THX!! I bought most of the plants, but 3 were volunteers from last year. It must have been location, south part of my big garden, lots of full sun and lots of amendments over the years there. I have NEVER grown tomatoes that were this Big before!!
I have saved seeds from one volunteer, an orange tomato, not large, dunno what kind, but all were tasty.
I saved seeds from the hybrid better boys--we'll see what we get!
I am just starting seeds from the Rutgers (bought plant, 2024). Every fruit was perfect, about the same size and blemish free and very tasty right off of the vine. Those are the ones in the grey cake pan furthest right on my table. I saved the ends of 3 Rutgers to collect their seeds, saved myself some time and stored them overnight in a 1/2 pint jar in the fridge.
I cut those up and DH dehydrated them. SUPER tasty, he LOVES them dehydrated, me, not so much, but 3 trays fit into a large mouth pint jar. Never dehydrated tomatoes before, so we'll have to see if DH and DD's gobble them up. DH thought they tasted great on his turkey sandwich today, tomato taste, without the mess.
If so, then more ripened tomatoes on my kitchen table will be dehydrated, too.
DH thought that slicing them into 1/4 inch pieces was too shallow.
I took time to research dehydrating tomatoes and so I sliced the fruit, prepped them in a colander on top of a bowl, and let them drain first. There was about 1/2 cup of liquid that drained out. I Think that helped. Not sure.
Thoughts?!?
I harvested a huge fruit from a volunteer Cherokee Purple (from 2023), but I put it on the ground bc there was some rotting. I am going back to collect seeds to ferment from That one, too, this weekend.
I am the only one that loves Cherokee Purples. Family thinks they look rotten when ripe!
Just to note: I dug all tomatoes 12-16 inch planting holes each, all 30 of the beefsteak, and 1 cherry tomato, threw in a handful of dried horse manure in every hole,
watered for 2 weeks straight, then NONE.
Yes, none.
The 4 cherries north of the garage just got a spade's width hole, but they did ok there.
It's very interesting to lay the plants on their sides, but, how much water do you want to put into those plants/season?!?
Every tomato buried grows extra roots on the stem hairs. When I pull them up end of season they are sometimes just as hard to pull out of the ground as weeds.
Speaking of cherry tomatoes...they just sprawled this year. I am thinking the best way to deal with them next year is to only plant a few--I have
lots of cherry and grape tomato Seeds in my cabinet--and give them extra fencing space, and treat them like growing fruit trees against a wall, like the espalier method, with many leaders.
Espalier trees, trained flat against a building wall or fence, are attractive and efficient ways to grow plants, especially fruit trees in a small space.
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