For a Charentais, the one you're most likely to find on the seed racks in a local store or nursery might just be listed as "Charentais" and not even have an actual variety name. "Savor" is one of the more modern selections of charentais. It is a heavy producer of melons that weight about 2 lbs. in a good year. It is available on a few different websites (Johnny's Selected Seed, Willhite Seed, and Totally Tomatoes are a few that normally have it) but since you want to order from only 1 company, Swallow Tail Seeds, that won't really help you. Botanical Interests normally has "Savor" on their seed racks, but I don't know if anyone close to you has Botanical Interests seed racks in their stores in late winter and spring. Normally I see B.I. seeds in organic nurseries in Texas or in organic, upscale grocery stores like Central Market or Whole Foods. When I see those in the grocery stores, the seed racks are almost always tucked away in out-of-the-way places, like at the front of the store between the check-out counter and the exit door, so that you see them only as you're walking out of the store after paying for your groceries. (Clearly the store managers aren't gardeners or they wouldn't have the B.I. Seed Racks in such awkward places).

I find Carolina Cross to be an interesting choice for someone whose space is limited.Have you grown watermelons before? I have a large garden and I wouldn't even try to grow that one because it would take up so much space. Carolina Cross has become a favorite of people who want to grow really large watermelons (especially for Giant Watermelon contests or to enter in state fairs) but to me the flavor is only so-so, and it wouldn't be a variety I'd choose if I wanted to grow a watermelon that has good flavor. I think all the water needed to produce those huge melons tends to water down the flavor, and even if you aren't giving it lots of water in order to produce hugh melons, it still will be a fairly big, rampant vine. I mostly grow smaller melons nowadays because the big ones have vines that run all over and take up too much space intended for other types of veggies, fruits, herbs or flowers. I also find it easier to store mini watermelons on the counter or in the fridge, since most of them produce melons in the 4-8 lb.range. In the summer when we have lots of produce, there is no way I can put a 30 or 40-lb.melon in the refrigerator to chill it. I guess I could manage it if there wasn't anything much in the refrigerator, but at that time of year, there's too much other fresh produce in there at the same time. So, before you plant it.....have a plan for what you'll do with it after you harvest it.

Viva Italia grows well for me, though I haven't grown it in several years. It has good flavor and good productivity and I'd likely grow it more often if there weren't so many heirloom types that I like to grow. I first started growing Viva Italia back in the 1990s and found it more productive and better-flavored than Roma and Roma VF, which were the paste tomato transplants commonly found in stores then. I think I found Viva Italia in one nursery once, but after that year, I had to grow it from seed because the nurseries didn't have it as transplants.

For canning tomatoes, you need at least 8 cups of tomatoes for something like a batch of the GW-favorite, Annie's Salsa, and that would make 6-7 pints. The reason you don't have to have more tomatoes than that for a batch of salsa is because it also has lots of onions, green bell peppers and hot peppers in it.

For tomato sauce, you need a whole lot of tomatoes at one time to make just one canning batch. I think that the Ball Blue Book recipe for plain old tomato sauce (containing just cooked tomatoes and lemon juice) requires 45 lbs. of tomatoes. They all don't have to be paste tomatoes, though. I often mix in slicers, and sometimes even cherry types, in order to have enough pounds at one time. The Ball Blue Book sauce recipe does make a lot of tomato sauce---roughly 14 pints or 7 quarts. I'm trying to help you picture how many tomatoes it takes to make a batch because most people who are new to canning seriously underestimate how many tomatoes they need to make a standard-sized batch of salsa or tomato sauce for canning. However, you can make fresh tomato sauce in any amount and then you might choose to preserve it by freezing it, or by canning it in a small batch. Small batch canning is not necessarily efficient, but if you cannot get enough tomatoes at one time to can a full batch, then a small batch is an option. To make a smaller batch of tomato sauce, you just weigh the amount of tomatoes you have and reduce the lemon juice (which is essential for safety reasons) accordingly so the tomato-to-lemon-juice-ratio remains the same ratio that it is in the full batch requiring 45 lbs.of tomatoes.

When I want to have a big tomato-canning year, I plant a ridiculous number of plants, but that's partly because I like to can a three-year supply in one year so that the next year I focus my canning efforts on something else---usually fruit or cucumber pickle products. In terms of canning, 2012 was a huge tomato year, 2013 was a huge pickle and pepper year. I'd like for 2014 to be a huge fruit year, but Mother Nature will control whether it is or isn't. So, I'm planting a moderately large amount of tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers so I'll have something to can if Mother Nature freezes the fruit while it is on the trees in late winter or early spring and I need a backup plan.

Thanks, Dawn! I appreciate all the info! I didn't even realize that charentais was a type of melon and not the variety so that's good to know.

Good question about the Carolina Cross watermelon! I should have noted in my post that I have the seeds but don't intend to plant them. I bought them the first year I was gardening because I thought it would be cool to grow a 200 lb. watermelon for my son's birthday party... not realizing how impractical that would be in my little garden :) Good to know that its not worth it for the flavor either.

I looked at your 2014 list again and noticed that you had starred your favorites, which really helps. One that I want to try is Speckled Roman, that is going on my list for next year (or sooner if I see it anywhere). I'm so glad you mentioned Whole Foods as I had forgotten they have seeds and I need to go there again soon anyway.

Thank you for sharing your experiences with Viva Italia. I was intrigued by how the website described the plants as being more compact than other paste types, and says that they are more heat tolerant also. Has that been your experience as well? Or did I fall victim to seed catalog hype again? :)

You brought up such a good point about the amount of tomatoes needed at one time for canning. I have never canned before and I didn't really think that part through. Somebody on here (I think it might have been you?) mentioned that you can just freeze whole tomatoes as you harvest them and can them later. I need to go back and find that post - I'm pretty sure I clipped it. Even so, I need to plant more than the seven plants I had last year for sure. How far apart do you space your tomatoes? I have a raised bed that goes all around the perimeter of the garden so that gives me 40 linear feet of bed that is two feet wide. How many tomato plants could I realistically plant in that bed do you think? And then there is the four by eight foot bed in the middle, which I was going to plant with sweet potatoes and/or melons and maybe a few okra. Might need to plant peppers there instead. I think I can get away with planting okra and some peppers in the front, as the varieties I have are compact and some appear to be quite ornamental as well. I could possibly plant the sweet potatoes out front also if I do it right - just have to make sure when I dig the potatoes that I'm not uprooting stuff I don't want to uproot. I really need more space...

Where would I find the Annie's Salsa recipe? Is that available here on the forum? I've seen it referenced before. That reminds me, I need to grow more peppers too. We love salsa.

Well, all of that has given me much to think about. Thank you very much for all the help. Probably glad I haven't started anything yet, as I really need to have a plan first.

Shelley

Hi Shelley, I think that TLC carries Botonical Interests seeds also.

Tracey

Thanks Tracey! I'll check with them again - they did say they would be getting more seeds in.

Annie's Salsa

Here is a link that might be useful: Salsa

Shelley, Viva Italia is pretty compact--reaching maybe 3 or 3.5' in height. It doesn't spread out a whole lot, so you can plant them closer together than you'd plant an indeterminate. I prefer indeterminates because tomato plants that are 6 to 8' tall generally give me a larger harvest than those that are 3' tall. It makes sense as there is twice as much plant there with the taller varieties.

Heat tolerance, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. What a person considers heat tolerant can hinge, largely, on what level of heat their area has. A hot summer in Pennsylvania, for example, is not the same thing as a hot summer in southern Oklahoma.

I have not noticed that Viva Italia is any more or less heat-tolerant than any other paste tomato. For me, paste tomatoes set fruit in hotter weather in the summer than slicers do, and since they do that, I tend to think of all pastes, as a group, as being better heat-setters than slicers and beefsteaks. I don't necessarily notice a huge difference between paste varieties in terms of which one is still setting fruit when my daytime high is 95 versus 98 versus 102, but it is clear to me that they continue setting fruit in July long after the heat and humidity have shut down most slicing types.

The spacing of tomatoes is a hugely complicated subject. I vary my spacing from year to year, depending on the variety I'm planting as well as what sort of weather I am expecting. I space them farther apart if it is going to be a wet year because they will get a lot bigger, and space them more closely if I expect a drier year. I space them farther apart if I know from experience that the variety I'm planting grows into big monster plants. I space them more closely if experience has shown me that they tolerate closer spacing. I might space them more closely in a bed that's been super-enriched that year with the addition of tons of compost, and might space them farther apart if that bed didn't get much compost lately. So, I cannot tell you how closely I space tomato plants because I vary the spacing from year to year, and even from one raised bed to another in one year.

In general, three foot spacing is fine, and four feet is better for the largest indeterminates. You can space some determinates 2' apart although 3' apart is better. Some years I want to grow too much of everything and cram plants in much more close to one another than I should. What works for one variety doesn't work for another. You just have to experiment with different spacing in different situations until you learn what works for you in your soil and with your temperature and with your moisture levels. With Tess' Land Race Currant, I don't like to plant anything within 4 or 5' on any side of it because it is a monster plant. It would be smarter to just plant it out in the middle of the yard where there's nothing within 8' of it. So, you have to know your plants and how they grow in your soil in the average year in order to determine what spacing works best for you. Closer spacing often gives you fewer fruit per plant, but if it enables you to plant more plants in the square footage you have available to you, you still might get a larger harvest overall.

I always plant 4 times as many tomato plants as I need (though never as many as I'd truly love to plant) and I plant them twice as close together as I know I should. Virtually every year I get all the tomatoes we can eat fresh, all the tomatoes I wish to can, dehydrate or freeze, and still have plenty to give away, so I won't change planting that closely....but I wouldn't necessarily recommend such close spacing to someone else because I don't know what their soil, their moisture levels, and their weather will allow. Make sense?

In a perfect world, I'd plant my indeterminate tomato plants 4' apart in rows 6' apart, but in the real world, they are lucky if I plant them in 3' apart in rows 2' apart. I'll have a two-foot pathway, then a 4 or 5-foot wide raised bed that has two rows of tomato plants, then another 2' wide path, then another raised bed. I don't even measure how far apart they are. I just eyeball it, though I've done it long enough that I can eyeball it pretty well. What works for me with the soil I have and the fertility level it has reached after 15 years of improvement might not work for someone else with different soil. So, spacing is something you have to master for yourself in your own conditions.

Because the heat tends to shut down production at some point in June or July, I try to get all my canning done in June and the first part of July, and then I can just yank out the paste tomato plants and focus on other parts of the garden. Usually by mid-July, I've 'had it up to here" (lol) with canning tomatoes and am ready to move on to making pickles or canning peppers or whatever. Some people in some parts of the country that cannot put their plants into the ground until late May or early June haven't even starting canning tomatoes yet, and there I am already done....and glad to be done. Canning in August when the high temps are 105 to 110 or even higher is not my favorite activity. I'd rather be done with all the canning before we get that hot.

Finally, the single factor that plays the greatest role in what sort of fruit set I get in any given year is simply how early I can get the tomato plants into the ground. My average last frost date is March 28 but we usually have a freezing night about once a week through the first week in May. If I waited until May to put transplants into the ground, it likely would get too hot for fruitset before they even had time to flower and set fruit, so I'd have to wait until autumn to harvest tomatoes. Instead, I plant as early as I possibly can, cover up the plants with floating row cover when cold weather threatens, and do whatever I can to get those plants flowering and setting fruit before the heat sets in. This involves lots of guess work and lots of hand-wringing when April brings an Easter snow storm a month after I put tomato plants in the ground. Heat tolerance will carry you and your tomatoes only so far, but you can win the war by planting early, early, early. Gordon Graham liked to put his tomato plants in the ground two months prior to his last frost date in Edmond, and he often had to stack two WOWs on top of one another to protect his tomato plants from late freezes or frosts or snow or sleet. I have a sloping garden so WOWs don't work for me....they just topple over and roll downhill when I fill them with water. I use floating row cover instead, and in some years when early warm weather was followed by snow around Easter, I have built low tunnels of PVC pipe and 6 mm greenhouse plastic and kept the tomato plants covered by the low tunnels for almost 3 weeks. Since our weather seldom cooperates with us, we just have to work around it in order to achieve the garden harvest we want when we want it.

My best tomato year in ages was in 2012 when I was able to start putting tomato plants in the ground around March 10th. We still got really hot in June and were really dry in July and August, but the plants had set huge loads of fruit in April and May, so that I was able to just keep harvesting them pretty deeply into summer. A year with an early last freeze like that is pretty rare---maybe once a decade or, in a really good decade, maybe twice. I correctly concluded, based on the January and February weather, that I could plant in March that year and it all worked out. However, you're really just guessing when you take that sort of risk and it can just as easily not work out. If my soil temperatures and air temperatures are in the right range for the tomato plants, I'll plant early more often than not. It is the air temps and the soil temps that either allow the tomato plants to grow or not, not a specific date on a calendar, so I tend to plant when my brain tells me to, not when a calendar says it should be safe. As erratic as our weather is, I almost never do things the same way two years in a row. That is part of what makes gardening fascinating.....it is like playing chess with the weather and you have to use whatever strategy it takes to help you win the game.

Tracy, I was sort of assuming that TLC would have BI seeds, but didn't want to guess. Thanks for confirming that.

Carol, Thanks for linking the recipe.

Dawn