16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes

Harvest time !
As of now I have picked 3 BK maters. This has been a long wait since I planted it in late May. That is over 90 days. But it was worth it. I will plant one next season too.

I pick mine real early, ie at color break and let it ripen on the counter. The green shoulders will get smaller if you let it stand longer. But it is just as tasty (except the woody part around the stem)
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Edition: 9/15/13
today I picked few more. Not fully ripe thou. they are catching ups fast now.

This post was edited by seysonn on Sun, Sep 15, 13 at 5:07

My Black Krim was very bland tasting. Super Beefstake, grow in the same area, were delicious and had twice the number of tomatoes. Others are reporting success with Black Krim so I'm encouraged to try them one more time next year.

My season is at least a month behind. I have not had one Brandywine, although I have certainly tasted them in the past, and I have yet to get to taste the large green fruit on my Linnies Oxheart or Fish Lake Oxheart plants. I have never tried those, this is my first year growing them. I have my first small Wes ripening on the counter, none tasted this year but I have in past years. I have had tomatoes from Sophies Choice, KB, Orange Minsk, Estlers Mortgage Lifter and Cherokee Purple Heart this year.

Linnie's Oxheart was reported by Victory Seeds as being 97 days from plant out to maturity. That would be the latest that I have ever planted.

This post was edited by sue_ct on Tue, Oct 1, 13 at 22:37

BRANDYWINE.... scrapped, scratched , terminated and zapped for ever. LOL

I found it a little surprising as well. All we hear about is how cold the weather is for tomatoes but never that its too warm.

I've grow tomatoes before but outside in the garden. They didn't get much love and if I got a good crop it is a nice surprise. Growing them in a greenhouse for the first time this year was... educational. :) By the end of the summer my husband was saying "hot is good!" and I was saying "NO, it needs to be cooler!"

Something else you might be interested to know is that high temperatures also affect pollination. So you know those warms summers where we all expect to get tons of tomatoes and then they set fruit late??? Its because its TOO warm. lol Apparently the "viability" of tomato pollen greatly depreciates if not turning sterile in temperatures of 90F (32C). Go figure!!!

Tomatoes thrive best in a given range of temperature. It partially depend on the cultivars too. It is a know FACT that most tomatoes shut down at extreme heat (over 90F).
I thin the optimum temp range is 70F to 85F.

Tomato plants are pretty cold hardy. I have experimented them to endure lows down to 38F. So the mature plant will be the same.

But the question of ripening the fruits is another issue. In my guesstimation, Both growth and ripening will be dramatically slowed down and the fruits will be more on the dry side.

Initially is was said that fermentation removed the gel capsules on the seeds, and it does, and also with the help of enzymes from the fungi in the fungal mat that you let form frees the seed from tomato tissue,, and it does, and it was also said that it inactivated any seed borne viruses, and that is wrong since all viruses to date have been found to be in the endosperm of the seed and fermentation can only address pathogens on the seed coat.

And it does, in terms of eliminating most of the tomato foliage pathogens as well as some systemic ones. And this we know from the work of Dr. Helene Dillard which I've posted here several times.

I will only use fermentation to process seeds, not any of the oxidative methods b'c there's no data to confirm what the oxidative methods can do although many have searched for such data.

There are a couple of good places to go to about how to do fermentation correctly. One is at Tania's T-base site and another is at Victory Seeds,

Carolyn

Advantage of fermentation Method:

In the conventional method you cannot separate the good , viable seeds from the worthless one. Because of the gel around it.

But when fermented, the seeds are freed from the gel. So when you process the product of fermentation in a tall cup/glass( by adding water and stirring) the viable seeds would sink to the bottom. So by pouring about half of the water, the particles and the bad seeds are discarded. You keep doing this several times and end up with a bunch of heavy viable seeds at the bottom of the cup.

The advantage is that there is a leas chance that any of those seeds will no germinate.

I have seen a little of that before on grocery store purchased tomatoes - but I dont know what causes it. I would think they would be fine for sauce.

This is calllus tissue which represents undifferentiated and immature cells . I am not sure of the conditions that favor this in a garden environment. In the laboratory, one produce callus tissue by manipulating nutrients and phytochemicals in growth media for the purpose of micropropagation and breeding experiments.

Someone asked which variety the farmers had at the farmers market. I asked today and the answer was Carolina Golden. They taste delicious, but I will not be growing them because they are a determinate variety and I have a string preference for indeterminates. The Carolina Golden is also a hybrid, and I usually prefer heirlooms even though I do grow hybrids from time to time. :)

Off the top of my head here's some faves in the Orange/Gold/Yellow group.

Aunt Gertie's Gold

Orange Minsk and also the heart version

Earl of Edgecombe

Jaune Flammee

Kellogg's Breakfast and its PL version KBX

Lillian's Yellow Heirloom,clear epidermis so ripens up yellow.

Yellow Brandywine (PLatfoot strain)

All are large fruited indeterminates.

Hope that helps and can pick my fave three, I think,if asked, that have done wonderfully for me in my zone 5 having been grown several times each.

Carolyn

Thirsty dirt

I agree with the fact that a foliar spray of epsom salts can and will help with the absorption of Calcium. Will a foliar spray of epsom salts lower your PH not likely. You would have to apply pounds of epsom salts to the soil to get enough sulfur to lower the PH. So if you mix 1 tablespoon of epsom salts with a gallon of water and spray this on your plant how is this going to lower your PH. Remember when you foliar spray a plant you mist it on the tops and bottoms of the leaves to the point of drip. I think a product that contains both a chelated calcium and chelated magnesium would be a better choice than epsom salts.
Tim

It seems that whether its a calcium or potassium deficiency, it always seems to be made worse by inconsistent water and temperatures...

Since this first tomato with BER I've been very careful of my watering practices and have only found 2 more with BER - and ironically it was after we were gone for two days and the plants weren't watered.

After returning the a regular watering schedule we haven't seem any more with BER.... and they are all starting to ripen nicely. :)

When the season is done I'll have to test the soil and see if its low, or high, in anything.

Thanks for the help.

This is a neat video

http://www.albionplantnutrition.com/plant-nutrition/efficacy/#video

Unckle Dunkle and Growneat Corporation !!!

I have a Black Krim and am getting ripe fruits from it, right now.

The size, shape and color of those in your top picture matches better than 90% to what I got, BLACK KRIM. It is likely that it has bee mislabeling or accidental tag switch.

Thank you all so much! My black krim plant was picked over by a gardening buddy and I didn't get to see how they looked!! I must have planted one out of order :)

I really appreciate all of your feedback! Thank you!

I consider Rutgers a good all-purpose tomato -- fine for fresh eating as well as for processing. Fruits will vary in size from small to fairly large. It is good tasting and quite blemish free.

Jim

If I only had a choice of the three, I would pick Rutgers. I don't grow romas, but I have heard they are very susceptible to blossom end rot, and I've never heard anything good about Tigerella. I grew Rutgers for the first time this year and it is a decent tasting tomato - mine weren't very large. Maybe next year I'll give it a better spot and its real potential can show.

Carolyn, thank you much!!!! Yes, I would LOVE to hear varieties that you think are better alternatives! I am mostly going off the Tatiana list because I like her judgement on varieties that I grew as well and Tatiana lists many as excellent ones. I am sure it is all about trial and error and personal taste but suggestions do help.

Not sure why system double posts.
Wanted to add also that what I have been doing is growing varieties and giving them to people at plant swap as what I want to grow so often they will be trial for me as well. I think I might concentrate on growing heirlooms to give away the ones that are trusted and I know they did well for me so I can share my experience as well. And then I will trial for myself other ones that I think might be fun to grow. For example I really like Marianne peace but for 2 years in a row it was the last variety to ripen in my garden. Terrific taste but fruits ripens mid Sep. I might grow it myself and use WOW and early planting but probably not a good plant to offer to others here in my area.

This post was edited by lindalana on Sat, Sep 14, 13 at 21:10

so theoretically if I plant one seedling into deeper and larger container right away it will do better than seedling transplanted several times from one size container to another?

Sweet 100s are a hybrid. This means that the seeds of a Sweet 100 plant will recombine from their hybrid parents and "re-assort" in many different and unpredictable ways. Perhaps many many Sweet 100 seeds stared out, but perhaps the only ones that survived were those that had re-assorted to be most adapted to your particular (difficult) growing conditions. So they produced good, healthy plants. This SOMETIMES happens with Volunteer tomatoes. I know people who insist that all volunteers are crap, and they rip them out at the first sign of growth Others insist that the volunteers are sometimes the best and strongest plants in their garden. Due to genetic chance, both things might happen. If you have a plant you like, be sure to save some of the seeds from it, and try to grow them next year. And hope that it is stable enough that it continues to do well, AND to taste good.