16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes

Sorry for double post but here is the evidence of them birds. I taped a few hours of it but this video is only about 17 minutes long. The sound is kind of dull because my GoPro camera had the the full housing on it.
Sorry for lack of music and sound but thought it was interesting when I placed them CD's up and awaiting the bird netting ect... The camera was rolling with out anyone on it, just placed next to one of my other plants for a few hours.
Thanks again all,
- Mr Beno
Here is a link that might be useful: Watch them birds fly near my garden
This post was edited by thebutcher on Sun, Aug 25, 13 at 19:30

No luck this time but this can be a good thing. The battery cut out after 40 min and no birds, it should of lasted for about 2 hours but I forgot to charge it all the way. Anyway I made this out of a red cup with ductape and put my trusty old Gopro up. I was trying to think that the birds would fly around the red cup
Tomorrow I will do the other direction and make it spin more. Knock on wood though no new pecks in the new maters I pulled off today, so maybe those CD's are really helping a lot? lol
Edit: on Bird net, I jut got it today and will do it in a few days for added protection. So now I got the water pan out, CD's reflecting and gona try to find that reflective tape as well.

This post was edited by thebutcher on Thu, Aug 29, 13 at 19:07

Joe, mine are pretty much goners as we had so much rain in the last month it was impossible to keep up with spraying. And now we are away for a week. Would like to hear how this milk treatment does for you. I had not heard of spraying with a milk solution.
Jennie

Update: Returned home today. I am almost positive this is Septoria Leaf Spot as the dark spots have grey centers and the fruit are unaffected. If it were bacterial Spot the fruit would be affected. And the hybrids finally succumbed to it also. I have quit spraying as it is too far gone, but I am not pulling the plants yet hoping some of the green tomatoes start to blush. I can't complain, I have had the best year in five years! We froze, ate, gave away and still couldn't keep up with the production. First year doing containers and I am a convert!
Jennie

I can't tell you about the 90+ heat as Bonnie claims. We have barely been in to the 90's a few days this year. We are usually having 100+ heat in July and August.
A lot of nights have dipped in to the mid 50's and it has been cloudy and/or raining almost all day every day.
It was planted later than my other tomatoes and has just gotten started fruit wise. The plant is still small, only 2' tall.
It is a thicker skinned fruit, but I don't mind that, more fiber! ;)
I'm just happy to get some tomatoes with some taste this year.
My tomatoes have been crappy taste wise this year.
This was like that first tomato from the garden after eating the fake tomatoes all winter from the grocery store.

If you like Phoenix, try Florida 91. It is a "sister" variety to Phoenix. We have over 250 of these plants growing and harvesting from for the late summer/early fall. I like their predictability and uniformity. We harvest after they start to blush/about half red. I know that when we do this, take inside to our storage area, they will be bright beautiful red in 1.5 to 2 days. Then they will hold at that bright red for another 3 to 5 days without any loss in quality.
We grow these plants outside and inside high tunnels and both are performing wonderfully!


Here is a picture of some Florida 91's that we had at our December Farmers Market several years ago. Most were picked at blushing to green the week before the market. They were grown in our high tunnel.

Enjoy,
Jay

All sorts of issues can cause lesions/blotches on stems besides Late Blight. No reason to just jump to the worst possible conclusion just based on that one symptom. Especially when LB is the least common of the possible causes.
Dave.


What do you think about the Stupice and Rutgers? I am growing both for the first time. Stupice was the first one to ripen but it was sort of "meh" as far as taste goes - not sure whether I would grow them again. Rutgers have set lots of fruit but nothing ripe yet.


It is easy to get skin off.
Drop them in boiling water fir 15 seconds, take them out put in ice water . then peel them the skin will peel off real asy. I do this for cooking and sometimes for slicing. Tomato skin(thin or thick) is indigestible. So are the seeds.

Gather your browser information, OS etc and inquire at Computer Help Forum - GardenWeb. I've no problem with FF23x and Windows 7 .


My Two largest this year are Homer Fikes Yellow Oxheart and Andrew Ruhart's Jumbo Red.
HFYO top tomato 2lbs even, and several others in the 1lb 12 oz range.
ARJR top tomato 1lb 12oz, and many more at 1lb 8oz range.
Flavor TBD as I haven't eaten any of those yet.
CH



Agree with what Dave says. Also have comment with questions:
That bed they are in looks awfully small. What is the soil like about 2 feet down? I ask because I have seen sidewalk beds that have next to no dirt in them, the concrete footing from a building on one side fills most of the space. I've seen others that have the cement truck "over run" in the bottom of them.
Is there anything growing behind the fence? If there is, it could be competing with your tomato plants for nutrients. In that case you might have to feed heavier than usual for the tomatoes to benefit from it.
Also, soil tends to be compacted under sidewalks, so that bed may effectively be a container, and you might need to feed your tomato plants like they were in a container.
The plants also appear to be mighty close together.
How much sunlight do they get?
Betsy
This post was edited by bets on Mon, Aug 26, 13 at 23:01

Hang in there. I live in Texas and I'm getting serious blossom drop right now because it's so darn hot. Tomatoes like warm weather but not too warm. I've noticed when night time temps stay above 80F, they don't produce well. Also, some varieties are more heat tolerant than others. I'll bet if you stick with it for another month or two, you'll be pleasantly surprised. Blossom drop can actually be a good thing. It means that the plant will put more energy into the green foliage which means more blossoms later. Come October I bet you'll have a nice little harvest.
The yellowing on the lower half of the plant concerns me a little. Without knowing exactly how much you water and how rich the soil is, it's tough to diagnose because it could mean 1 of 3 things. Too much water, too much nitrogen or not enough nitrogen. If you're using compost, the nitrogen should be good. So I think I agree with digdirt. I think it's over watering. Tomatoes are pretty hearty and can survive well with little water. Let them dry out a little and see if that works. If that is the problem, you should notice a difference in about two weeks.
I do disagree with digdirt on the fertilizer. The top half of the plant is very healthy looking which makes me think that the NPK numbers are good. Also, too much fertilizer can cause blossom drop as well. So if it were my plant, I think I would stop fertilizing too. The compost should be plenty rich enough.
That's my two cents. Keep in mind, i'm not an expert. I'm only telling you what I would do.
Good luck


Having grown true Rostova, as I noted above, I think it's a great variety, but I havent seen anyone with true Rostova in many years.
I was curious to see what Tania said, but I kind of knew before I grabbed the link b'c we'd discussed it before .So I linked to it below and she's spot on.
Carolyn
Here is a link that might be useful: SRH


hmm, this makes me wonder what's wrong with mine. Started from seed 5 weeks ago, sprouted in two days, but now they only have two true leaves each. They're SS100s.
I did transplant them a week ago, could that have caused them to focus on the roots for now?

I wasn't aware that any of them are claiming to "prevent blights". That would seem to be a rather specious claim since the "blights" fungi are airborne. Improved rootstock would seem to have little effect on airborne diseases. Who is making that claim as I'd like to read more about it?
I do know they claim increased resistance (rather than prevention) to the soil born disease problems like the various wilts.
Dave

I've grown 2 grafted tomatoes this year and last year. I wanted to see what the difference might be. Also grafted eggplant and pepper this year. I saved seed from last year's tomatoes and they seem to be doing just as well as they did last on grafted roots.
The biggest difference was with the eggplants this year. The grafted had big fruit earlier.
Penny


TY for that info, seysonn. I'd hate to ruin them after all the work and love I've put into them.
S....actually, my Cherokee Purples have had no radial cracks at all. For me, they are a better quality fruit.