To everyone who recommended upthread that I plant Chocolate Cherry… thanks! We had our first ripe one today and wow are they great. Definitely a new favorite. Unfortunately, none of the other new tomatoes that I am trying this year have been as impressive so so far. I read a lot of rave reviews about Matt’s Wild Cherry, but it really isn’t that great.
So I majorly screwed up and planted everything too close together. I had never planted all my tomatoes in the ground in a patch before. I put them about 2.5’ apart and about 4’-5’ away from my newly planted stone fruit. In April everything looked so small and far apart
The good thing is everything is thriving. The bad new is it is an impenetrable jungle! I can barely get to the tomatoes to pick them. The plants are massive 8’+ beasts and have escaped their cages. I have tomatoes in my peach and apricot trees. The tree don’t seem to mind. They have grown a ton too and most are almost as tall as the tomatoes… even the ones on citation.
You’re welcome, glad you like them. Yes, they are very good, they’re have been our favorite for many years.
I plant mine at 4ft apart, and they are almost inpenetrable now. Just like a jungle. A lot are 5 to 7 feet tall, and are starting to fall over because they’ve grown way over their stakes.
I am somewhat disappointed with my tomatoes this year. The production is fine, it is the qualiyty of the fruit that I do not like. Only exception is 4th of July and Defiant - they are so far my best performers.
“Jetsetter” (that in my opinion is not real JS) produces large fruit, but they unevenly ripen, the taste is somewhat bland.
Paul Robson - I choose it for the promise to produce smooth black tomatoes. Instead the cat facing is very bad, inside top portion of tomato is white and hard even in ripe fruit. Bush is not healthy.
Chapman - huge tomatoes, taste is acceptable, but bush is not healthy comparing to others.
Lazy Girl - oxheart shaped , large, early, but fruit is so tender, it is going bad in a day on the counter, it is also too juicy.
Bellow on the photo is the largest Chapman I have:
Anybody try growing tomatoes over an arbor? To solve my jungle problem for next year, I was thinking of buying a few vinyl arbors like these: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0037O4AM0 and growing tomatoes up/over them on each side (still with the 5’ cages). I grow my tomatoes in my front yard, so it could look nice.
I planted two sungolds on each side of a path and they grew over the path towards each other. Unfortunately leaving only a 3’ high “walkway”, but gave me the idea that maybe I could build a tomato tunnel. Would be a be $$, but if It lasts years, it may be worth it.
Pic of a sliced up Aunt Ruby’s German Green, it is a green when ripe variety. I thought it had a nice zing, not too tart, and a bit sweet. My wife and Mom thought it was a bit bland, maybe the recent rain we had diluted it a bit. But, anyways, an interesting variety.
Those were the first tomatoes to ripen for us, even though we started germinating the seeds later than a lot of the other varieties we grew this year. They are a great tomato, it’s something that I attend on us growing for a very long time.
Some people when they think that a loquat is too sweet, they like to pick them before ripe. It’s personal preference, yet here is what I know.
"When fully ripe Naspla are glossy, have a pleasant fruity fragrance, are very juicy, easily just come off when touched, have a tiny bit of give under the fingers, have an eye at the bottom with no green color, if the eye is green then it’s not ripe, when fully ripe the fruit is somewhat rough/hairy yet smooth when hairs are rubbed off with clothes, all of which regardless of variety.
Ripe loquats tend to be a little larger and fatter than the unripe ones, and the color is darker. Loquats must be picked in bunches (individually or with a pruner), trying to remove just one from a bunch will cause the rest in the bunch to rot all of a sudden. This will prevent some fruit from being fully ripe, while others will be perfectly ripe, or over ripe. Juice is sweeter than the flesh.
Loquat trees blossom sometime during autumn or winter, and they set fruit sometime during winter, or during spring/early summer."
Oh I thought I was in the thread about loquats when I responded to that, when they are fully ripe they are usually dark purple almost black on one part of each tomato, and a red or darkish orange on the other side. Yet you can pick them before that.
My brandywines… usually crack on top…but thats ok…so big that still lots of good tasting tomato below cracks…i wonder if cracking more typical for brandywines…i know caused by uneven moisture…
I sprayed with immunox this year…seemed to keep lights and fungus under control…better than
I have been super busy and have not taken many pictures. My main tomato for me is Indian Stripe Potato leaf version. I like the tomatoes a lot and for a dark tomato grows well here. A great crop again this year. I didn’t take any photos of them. I should have they were gorgeous and ZERO BER. They pretty much are done now. A 2nd round is coming, but the first series of tomatoes have ripened. Now Girl Girl’s is starting to ripen, some ripened early and I had BER problems. A very rainy spring here. I’m going to replace Girl Girl’s with Pink Berkeley Tie-dye next year.
Yesterday I picked a bunch of our tomatoes, some are starting to rot on the vine, so I thought I’d better do something with all that fruit, you can only eat so much 'maters. Plus, it looks like some fruit had been chewed on by some critters. I hauled two pretty big clothes basketfuls, maybe 35-40lb.
The plants that made up the majority of the haul were: Pink Brandywine, Boxcar Willie, Better Boy, Jaune Flammé, Sister Miriam, Black Brandywine, Watermelon, Chocolate Cherry, and Omar’s Lebanese.
I started about noon and finished around 10:30, I ended up canning 11 quarts. I cold pack processed 7 quarts, and hot pack processed 4 quarts. A lot of work, but worth it having something to show for it.
There’s still quite a few fruit left to ripen, but the plants are starting to blight out. But, still, this is by far our most productive year, with the tomatoes tasting very good. Being relatively dry and very warm has been a boon to the plants.
Thanks, it was just a combination this year of good weather, soil and general lack of varmit predation.
I had quite a bit of BER to start the harvest season, but it hasn’t been an issue lately. The amount of rain has been about the same over the last couple months. I’ve seen this happen in previous years, so don’t why it happens early and then dissapates.
GG has done okay for us, but isn’t really productive. It produces some of the most bizzare looking fruit, I believe, than any other variety.
This is the first year we tried Better Boy, and it has done very well. Good sized round fruit and good flavor.
You growing a lot of peppers this year? Any super-hots? I have three habanero, a couple 7 pot, and one ghost pepper plants in the garden.
I did too, and usually never have it. It was rainy, we are not far apart.
Mine had a lot of BER, and Indian Stripe did not. I’m going to replace GG next year with Pink Berkeley Tie-Dye. It has even more interesting stripes, a little smaller, but a good producer. I have grown it before.
I’m growing my standard sweets that work really well here. Yellow Monster, and Spanish Mammoth . Both are late ripening but ripen quite a few.
No super hots, but one hot the Fish pepper. I like the pepper. Traditional for fish sauce (I have a recipe somewhere). It very unique, it is variegated. The peppers are green and ivory colored, and turn red when fully ripe.
I’m growing Fish for the first time, I have 3 plants in the garden. I noticed the white on some of the leaves, thought something was wrong, but found out apparently it’s normal. One plant has a few peppers on it, with the white stripes on it. Very interesting pepper, have heard a lot of good things about it, look forward to trying it.
I’m also growing jalapeño (4), sweet banana (4), Beaver Dam (2), one Corno di Torro (a red sweet banana), and a Golden Calwonder, a bell pepper. Really like BD, a nice pungent red banana.
My Ghost Pepper already has some decent sized pods on it.
