16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes
I guess I just found some of the few, good reviews, here, within the last two years as that is what I was remembering I think, and wny I ordered from the site to begin with.
I am sorry to hear of any small farmer / seed producer that is not getting good reviews. Its a tough way to make a living. But, not sorry enough to order from them again in the near future....
I think shading in the afternoon helps a lot as long as they get at least 6 to 8 hours.
I have been here since 1979.I have huge, 80'tall or more, oak trees on the west side and they shade mine in the afternoon. They get full morning sun and the plants closest to the west side do better.
Over the years, as the trees have grown, the toms have steadily improved. I have very little sun scalding any more. Back in the 80's I had a lot of sun scald.
Another thing that I changed a few years ago, I started planting the rows east to west instead of north to south so that they would shade each other and saw an instant improvement on everything in my garden. It is very hot and humid here, especially in the afternoon.
You can look for waste to help find the worm & pick it off.
The moth comes out in Spring in S.C., then lays eggs on tomato plants. The worm eats his fill in a few days & falls to the soil below , then digs in. We are blessed with a long growing here & the worm become a moth & lays eggs again in July. So I get two crops of THW, but I only got 6 worms this year. Mostly because I hand picked them, tilled in the fall to kill most of the worms in Pupae form & rotate my crops.
The wasps (2 kinds) help a lot.
Trap plants help also.
Here is a link that might be useful: Kill Tomato Horn Worm
Carolyn, It was probably a cricket that "was clicking so loud and on such a regular basis that it really got to me." I don't think that grasshoppers click. At least mine don't! LOL
As marymcp said, if you get a swarm, " Grasshoppers can eat right through your lovely garden and leave it looking like the picture from garf."
A good feral cat does wonders in the garden, mine collects bugs every day! He is a hunter. And yes, before anyone asks, he has been neutered! And he has his own little cozy house, he comes in during bad weather.
Determinates and semi-determinates are never pruned because it terminates production. So the 1 vine/2 vine/3 vines argument doesn't apply to them. That is only applicable to indeterminate varieties which grow very differently.
Pruning your plants to 1-2-3 vines will cut your production by thirds or more.
Dave
Here is a link that might be useful: FAQs - Determinate vs. Indeterminates
Mary, Sophie's Choice, which I introduced, isn't a large fruited variety, and nor is Riesentraube, which is cherry sized with a nipple at the blossom end. ( smile)
Kathy, if you do a search here at GW you'll find lots of threads asking the same question, but I'll just list a few large fruited ones that I think are dependable and great tasting.
REDS ( beefsteak)
Neves Azorean Red
Chapman
Red Penna
Milka's Red Bulgarian
Aker's West Virginia
OTV Brandywine
Cuostralee
REDS ( hearts)
Wes
German Red Strawberry
Linnie's Oxheart
Indiana Red
Fish Lake Oxheart
Reif Red heart
PINKS ( beefsteak)
Omar's Lebanese
Large Pink Bulgarian
Tidwell German
Soldacki
Terhune
Hays'
PINKS ( hearts)
Kosovo
Nicky Crain
Anna Maria's Heart
Ludmilla's Pink Heart
... and many more
it might be best to start out with the large reds and pinks for a few years and then go on to the large green when ripes, the so called blacks and gold/red bicolors and oranges.
I listed both beefsteak and heart varieties for each color b'c I find that some of the best tastes are to be found with the hearts, but maybe consider starting with the red and pink beefsteak ones first.
If you don't know the above varieties I think it would be best to go to Tania's Tomato Data base, I'll link to it below, and when on the Home page scroll down to where it says to use the alphabetical method of finding the page for a variety b'c you can do that knowing the variety names I posted above.
Each variety has traits, pictures, comments from others, histories when available and if you scroll down on any variety page you'll find the seed sites that list that variety. Tania herself sells seeds for over 600 varieties and many of the seed sites she specifies list hundreds of varieties.
Hope that helps.
Carolyn
Here is a link that might be useful: Tania's Tomato data base
Favorite beefsteak discussions
Favorite medium size discussions
Best beefsteak, black and oxheart tomatoes
Lots of suggestions for you.
Dave
Sandy, there are many variables that play into BER being induced and many threads here discussing it. For sure weather can be one of them.
It's well known that paste varieties are more susceptible to it, as well as Early Blight (A. solani).
What causes internal BER as opposed to the much more external kind that almost all of us are familiar with. I can only speculate, knowing that the physiology of varieties can be very different ( movement of water and nutrients within the plant) that sometimes the lack of Ca++ occurs internally as well. And I'd attribute that to the transpiration of ions that's known to occur through the upper leaf surface.
Sheer guess work on my part trying to put together transpiration, all the variables known to induce BER and come up with something that at least sounds reasonable to me. LOL
Carolyn
Thanks for the response, Carolyn. I get a lot of questions about BER and I'm still learning more about it each year. Not a scientist or professional, just a long time Master Gardener who likes to know what I'm talking about!
(I bought your book about 3 years ago and didn't realize I was getting a collectible item! Wow! It is one of my most prized books and won't part from me until my hands are cold and dead!!!)
wow you went to st joe?
wish I had known to look for you.
since this is a variety targeted towards commercially growing you likely wont find it small quantities. Disregarding the specific disease resistances (most of which shouldnt be a problem where you are anyway) BHN 871 is going to be very similar to 'Carolina Gold' which are more likely to find in smaller quantities. If you have tried it and didnt care for it then you likely wont care for the BHN line.
Siegers seed was about $25 for 500 seed rather than Seedway's price.
I was rather displeased that none of the seed reps had samples of any seed. When I have gone to other meetings in the past seed company reps always had samples to give away.
Since Fusarium can't exist in the soil where the ground freezes deeply, there hasn't been much Fusarium IN NJ, although there are pockets of it. This past winter was a mild one so it would mean, if the spores survived, that you probably should have had Fusarium infected plants LAST season.
Most of the Fusarium in the northern climes is imported on tomato plants that were grown in more southern Fusarium areas and then shipped up north for sale.
What criteria did you use to make a DX of Fusarium as compared with other systemic diseases such as Verticillium and others?
So I assume there were no spots on any of the leaves?
If you're sure that it is Fusarium, and again, may I ask if your plants have ever had it before b'c it seems new to you and you say that ALL of the plants are going down one by one.
No, there are no chemicals that will rid the soil of the systemic diseases caused by either fungal or bacterial diseases.
There's another thread here which discusses what I suggest folks can do if folks have plants with foliage diseases, but I'm not too sure it would work well with systemic diseases, especially if a whole area such as you describe is contaminated.
Hope that helps at least somewhat.
Carolyn
Some of it yes. Classic 'cooked skin' appearance. The rest is uneven ripening caused by hot air temps. They tend to go hand-in-hand.
Dave
Here is a link that might be useful: Sun Scald images
The only way to be sure about that cherry tomato is to grow it again. I have several "volunteers" every year because I don't clean out every fruit that drops to the ground in my garden. One that does this with great regularity is Sungold F1.
I'm quite sure that Sweet 100 is a Hybrid. As such, the variations will be quite evident. Plant 10 seedlings and you will not see 10 identical "true to type" tomato plants with "true to type" fruit on them.
If you like the original and it is a hybrid, then you'll have to buy the seed occasionally.
Ted
No not on my plants, but the bottom leaves will die when the heat gets high. My plants are over 6 feet & new growth is growing horizontally with blooms & green tomatoes.
But the bottom leaves are brown & dried up.
While there is no reason to leave dead branches on a plant there is also no reason to remove branches that are not dead. That holds true regardless of where they are located on the plant. The one common exception is removing any lower branches that are in contact with the ground.
Do branches below a ripened cluster automatically die? No.
Dave