Tomatoes don't Grow in Trees

12 years ago

If they did, I might be in trouble.

Color vision is important to us, anthropologists tell us, because it helped our food gathering ancestors to locate food. If you are going to climb a tree, it would save you quite a lot to know if the fruit up there is ripe or not without doing any climbing to find out!

No, my tomato plants are quite small this year but the fruit is of different colors and there are LOTS of plants. I have never had so many tomato plants! Now that there is ripe fruit developing on every one, I'm having a few problems! One is slugs (!) so with reluctance, I'm harvesting fruit when if first develops a blush. With 85+ plants this year ( so cool! ), everything has to go in buckets where it is difficult to keep them separate. As a result, I'm having trouble with colors.

I have learned by experience and reading that flavor is greatly a result of pigmentation. If other things are equal, there will be quite a lot of difference between the taste of a yellow tomato and one that is red. In fact, there is a difference between a pink or an orange tomato and a red one. This is a delight :o)! It is also trouble for someone who doesn't see colors all that well.

So, the tomatoes are mostly green coming out of my garden. They quickly begin to ripen in my kitchen. But, some red tomatoes go thru stages of orange or pink on their way to becoming red! And, I've got orange- and pink-when-ripe varieties!

I have serious trouble with the fruits that are orange when ripe. Too many of the varieties I have, go thru an orange stage before turning red. I lose my Kellogg's Breakfast and Woodle's Orange in with the others!!!

Really throwing me is a variety (Dagma's Perfection) which came on with quite a few fruit these last few weeks. Problem is, the ripe fruit is a very, very light yellow! I guess you could call it chartreuse! I've allowed 1 to nearly over-ripen thinking it was still green.

Knowing that this is a deeply-sympathetic audience . . . I came here to share my troubles.

Steve

Comments (3)

david52 Zone 6
12 years ago
I think we've discussed bar coding under-ripe tomatoes before......

I've got chipmunk issues this year, along with something that eats a smaller-than-a-dime, shallow hole in the ripe fruit. They're not touching the ground, so I don't think its slugs, but I have no idea what it is.

The chipmunks will return and eat on the same fruit, so I just leave a few out there for them to dine on over the week.

As usual, the plant labels have all disappeared and that map of what was planted where became irrelevant with early disease problems and replacing plants. I can recognize most of my tomatoes this year because of size and shape - a new variety for me this year is 'Basket V" which is a very productive semi-determinate - all the fruit have a distinct pointed end. Then we have Thessaloniki, distinctly round and within a size range, and then the Cherokee Purple/Pruden's Purple cross is larger and comes with stripes. Then an ox-heart.

My ox heart comparison, where I was to try 4 different varieties, didn't work out this year, what with all but two plants of 'Kosovo' died in the early June windstorm/virus onslaught
digit
Original Author
12 years ago
Bar Codes!

I shoulda remembered to do that!!?

digitS'
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billie_ladybug
12 years ago
Feeling the pain. I have grasshoppers eating the ripe tomatoes. They have only gotten a few, but still...
Then there are the three purple hornworms I found, yes purple.
Then of course, some of the tomatoes I got at the swap I love, but have no idea what they really are. I know the pear shaped red is not black Krim which is what it was labeled. Then there is the one that I really am liking that is must be a sauce tomato, but had no label. I am resorting to saving the seeds and hoping I might be able to come up with the name later.
Then, of course, I am looking at all the tomatoes that are not even coming close to blushing and wondering if they will beat the first frost. Maybe I should try playing the blue collar comedy for them. If that doesn't get them to blush, I guess I will have lots of green tomato relish.

Billie