maturity issues go, most of these are under 100 days, so we should have enough time for that, especially if they get planted in a few weeks.

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I don’t grow mine from seed so I get locally started tomatoes and limited to what they have.

In the garden have marglobe, lemon boy hybrid, rutgers, cherokee purple, arkansas travler, parks whopper, and bradley. My son picked a grape tomato he thought looked “cool” called bumblebee sunrise.

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I potted mine up today into 16 Oz cups. They were growing too fast and their roots were growing through the netting in the peat pellets. They seem to have a bit of transplant shock so I’ll keep them out of the sun for a while.

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I am trying a variety called Stellar, as it is supposed to be resistant to late blight, which did in all my tomatoes last year. It was so heartbreaking to see bushels of large tomatoes all suddenly rot! I just transferred the little plants into pots yesterday. The snow is melting fast in this warm weather, but not safe to plant them out until June unless one is going to be around to cover them in cold snaps…

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Looks like I ordered 12 varieties this year, I’ll plant out 10 of each variety and give the remainder away, so about 120 plants this year, that’s about average for me. I need to cut that back ! :
Siletz
Sungold
Legend
Heinz 2653
Beaverlodge 6806
Rutgers
San Marzano Gigante
Cordova
Caiman
Bobcat
Carmello
Ranger

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In less than 4 days after planting, I’m already getting about a dozen sprouts from my 'mater starts. So, I’ve got to prop open my clear greenhouse cover a bit until more come up. Nice quick germination from these seeds so far. But they’ve been on a warm and toasty mat, and it’s been quite steamy under that cover.

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I decided it didn’t pay to be a tomato snob. So I grew some from seed this year. This is what came up:

  1. Berkeley Tie Dye. East Texas taste for a cool climate beefsteak tomato. A favorite.
  2. Bloody Butcher-- not a fan, but maybe I was just unlucky.
  3. Red Siberian–A pretty productive, pretty good quality early tomato.
  4. Glacier Small plants, but very productive inch-for-inch. Tasty for an early season tomato.
  5. A salad tomato that was dirt cheap at the farmer’s market. So I figure it must be productive around here.
  6. An early season cooking tomato that I also bought at the farmer’s market.

Wife said she would buy a Stupice. For us, Stupice is valuable as a late-season tomato. It’s early, yes, but no earlier than the others mentioned. The quality of the fruit seems to start out sub-par and then steadily improve through the season. It’s the last one to quit bearing. Pretty nice to have October tomatoes here in the southern rocky mountain foothills.

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Last year I planted two different cherry tomato plants. When one went bad before I could pick it, I usually tossed it around the yard, plus a bunch just fell off into the veggie beds. One of the cherry tomatos survived our anemic winter and has been producing like gangbusters, we had fresh tomatos most of the winter. Now I have a bunch of tomato seedlings popping up. I potted a couple and gave them away and am letting a couple come up where they will. It’ll be interesting to see how they turn out.
I also bought a Black Krim seedling this year and it’s looking nice. It’ll be a nice change for us as I usually do not plant full sized tomatos.

I won’t post pictures of the greenhouse currently with about 10,000 tomato and pepper seedlings of about 300 different varieties. You will just have to imagine it.

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Yesterday, I planted a Black Krim, a Cherokee Purple, Pink Brandywine, a Better Boy, an Early Girl, and a Lemon Boy. I also got a sweet 100 cherry I’m going to grow in a pot.

This is my third year planting tomatoes and my first two years I got some tomatoes but was mostly defeated by disease in my hot and humid climate.

This year, I mulched with 2 inches of straw, and I’m going to be as diligent as I can in keeping the tomatoes off the ground. I also purchased Daconil and put it on the tomatoes immediately after I got them in the ground. I think I’m going to alternate between that and copper soap all year and see if that prevents disease. I tried to do an organic, light spray method last year, using neem and Serenade, and that didn’t seem to work. Maybe I’ll do neem this year if it hasn’t rained for a week or so, just to keep something on there, but use the Daconil or the copper soap after rains.

I also got 3 disease resistant tomatoes this year (I usually only get one or so) and am using them in between the heirlooms to help cut down on the spread of disease. They are also there to ensure I get something in case my plants still get ravaged by disease.

I’m jealous of all of you planting rare heirloom tomatoes you start from seed, but I think I need to have a year or two of good success with the ones I have before I can think of doing more.

If anyone has any tips for me, I’d love to hear them.

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The only suggestion I have is to rotate your planting plots. That will help reduce the spread of disease from pathogens overwintering in the soil.

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I expect you already know this, but one of the most important reminders I tell people growing heirlooms is water the soil not the plants. It is amazing how quickly disease can spread when water is being sprayed on the plants and splattering between them.

I have a plot in a community garden and the overly helpful gardener in the neighboring plot would be out there spraying his garden and then give mine a little shower as well just for good measure. He meant well, but the tomatoes closest to his garden started blighting before mid-season and the rest followed soon after. Only the ones that were on the far side in a separate section survived.

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After 9 days, all but 3 of my 36 toms have sprouted. Don’t know what’s up with the others, but that happens sometimes. It looks like some of those are trying to spring up, but having difficulties.

My peppers, on the other hand have only had 3 sprouts out of 24, but that’s to be expected for them I suppose.

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I have right about 30 plants that look like they have been successfully grafted. The living plants include

Sungold 4 plants
Stupice 1
Coustralee 4
Brandywine O.T.V. 4
Bear Claw 1
Aunt Ruby’s German Green 2
Omar’s Lebonese 2
Opalka 3?
Paul Robeson 3?
San Marzano 2
San Marzano Redorta 2
Stump of the World 1

This aught to be an interesting sampling of different flavors. I am just hoping the plants survive and make 'maters!
We probably won’t grow as many varieties next year, just the most productive surivors…assuming we will have some.

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