16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes

I have posted in several places this year that Fouth of July Hybrid came through our Summer, fruiting. My plant is Still alive under my patio cover, and still putting out fruit. My heat would have been at least as bad as yours, likely worse.

I'm trying Super Sioux this year. Cannot report results yet but it's advertised as heat tolerant and this variety is mentioned a few times in the link provided above by digdirt. I could send you a few seeds to try if you like. email me with your address if you are interested.

This post was edited by marymcp on Fri, Jan 4, 13 at 7:55

I guess it is also called 1/4" galvanized aircraft cable. 7x19 construction. The breaking strength on this cable is 7,000 pounds.

As to your original question, yes, if you want to do all the required pruning then growing tomato plants up a string (regardless of the wire used to hold the strings) is a fairly common method. All that pruning to a single stem costs you production of course but some prefer the ease of access and appearance over production.

As for planting things underneath the plants - that all depends on the tomato plant spacing you use. Often string growers use that method so they can plant more plants in a confined space, often as close as 16-18" apart. Consequently there isn't room to plant anything under the plants.

If you are going to use 3-4' spacing then there would be room for inter-planting but keep in mind the different nutrient and water needs of many of the plants you list. Anything you plant in between will be competing with the tomatoes for sunlight, water and nutrients - when those needs are so different neither crop does well.

Best results is to have a tomato area and a separate areas for each of the other crops. That way you can deal with each crop's individual nutrient and water needs, planting times, harvesting times, and needed sun exposure.

Dave

Agree with CTed. A soil test is in order to include PH. If your friend is going to use tomato transplants again next year
tell her to dust the roots with endomycorrhiza prior to planting. The Myco's will unlock the unavailable phosphorus that already exists in the soil and make it available to the plant and will also help the plant during drought conditions. Ami

I think the soil is the problem. A soil test would be good but I think it may be the texture of your soil that makes you more successful. I haul in rotted cow manure and hay every year and it doesn't make the nitrogen too high. What kind of manure was it? Cow manure would be OK if it didn't have herbicide in it. Horse manure often comes with with wood chips which I don't think are good. Chicken manure would be high in nitrogen.

Heather,
I received mine this weekend. Thank you so much for another great assortment of seeds!
Alana

Heather, I'm so sorry but I realized that I forgot to post that I received my seeds (around December 18th)! I thought I had posted, but must have gotten side-tracked with something else....Thank you so much for the awesome assortment! As always, you do a fabulous job. Thank you for doing the swap.

Oh no!!! I totally was obsessed with wanting to try OM tomatoes last season so I completely thought that was what I was growing this season.

I actually travelled to the US for a couple of months starting at the end of September so I had the housemaids plant the seeds for me. I thought it was an OM seed packet I gave them.

I looked at my old thread asking about the OM flowering early and the leaves are completely different.

http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/tomato/msg0307191831074.html

I just went through all of my tomato seeds and one that is missing is Brandywine Sudduth so it could possibly be that variety. But I am not sure so I guess this will be a surprise tomato plant for me!

carolyn137 he he he in fact you are the one that gave me advice in that previous thread :D

I am sad it's not OM now... but I guess I had a good reason for giving the house maids a different variety seed packet... I just don't remember why LOL

Gunnar was so correct in that my former computer scorched a transitor. My computer man, and friend, told me last Fall that that might happen and I ignored him.

So here I am with a new computer and it's so different in many ways, but I'm learning.

Gunnar is quite correct that I introduced all three to the SSE Yearbooks.

Joe Bratka had found seeds in glass jars, already named, as bred by his father, couldn't germinate them and sent them to me to try.

I was able to revive;

Box Car Willie
Red Barn
Great Divide
Mule Team
Pasture, a red cherry

There's not that much difference between Mule Team and Box Car Willie as grown by me and I think Red Barn has been overlooked and might be the best tasting and performing of all of them listed above.

Seeds for Indian Stripe were sent to me by a good friend from TX who found the fruits in a garden of a neighbor of her relatives whom she was visiting when in Arkansas.

For all the history you can get it at Tania's wonderful data base. There are many now who prefer IS to Cherokee Purple and Craig LeHoullier, who named CP, agrees with me that IS is probably related to CP in some way.

Su much so that there's a PL version of CP,actually three of them, and a PL version of IS, and now a heart versions of both. I'll be offering the IS heart one very soon and the heart version of CP will also be along soon,I didn'thave a hand in that one but do know of it.

It's hard for me to select just one from that list so why not grow just one of them this next season, then, well you know what I'm suggesting.

I think I'd start with IS, then Red barn, then Box Car Willie and if you have the room all three in one season.

Hope that helps,

Carolyn

Cool! I have grown both Red Barn and Box Car Willie, and would grow both again (with a slight nod to Red Barn I think if push came to shove.) Now, apparently, I need to give this Indian Stripe variety a try. It's been a while since I grew something entirely new, so I'm pretty excited to give it a try.

Juglone will severely stunt or even kill tomatoes. They are more seriously impacted than most other plants. I was not able to grow tomatoes any closer than 50 feet from black walnut trees in my yard. I now grow all my tomatoes in 25-gallon containers, and I had a very good year in Southwest Ohio in spite of the heat and drought.

If your tomato plants appeared full size and healthy, they probably were not affected by juglone. If they were stunted and sickly, juglone could be the culprit.

2011 and 2012 my tomatoes did very well. Makes me uneasy thinking of 2013 as three in a row seems too much to hope for. The really wet summers are my enemy as my clay soil will not drain and only grows weeds. I am building a smaller area tho of looser soil in another area. I had a Chapman, an orange Burpee and 4 Cherokee Purples there last summer that did well even with less sun than the big garden. I have been able to amend the soil there as it is a much smaller area.

I am a huge fan of the FW and did seem to have more sunscald this year, but I think it would have occurred with any trellis system. 2012 was a bad tomato year for me.

Normally, my FW creates a tomato hedge, with good foliage cover.

I grew in 2 locations this year, one florida weave, one regular. I had a bit of sunscald on the regular ones, but none on the FW. Perhaps not surprisingly, the biggest difference was sun exposure - the FW plants had 6-7 hours a day, the regular 10+.

Well Bart, you are two zones warmer than me. My dwarf tomatoes are germinated. I plant them in 16" clear beer cups with lots of holes in the bottom. I only put 2" of soil in them when I put the seeds in then as they grow I add soil. This way the cup is filled with roots when it is time to transplant into pots.

So, I will try - if I get no tomatoes, I will have large plants to plant out in the spring.

You answerered your own Q with this last post. Starting seed now will basically give you a month lead over my starting date for greenhouse planting. By early March you might have plenty of light depending on your setting. However you will get lanky plants in the meantime without supplemental light. Either way you are very optimistic about Winter fruit. Early Spring picking is more realistic.