I need help eating these....

Here's todays harvest of maters.....

..

How do you know which tastes the best when you have so many varieties?

I will be picking the first of my large tomatoes tomorrow. Cherry tomatoes have been going for near 2 weeks.

Bernie

HOLY! You are gonna be overrun with maters. Great looking greenhouse.....how many plants you have? Varieties?

There's only 9 varieties in my pic....I can tell which is which easily enough.

Looks like a lot more!

There are 300 in that house. Another with earlier ones has 100. Cherry tomatoes are tucked here & there, not in the count. Probably 50 or 60 all toll.
I sell them at the Farmers Market.
The tomatoes are in the ground, not hydroponic.

Bernie

Mark, I am green with envy. I had my first Sun Gold/Sungold today. Just one. Did you make sauce, tomato tart, salad...?

Bernie, cool greenhouse. I want a mini version so I could grow tomatoes year-round.

Happy Harvesting!

Annapet

Moonglow: My sungold didn't make it, I planted it in the revolutionary planter. I like sampling all the varieties I have growing myself; but, my production is not quite as bountiful as Rays. LOL

Ray: I don't like the chocolate cherry ones too well; but, I do have a preference for the Brandy Boy, which means he will get planted again I'm sure. What I would like to find is a large tomato that will be a determinate, (I think is the proper term), as I want one that produces early on, not so late in the summer. One that doesn't sprawl all over the place; but produces abundantly. Any ideas?

joy

Joy, I was about to save Chocolate Cherry seeds for Mark, LOL. I have been reading good reviews about it. What didn't you like about this particular variety?

Thanks.

Sincerely,

Annapet

Moonglow - Yup, I have made some sauce with my tomatoes and pickled some Peppers. Looks like I have more work ahead of me. Can't wait until my hot peppers are all ripe for making hot sauce.

Joy - I haven't tried Chocolate Cherries before but if you want a great tasting dark cherry tomato.....look no further than Black Cherry. You can give these determinant varieties a try....

Black Sea Man - Had a friend grow them (in Florida) this year. He said it was loaded and tasted great. I just started a few transplants here. Hope they do as well for me as they did for him.

Celebrity - Reliable and decent taste. Can have thick skins....at least for me they sometime do. Very productive.

Ace 55 - For me, these grew bigger tomatoes than most of my determinants. Not sweet.....a good acidic tomato.

Legend - First time growing them. It's been very productive for me but haven't tasted them yet. Most are about 5-8 oz sized.

LOL....I'll definitely try them! I too have read good reviews from a few people this year. You never know, I may like them even more than Black Cherry.....now that would be a huge surprise.

Moonglow and Ray: Thanks for the advice on the tomatoes to plant for next Spring, I did try a lot of the chocolate cherry tomatoes, and I really thought the taste was a bit sour to me, not sweet like some of the other varieties I tried. I have a preference for the huge meaty tomatoes though and give all the cherry types away usually. LOL
joy

Looks like the beast has spawned Ray! Nice looking maters.

Has anyone tried the Radiator Charlie mortgage lifter tomatoes?

Nice greenhouse Bernie. I'm hiding the pic from my DH. :) I remember what it's like to put up all the poly!

Sherri

They look GORGEOUS! I am so jealous of your lovely maters.

Question for you - what's your recipe for hot sauce? I just picked 73 hot peppers yesterday and have no idea what to do with them all!

Lovely tomatoes!

NewG, here's a link to the list of articles I've written for DG: http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/by.php?user=critterologist

If you scroll down to last Aug/Sept, you'll find a pair of hot sauce articles (look for the pepper pile thumbnails). If you scroll down a bit more, there's also an article about making roasted tomato sauce if you also have an abundant tomato harvest.

I love Black Cherry tomatoes, and I tried Chocolate Cherry also this year to see if they might be better producers.

Although the tomatoes are more mid-sized than "big" as Joy asked about, I love 'Wisconsin 55' for a semi-determinate delicious red tomato.

Yup Sherri. the "Beast" or "Blob" (I call it both) is starting to ripen up. Made my first BLT with CP. Yuuuuuuuum! Looks to have about 50-60 tomatoes on it so far. I wish all plants could be like the blob. I have tried twice with Mortgage Lifters, last year I tried 2 and it did OK. Nothing special. This I tried 2 more and one died early on. Have one left with about 5-6 maters on it. They have been finicky for me. I haven't gotten the full potential out of any ML's I have grown. But a lot of people like them. Give them a try.




Thanks newgarden! Too funny that Critter posted because I was about to send you here.... http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1543/ I do something similar to what she does. I deviate a bit with the types and amount of peppers. I use whatever I have on hand at that time. I mainly use Jalapenos and Anaheim peppers. I'll throw in a habenaro or 2 for even more of a kick.



Hey Critter, Black Cherries are starting to pour in for me. Can't wait until I can fill a big bag full :) Keep us posted on your Chocolate Cherries.

Is their a determinate tomato that reaches over a pound? Most I grow are 5-8 oz. (10 oz at the biggest). Wisconsin 55 huh? Never tried it....gonna look into it.


Oh and BTW....I won't be needing any help eating these little guys(Bush Star Melons)....

Yup....it's snack time....

The Wisconsin 55's are generally 10 or 12 oz for me, as I recall... not 1+ pounders, but still big enough to make a lovely BLT. They're Jim's favorite.

10-12oz is the perfect sized tomato. I don't need anything bigger. Once you have a huge tomato growing you are checking on it constantly and you worry about it. Shoot, I don't need a tomato keeping me up at night wondering if it's gonna fall off, something getting at it, etc... Give me a plant that produces nice, tasty 8-12 oz maters over one that can produce only a few 1 pounders any day.

Ray: It's the melons that keep me up at night worrying. LOL
joy

This is my "early" house. About 100 plants in here.
Will be picking in a few minutes.
Bernie

Bernie: Wow them are some tomatoes there.
joy

LOL Joy! I don't worry about melons for some reason. "If they grow, they grow" is how I look at it. With that said, I did check them daily. The only thing here that could damage my melons is another human.


Nice Bernie! Watch where you walk....

What earlies you growing? I'm dying to meet a early I really like.

these are greenhouse varieties, I don't know how they would do outdoors. They are not that early. They were put in the ground April 15. They were about 15" tall.
They are Arbason & Buffalo. Both from Johnny's.
http://www.johnnyseeds.com/catalog/subcategory.aspx?category=1&subcategory=497

Bernie, you made me look at Greenhouse Tomato Handbook. I may have to move if I get into this, too. LOL.

Mark, the early tomatoes that I have are NOT EARLY ENOUGH. What are the earlies in your photos?

Sungold - not even happening yet. I get one ripe a day the last few days except today resident Stellar Blue Jay beat me to my allotment.

Matina - 3 ripen when I was in San Diego. Was flown-in for consumption. Forget about eat locally grown tomatoes. LOL.

Gold Dust (semi-determinate) has more fruits than leaves, I kid you not. I have yet to taste a ripe one. If I like it enough, I will grow a few next season to have early tomatoes.

Gosh, every time I see your bounty I get sad because I don't have any yet. But really, I'm happy for you. Hmmmp. LOL

Ray: Moonglow is right there, you make the rest of us look bad. LOL Of course you don't have the battle with the bugs we have here in FL. I hate summer season for gardening in FL, drought, monsoon, bugs, drought, monsoon, bugs and everytime you spray, monsoons. Some of these bugs could carry off the entire garden if they wanted to and lately, I've been fighting the birds over cherry tomatoes, better yet, let them have the cherry ones and leave me the big fat meaty ones right? LOL
Bernie: Your toms are in a greenhouse? Bet that cuts down on the bugs hey?
joy

Only had a few white flies once. Used a mosquito spray on them. Kept them at bay. Then winter comes & the poor dears freeze to death! Most bad bugs can't over winter here, so we have minimal problem with bugs.

This is the ninth year with tomatoes in this greenhouse. Planted in the ground. All we do is till up the strips & fertilize with a 10 - 10 - 10 fertilizer.

Puts a question mark on the theory you can beat the blight by rotating crops. We have never had blight inside the greenhouse.

Our only problem is getting good germination in the hottest part of summer. I think we have it figured out for this year. Not a great problem since the lack of tomatoes is about same time as when field tomatoes flood the markets here. We get $3.00 a pound for our tomatoes. Field ones go down to 25¢ a pound when everybody has a bounty. We don't raise any in the field!
It will be about 3 to 4 weeks before the flood of maters hits.
Bernie

I'm guessing you may have avoided blight problems since your greenhouse tomatoes aren't exposed to the weather. Seems to me the blight spores end up in the ground eventually, and then the rain splashes them up onto the lower foliage.

I don't have enough room to rotate, so I mulch with a nice layer of grass clippings... and when I irrigate, I use soaker hoses. Some years I'm still spraying for blight by the end of summer, but I think trying to limit splash-up definitely helps.

I agree. But it is really difficult to keep the splash up off the plants.

Country Gardens: How do you get the tomatoes pollinated?
joy

I love Laurel, Mark. I'm so envious you're only one hour away from her. My starts came from her, and the rest I started myself! I feel so grown up. LOL.

Hi Annapet, I'm not growing any early varieties this year. Haven't met one I really like so I stopped growing them. You have turned me on to some different varieties that I haven't even considered before. (Writing down Matina and Gold Dust).

I picked a bunch more today :) Some nice peppers too. Gonna need help eating these too. I'll post them below.



Oh SoCal has bugs! Lots of them. Not a bunch of different kinds but masses of whiteflies and aphids....plus I found my first hornworm today. Many more to be found in the next few months. I don't have any rodents really and the birds rarely bother a thing. Other than they love to sit on my cages and use my plants as a toilet lol



Here's what I picked today....

This message was edited Jul 10, 2009 6:40 PM

First year growing Pimento Peppers. They haven't been overly productive for me but they put out some really nice peppers.

My new friend :) I spared his life....the first few I find are pardoned and allowed to live the rest of it's life out in the neighbors yard.

Ray: No, don't give him a reprieve, he will sneak back into your tomato world and gobble them up before you know it, trust me, I know this he is my arch enemy from last Spring/Summer. He devestated my peppers, my tomatoes and left me weeping and gnashing my teeth, well, maybe not him in particular; but, his relative, crunch him under foot and if he is that big, you can bet there are more.
joy

He did strip one of my Anaheim Pepper plants. Not worried about him sneaking back in.....I launched him 100 feet away into the neighbor's Ivy. Looks like I'll be doing daily inspections from this point on. Breaking out the portable black light for those really difficult ones to find.

Wind does the pollinating.
One house has 2 huge fans blowing out. The intakes create a big breeze.
The other house is just open all round, no fans. We have wind here nearly ever day.
I picked some for market tomorrow. This is second time. I picked a few yesterday. When I priced them, they will bring in $82.00.
It will take about 15 minutes to sell them.
Bernie

country gardens: I noticed that you use clips to secure the limbs, I've thought about that one, especially after trying to stake my tomatoes in cages, those cylinder type, I wound up with leaning tower of pisas all over the place. My greenhouse is not nearly as big as yours, mine is portable; but, I've had thoughts of having something growing in at all times in the Fall/Winter, might even try some maters that way and just stick in a portable heater when it gets cold, who says tomato season is over when it gets cold right? LOL Problem is, if I left it open to let the bees in, the bad bugs would come in also and not leave me much room to swat them either.
joy

You don't need bees for tomatoes, in fact they won't even go to them.

If I were overrun with hornworms, I'd resort to squashing... but the first few at least are relocated onto volunteer 'Wild Cherry' tomatoes or nicotiana plants. They turn into such cool "hummingbird" moths! There are some great photos from other DGers in this "Friend or Foe?" article I wrote about them: http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1270/

Ray
Loved the pimento peppers. That is a definite try for me next year. We spare our " "visitors" as well. The moths are way cool. They like the cannas and gingers. Good idea about the black light. Can't wait to see what I can see. LOL