16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes

Azoychka - it's among the earlier yellows, and also has the citrusy tang. Not for people who like sweet tomatoes.

Carolyn has a list floating around somewhere, I think New Yorker and Wisconsin may be on it.

ddsack - Good to know about Azoychka, I am growing it for the fist time this year.

Jean, I know it helps so much when there is a pic. I just don't have a camera.

I'm going to hope Dave is right about the tomato leaf roll. Mostly because it just doesn't look like herbicide damage.

The link that missingtheobvious posted above (showing the herbicide damage from manure), that damage showed on the entire plant. A drift kind of damage will show in sections of a plant--entire sections, and eventual growth from those sections will be deformed.

Our beds are filled with our own compost, a little wood ash, cedar chips, some bagged manure, and sandy soil from our yard.

That manure/herbicide information -- thanks.

I had what I am pretty sure was herbicide damage caused from bagged manure I purchased at a very reputable nursery last year. At first I thought it was 2-4d damage possibly from drift from the neighbors lawn care company. I had a state agricultural agent come and after his investigation he ruled that it was probably in the manure I had worked into the soil. Not all of the leaves were effected right away. But over time the entire plants were effected. Hopefully this is leaf curl and will clear up.

Do the leaves truly wilt, or are they just gradually drying from the edges inward and crumbling? Opalka is quite spindly and wispy leafed compared to other tomatoes, the older leaves tend to point and curl downward, so they never look as healthy and vigorous as broader leafed varieties. As a wispy leafed, it's very prone to the indoor seedling malady called CRUD (which Carolyn named :-))

If you have the drying and crumbling of CRUD, the plants will outgrow it once they get outside into the garden under summer conditions. I often get CRUD on many of my wispy leafed seedlings while they are still in the house.

I once gave a friend some really nice large Opalka seedlings along with a bunch of other varieties. When I asked him later how he liked them, he said he pulled them because they looked sickly. Guess I forgot to warn him about the droopy leaves.

They truly wilt like the leaves are soft. This is my 3rd year growing opalka so I am used to its wispy growth but never saw this type of wilting before. I separated the two from the rest two days ago. One of them seems to be happy now. The other one continues to wilt but the progress is much slower. I hope at least one of them pulls through.

This year I am also growing san marzano redorta which also has a very wispy growth. Wonder if this is just more common among paste type tomatoes.

I like Sun Sugar better than Sungold.

I've grown both, though not in the same year. Last year it was Sungold (which has outproduced every other cherry I've grown in the past couple years). The first ones of the season had an odd flavor, then in the middle of the season the flavor improved, but later on either I got tired of them or the flavor got odd again, so I started cooking with them instead of eating them in the garden. I don't think I'll grow it again -- too many other tomatoes to try! When I grew it 3 years ago, in a sunnier location, it produced even more and I think I liked it more.

Two years ago I grew both Sun Sugar and Galinas, which had a similar taste that I never got tired of. If I were growing from seed, I'd choose Galinas because it produced more and is OP. But locally, I found only Sun Sugar transplants this year, so that's the one I'm growing again. I didn't grow Sun Sugar before that, but I did occasionally eat a few from a friend's plant.

I have read that Sun Sugar's skin is thinner than Sun Gold's but others say that it is thicker. It would make sense that it is thicker if it cracks less.

Any other opinions out there as to which tomato has the thinner skin - Sun Sugar or Sun Gold?

Brandywine Sudduth's strain and Cherokee Purple.

It sounds like we live in the same area, I had great luck with Sweet 100 and SunGold last year as well as Brandywine, which I planted in late April. Unfortunately mine succumbed to pests and some kind of disease by August; I didn't keep up with my tomato plant defense strategy as much as I should have. :( This year I'm trying Lemon Boy, Green Zebra, Sweet 100, San Marzano, Brandywine, and an as yet to be determined hybrid.

According to some reading, Champion is supposed to be a great tomato for coastal SoCal, both in terms of taste and ease.

Thank you very much for the information. I am sorry I did not do my homework first, that would have been the thing to do.
Ann

I think you will also find that your plant out date differs greatly where you are now from when you planted in NC. That alone can reduce much of the stress on your plants.

And as always when trying to garden in a new location, other local gardeners can be a wealth of info. If there is a local Farmer's Market that is a great place to meet them and don't hesitate to ask them questions. They love talking gardening with customers or even browsers.

Dave

I use a spray bottle to water them every other day and am sure not to soak them.

Top watering encourages shallow rooting and poor root development. The tap root of the seedling which lies deep in the soil dries out quickly with top watering and growth is stunted.

That is why bottom watering is the standard recommendation they have germinated. You'll find several discussions about this over on the Growing from Seed forum here.

And every other day can still be too much if it isn't needed. There is no set rule to how often to water because it can be affected by many variables. But using the surface soil as an indicator can be very misleading since it is the moisture in the soil down at root level that counts. Checking that moisture level in one of several different ways like using your finger or a Q-tip or piece of tissue on a stick before watering is also a frequent discussion on the G from Seed forum.

But since your plants have not developed true leaves after 4 weeks the odds are that the problem lies with your water method and regimen. True leaves will usually begin to show with 4-6 days after the cotyledons develop.

Hope this helps.

Dave

I like and use the Burpee mix with good results, so that's probably not the problem. As for watering, I treat seedlings like other plants, when I water them, I do a thorough/soaking (not drowning) job, discarding any accumulated water in the bottom tray. I do not water again until the seedlings really need it (as I've mentioned before, I use the relative weight of the sixpacks I plant in to judge when they need water). One tip is that if you water well when you plant, you may not need to water again for a week or more. As they grow bigger and develop more roots and leaves, you'll find they need water more frequently. Also, the Burpee mix comes with fertilizer that will carry the seedlings to planting out - you don't need to add more unless you're holding them inside for a lot longer than the normal 6-8 weeks.

Often one of the hardest things for folks new to starting plants from seed to learn is when to let them alone.

Is the skin hard to chew on these?

I meant to say, is the skin of the Momotaro hard to chew? I like sweet but I don't like chewy, plasticky skin.

Very nice! I also rather hope it is true.

Love it. My sister says every time she pulls in the driveway she expects to see another raised bed. I took over about 6 years ago, our kitchen garden had been overtaken by the 'shrubs' planted at the back, So I pulled them out. The roots were so deep it rattled the house. Then I said I am planting tomatoes (my mother was in hospice and I was chief caregiver, and what she loved most of all was a BLT or tomato and cheese. and by gum she had them. Then I got some cedar lumber from my inlaws, what to do what to do... anyway. there are much worse addictions to have. Thanks for sharing.

I used to live in Sacramento. There is a reason it's called "Sacatomatoes" as they grow like crazy there which was my experience. I grew a variety of different heirlooms & OP varieties with a very few hybrids and always had an extreme glut of 'maters. I did grow in homemade earthboxes after the first year as it was difficult to keep them watered consistantly in the extreme heat if planted in the ground.
Like has been said, tomatoes are self-pollinating - there are no male or female flowers. Each flower contains both anther & stigma. All they need is a gentle breeze to pollinate.
Some of the heirloom/OP I grew in Sac were Black Cherry, Arkansas Traveler, Jumbo Jim Orange (sautesmom I *believe* won a Tomatofest contest with this one), Cherokee Purple, Kellog's Breakfast, Black Krim, Black from Tula, several different Brandywines, etc. They all set amazing amounts of fruit.
I'd find sneaky volunteers in the back of the yard that had fruit.

I'm now in the midwest and WISH I still had the temperatures of Sac to grow in.
I would definitely get your soil tested. It's not the temperatures.

Are you purchasing your plants from Capital Nursery? If so, I recommend that you stop. I did nothing but fight disease from their stock.

I know it's tempting, but don't plant out until April 1. It seems warm enough to plant sooner, but it really isn't. Planting any sooner causes the plants to stunt. As a matter of fact, I was just at Green Acres Nursery this week and they were throwing out their entire Tomato Plant stock because it had frost damage. We most certainly DO get frost this late in the season, no matter what the farmer's almanac says! :)

If the plant stunts, it won't put on its blossoms at the right time, which is during spring. Our summers are too hot for most any tomato to produce. So, you want to plant out at the right time.

One other thing, for the past couple of years, we had very strange weather. We went from rainy season, straight to extremely hot, with very little "spring." Most everyone I know had trouble with their gardens due to this erratic climate.

I've seen no better result with hybrids as I have seen with tried and true heirlooms. I really believe the secret lies in the condition of your soil, the proper light exposure, and planting at the right time. Is there plenty of organic matter in your soil? Most of Sacramento is known for heavy clay soil unless you're closer to the river, then you have a siltier soil. Nothing grows to its full potential in this soil unless it's heavily amended. Once it is though, watch out because it's great stuff.

Varieties that have worked exceptionally well for me:
green zebra
brandywine
black krim
watermelon
san marzano