Tomatoes 2021

[Dirtmechanic]

Around here we’ve had our share of tomato problems, never enough to wipe out a crop but by late fall the plants would be pretty ugly. Usually we’ve gotten enough sauce etc that it’s no big deal and we just call it a wash, move on.
last year i did some reading about folks using salicylic acid (aspirin) to treat tomato problems. Well, being a bit geeky; i went on line and found numerous highly technical articles detailing research with tomato, cucumber and bean’s. These are the main crop in my greenhouse so i was happy it pertained across the board. Now when i say “highly technical” im talking articles that i can only pronounce half the words in a sentence!!
Then the geek in me went looking for a pure form, wanting to avoid what ever else may be in a common aspirin, and easily found U.S.P grade salicylic acid in 4 oz packages!
these articles explained that this stuff is actually a plant hormonal exudate and how it stimulates the plants natural defense’s to ward off various pathogens.
Armed with this tidbit i went back to the original aspirin articles to learn about dosing etc and settled on one 1/16th teaspoon in a 5 gallon size planting hole, spread evenly around the sides before transplanting the tomato into the hole. the article discussed using a foliar spray at first flowering as well but my stuff was entirely clean and i blew that part off.
At seasons end i can say with certainty i saw dramatic improvement on tomato’s and beans. Cukes still need some tweaking.
Here’s a picture of one Celebrity plant, 12 ft. Wide, 14 ft. Tall and 8 ft. Thick from front to back. This picture was taken in early October. As you can see, it’s still pretty clean! It was transplanted into the greenhouse April 15th.
I will continue using this method another year before drawing a firm conclusion but hey, it looks pretty good to me.

From what I have read, salicylic acid acid acts as an auxin, like you say a phytohormone. Auxins promote tip growth both above and below ground. I use auxins up until flowering starts. One drop per gallon of water. Now I read they are focused on SA as a plant defense and general promoter of plant health. The reason I got off aspirin was that while in my case I was trying it for powdery mildews, I read that it also acts as another family of phytohormones related to senescence. I did not, and still do not, really know much about that side of the plant cycle so I have chilled out. It seems to help animal cells live longer from what I am reading now. It will be fun to dig deeper, so to speak. And I was using aspirin, made by the reaction of salisylic acid and acetic acid. So not the same either. Damn tomatoes can get complicated can they not?

 

[Zeedman]

There's a foot of snow on the ground & it will be -14 F. tonight, so my plans are still flexible. Probably the only thing still flexible in this cold...

My tentative list:

• Willie's Garden (orange)
• Snickers ("black")
• Gogosha (pink)
• Hungarian Heart (backup to Gogosha) (pink)
• Japanese Plum (pink)
• Cipolla's Pride (red)
• Elfin (red)
• Gilbert Italian Plum (red)
• Italian Giant Pear (red)
• Novechoc (red)
• Solanum spontaneum (currant type, yellow)

Gogosha is "iffy" (hence the backup) because my seed is from 2009... I really hope it makes it. The plants were really loaded when I last grew Gogosha; but it was a bad year, and they were struck down by blight before any of the tomatoes could ripen.

I may start some of the seed from last year's Cleota Pink, since it needs to be checked for crosses. The neighbor - unbeknownst to me - planted potted tomatoes right across from Cleota Pink, hidden by the fence. I'm hoping that the bees were fooled by the fence too.

 

[Alasgun]

The bee’s are never fooled but hey, you can call what ever you get
”Zeedman’s Wonder”

 

[Dirtmechanic]

The bee’s are never fooled but hey, you can call what ever you get
”Zeedman’s Wonder”

I can second this motion.

 

[Artorius]

I start with tomatoes on April 1st. The seedlings will have the right lighting conditions. Tomatoes grow like weeds in good conditions. Now in Poland a winter that has not been for several years and white bears are walking in the streets.
As usual, there will be 40 varieties but I don't have a specific list yet. I will repeat a few tomatoes to restore the seed supply. There will definitely be 10 varieties from the Minusinsk Valley in Russia that I didn't have last year. For fun, I will also plant a few tomatoes that are named after fairy-tale characters.

 

[Artichoke Lover]

I’m about to plant out mine. I actually got the Jelly bean and Yellow pear out to the garden and then decided I was to tired to plant them tonight.

 

[Zeedman]

All of my tomatoes had good germination - even Gogosha, which was 2006 seed (not 2009). The last time I attempted Gogosha the plants were really loaded - before being killed by blight. Hopefully this year will succeed. All seedlings are still small, but growing fast indoors under 18 hours of light.

I also added a tomato I had requested from SSE just named "Purple" (one of several with that name) which arrived 6 days after the others were planted. I really hope it still has time to reach maturity, this accession was a monster when I observed it on Heritage Farm.

So now I am 2 over the allotted number of tomato varieties for my isolation system. Don't know yet whether I'll give some/all of those plants away, or plant them & bag blossoms... probably a little of both.

 

[heirloomgal]

I grow only tomato varieties that I can save seed from (frugal gardener!); this year instead of adding all new tomato varieties to my collection (which I usually do) I decided to regrow several of the varieties I haven't grown in awhile and add only a few new ones. Germination was nearly 100% even with 5 year old seed, so I was happy about that.

My list this year has a lot of classic beefsteaks, and a few oddballs:
(* means new to me)
Estler's Mortgage Lifter
Halladay's Mortgage Lifter
Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter
*Yellow Mortgage Lifter
Landis Valley Brandywine
Sudduth's Brandywine
Stump of the World
Crnkovic Yugoslavian
Cosmonaut Volkov
Grosse de Perthuis
Pleine de Chair
*Roger's Best Black
Pruden's Purple
Green Grape
*Stokes Green
Aunt Ruby's German Green
Gordost Sibiri
Korshun Ogromnyi
Shuntuski Velican
German Pink
*Yellow Stuffer
Old German
*Spoon
*Micro Tom (at 6 inches it's flowering already!)
Cosmic Eclipse
Dark Galaxy
*Armadillo Amarillo
Sea Horse
Rebel Starfighter

Tried to start one new cherry 'Casino Chips', and it didn't sprout a tomato plant. It seemed to sprout, strangely, a potato plant. The company must have got some seed mixed up by accident.

On a bit of a sidenote, I was watching today a documentary about hybrid seeds, tomatoes in particular. I haven't grown many of them mainly because I want to be able to save seeds. But according to this doc, it said that according to laboratory tests hybrid tomatoes had 63% less calcium, 29% less magnesium, 72% less vitamin C, 58% less lycopene and 56% less polyphenols than the open pollinated tomatoes they tested. Wow, I had no idea there was any nutritional differences. They also found that tomato nutrient content was also significantly linked to flavor; that essential nutrients are a big part of a 'great tasting' tomato. Wow.

Here are some pics of my stranger tomatoes this year....

Micro Tom

Yellow Stuffer

Dark Galaxy

Amarillo Armadillo

Stokes Green

Spoon

Rebel Starfighter

Old German

Sea Horse (different than red pear, more of a bottleneck)

 

[Artichoke Lover]

I grow only tomato varieties that I can save seed from (frugal gardener!); this year instead of adding all new tomato varieties to my collection (which I usually do) I decided to regrow several of the varieties I haven't grown in awhile and add only a few new ones. Germination was nearly 100% even with 5 year old seed, so I was happy about that.

My list this year has a lot of classic beefsteaks, and a few oddballs:
(* means new to me)
Estler's Mortgage Lifter
Halladay's Mortgage Lifter
Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter
*Yellow Mortgage Lifter
Landis Valley Brandywine
Sudduth's Brandywine
Stump of the World
Crnkovic Yugoslavian
Cosmonaut Volkov
Grosse de Perthuis
Pleine de Chair
*Roger's Best Black
Pruden's Purple
Green Grape
*Stokes Green
Aunt Ruby's German Green
Gordost Sibiri
Korshun Ogromnyi
Shuntuski Velican
German Pink
*Yellow Stuffer
Old German
*Spoon
*Micro Tom (at 6 inches it's flowering already!)
Cosmic Eclipse
Dark Galaxy
*Armadillo Amarillo
Sea Horse
Rebel Starfighter

Tried to start one new cherry 'Casino Chips', and it didn't sprout a tomato plant. It seemed to sprout, strangely, a potato plant. The company must have got some seed mixed up by accident.

On a bit of a sidenote, I was watching today a documentary about hybrid seeds, tomatoes in particular. I haven't grown many of them mainly because I want to be able to save seeds. But according to this doc, it said that according to laboratory tests hybrid tomatoes had 63% less calcium, 29% less magnesium, 72% less vitamin C, 58% less lycopene and 56% less polyphenols than the open pollinated tomatoes they tested. Wow, I had no idea there was any nutritional differences. They also found that tomato nutrient content was also significantly linked to flavor; that essential nutrients are a big part of a 'great tasting' tomato. Wow.

Here are some pics of my stranger tomatoes this year....

View attachment 40447Micro Tom
View attachment 40448Yellow Stuffer

View attachment 40441Dark Galaxy

View attachment 40442Amarillo Armadillo

View attachment 40443Stokes Green
View attachment 40444Spoon
View attachment 40445Rebel Starfighter

View attachment 40446Old German
View attachment 40450Sea Horse (different than red pear, more of a bottleneck)

Wow you have so many interesting varieties! Tomatoes are my gardening obsession and I’ve been trying to expand my collection but it’s nothing like yours!

 

[heirloomgal]

Wow you have so many interesting varieties! Tomatoes are my gardening obsession and I’ve been trying to expand my collection but it’s nothing like yours!

If you like any of these @Artichoke Lover, and I succeed this year, I'd be happy to send you seeds! I have a serious tomato obsession too.

I'm always curious about the kinds of tomatoes other people grow...do you have any favourites?