16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes

If you don't have any predators you could leave them. But they will ripen just fine on the counter and taste good too.

Thanks Ed, I did notoce beak marks i think, they tried to get in or it could of been caused by the sun. Anyway I pulled 2 more off and I put a "group photo" of the original one with the 2 new "Ramapo's" from today and yesterday. The original one is on the bottom right. The bright green one was a stupid mistake that I pulled off 2 weeks ago. The other small ones are the "4th of July Hybrid" that is growing in ground.

Thanks again everyone,

- Mr Beno

It has happened to me too. Once I hade similar product(Bone Meal, I think) somewhere in the garden area and the rats had finished it ..hahaha.

I'm glad to see that my dog is not the only one liking fish emulsion and other organic fertilizers. I caught her lapping up a little puddle of liquid fish before it had fully sunk into the soil of one of my container grown okra plants. I had wondered why she was sticking so close to me while I was feeding the plants-usually she's on squirrel patrol at the other end of the yard. Also glad I hadn't used any pesticides. I almost lost a dog to rat poison pellets years ago. Haven't used them since, dont want another trip to the animal emergency room! I also stopped using the liquid fish because I definitely do not want to reinforce that type of behavior.

yep, this year noted for slow stunted growth at my community gardens whereas at home patio and small patch of about dozen toms have created jungle. So go figure. I had really bad luck this year with septoria but many people did due to weather. No diseases at my home maters yay!

Good to see some neighbors here. I'm in Birmingham!

My plants are doing well, but wilting in the heat. Not the best year, but definitely not the worst. My best year is when I tilled in a lot of compost a couple of weeks prior to planting. Hugh plants and lots of huge fruit. For this year, I put the compost down last fall. I think I'll go back to the spring application. Of course, I know this weather is playing a roll.

Carolyn, I googled Variegated Tomatoes and found a message and pictures at bambooweb.info from someone who found a Cherokee Purple with some variegation. Of course it may have been a one-time fluke. Don't know.

Richard

Richard, sadly I can't link to other message sites here, but I too did some googling and I did find that some have reported what they called varigation ofCP and there was a really great talk about how commercial growers of plants use growth retardents that can cause temporay variegation but that's temporary, not passed on.

Then I remembered that someone who got Green Zebra Cherry from a seed offer of mine also got some plants with variegation, and whatever it was saved seeds did not pass it on.so the conclusion was thatit was something environmental, perhaps herbicide drift.

Hope that helps,

Carolyn.

M fruit have just set and are hard as rocks so I'm not worried about that yet ;-)

I've got 106 tomatoes, 69 beans, 27 edamame and 49 pepper plants 1000ft from my house that I have to water by hand with gallon jugs filled from 50 gal barrel(s) hauled down in my pickup so if I can afford to wait for rain, I wait!

Depending on the RH, plants need more water at higher temperatures, just as humans do, due to perspiration. Additionally, if the bed is not adequately mulched, with moisture retaining mulch, the plants will need even more water. This issue is very well manifest itself in pot/container gardening, depending on the size, temps, location. Sometimes you have to water them twice in a day.

Sorry to bring up an old thread, but I wanted to note that I am currently growing egg yolk (bought them off of Mr. Pierce himself) and I cannot believe how hearty and prolific this thing is. I didn't get my tomato bed built in time, and my nursery bed of closely spaced tomatoes got a bit.. well.. saturated. When I was pulling them out to transplant, I found fruit had set all over the egg yolks in high 90 heat with poor air flow. I'm shocked.

I know this is an old conversation, but I grew the egg yolk tomato last year and loved it. I had tiny cherry tomatoes and tons of them. This year I bought my seeds from the same company (sustainableseed.com) and they are golf ball sized on one plant and cherry sized on the other. Either way, they still taste great. But I also noticed the size difference.

They'll do that if it's been esp. humid. Just hill up around them, the more roots the better!

I should have added that they are quite high up on the stems and not near the bottom or contacting the soil. I think the humidity factor is probably the answer, yet it only happened on the one plant in my garden and the ones in the store were all the same variety and all growing close together. Mine was pretty shaded (and probably humid) before I removed a lot of the lower leaves.

Thanks,
Linda

I would spray with whatever you can and remove any affected leaves (which helps a lot). It's generally recommended to use the fungicide as a preventative. The best you can do now is control the disease.

We're moving into the middle of the season now and even if you have some problems you should still get a decent crop. The plants might look unsightly, but the fruit should still be good. Some people feel that disease is just part of the growing process and don't treat with anything, but are consoled with some nice tomatoes regardless.

springbound I feel your pain! The community garden experience is quite different from doing it at home. I am hoping you do not get it. I would definitely spray with whatever your community garden allows so you don't end up like me. I think it is a good sign that none of them have it yet.
monet_g you made me feel better! I will do what I can. With the exception of a big rainstorm in the beginning of summer, it hasn't been a rainy season so I've got that going for me. All my plants are flowering and there are baby tomatoes. So I will just keep it up. Thanks again!

The amount of worm castings you use really depends on the "recipe" you use to make compost tea.

I've seen recipes with as little as 1/2 cup to 2 cups. I have about 8 different recipes tucked into my Evernote notebook. If you list what you plan to put in your tea based on ingredients you have on hand, I can find the correct proportions per any given recipe. Just let me know.

Just FYI, I've learned that gardening has a ton of variables so you have to find what works for you. Guidelines are just that - guidelines not cut and dried rules.

Glad to hear you were able to salvage the damaged fruit.

My plants are watered from the bottom through a wicking system I built into each bucket. So basically the plant shouldn't get over or under watered because it takes only the water it needs. However with my roma tomato containers I did not put wood chips on top of the soil like I did with my other plants so the water evaporated through the top and the soil started to dry out. This system works great for my other plants. I add water to the bottom of the container as needed and the plant does the rest.

Just went out and looked at my plants. They all have new tomatoes on the top of them that weren't there last night. The leaves are not quite as wilted and I think they are starting to come back. I pulled about 10 more smaller rotted tomatoes off and plan on trimming some dead leaves off later. The weather has cooled down a bit and we might even get some rain here finally (then I can fill my rain barrels again). I think there might be some hope of getting some ripe tomatoes off these plants if I keep up on my watering.