Tomatoes for 2023

[digitS']

Let's see if I can take an okay picture of the first slicer to ripen in my garden.


It’s a Gary O Sena. I had to turn it so that it isn't showing the three splits on top . There is also a tiny chewed area on one split and my guess is that the quail that are in such strong numbers out there this year may have decided to sample it since it wasn't discovered until fully ripe.

The 8.5 oz fruit is there with Bloody Butcher, which seem unusually small in 2023 but considering the crowd are doing okay. BB is my usual first step up in size to ripen from cherries and I like the "big guy" flavor of the little guys. Like Gary O as well. It is a cross between two heirlooms – Brandywine and Cherokee Purple and remarkably early for a bigger OP, it seems to me. Also, it tends to stay healthy.

Big Beef and Early Girl are regulars out there but not this year. I have to save seed from too many others. The two in the picture aren't really highest priority saving choices because they are both available – fairly broadly.

Steve

 

[Dahlia]

I really love fresh tomatoes in summer, a taste that can truly only be had by growing them. But it goes from 0 to 100 overnight and the tomato fatigue is beginning. I got lucky with my cherry tomatoes this year, one of them is a really sugary the other is both sweet & tart. Both taste columns.

Mirabelle Blanche, yellow and tangy. Remy Rouge, red, tiny and SWEET. Oval shaped dark pink is Una Hartsack. Decent, productive, not mind blowing. Was good on pizza, holds together better than the cherries.View attachment 59327

The big one ended up here.
View attachment 59339

I wish I had your problem of too many tomatoes at once! I absolutely love garden ripe tomatoes!!!

 

[Dirtmechanic]

I always start my tomatoes in mid April in pots on my enclosed back porch. That's about a month and a half before the last frost. That variety I planted last year simply matures too late to escape the early frosts. I did get several bowl-fuls of tomatoes, so it wasn't a huge loss, just frustrating to see so many still-green tomatoes killed on the vine by frost.

I did learn something about the variety (Candyland) that I planted this year. Apparently these fruits are teensy-tiny and only reach the size of currants at maturity. I noticed yesterday that some of these miniature fruits are beginning to turn orange already, so my hopes of harvesting are renewed. I had been thinking it still remained for these tomatoes to at least double in size, but not so!

I covered the squash plants with deer netting yesterday, but I'm thinking now that the culprit has been an army of slugs rather than deer. Slugs are thriving in this new climate of constant rain. They are disgusting creatures!

Wow this post demonstrates why the internet confuses. If we do not have tomatoes in the ground by mid April the coming heat in July makes them shut down, no different than cold really in terms of production.

 

[digitS']

All gardening is local, @Dirtmechanic .

Years ago, I was reading about Early Girl and how some sort of survey of US gardeners was done. It was the most popular variety, north or south. At the time, I wasn't aware of the problems gardeners in the South have with heat shutting down the tomato plants. So, share your local experiences .

Before having a backyard greenhouse, I started tomatoes in a south window. Antsy to get to going one year, it was 17 February and seeds went in. I shoulda guessed that I would have problems because it was below zero that morning. I didn't have enough room with adequate sunlight for the up-potted plants when cold mid-Spring weather forced me to keep them indoors. I have more flexibility now but still start about 2 weeks later.

(The plants then suffer through the Pacific Northwest JuneGloom and do nothing until July. Then, Wild West Heat smacks into them.)

Steve

 

[SPedigrees]

Wow this post demonstrates why the internet confuses. If we do not have tomatoes in the ground by mid April the coming heat in July makes them shut down, no different than cold really in terms of production.

Alabama's and Vermont's growing seasons are light years apart. Frost is barely out of the ground here in April, and it's typically unsafe to plant anything outside until Memorial Day (the old Memorial Day which fell on May 31st). Mid to late September is when frost typically kills unprotected garden plants. It's a short growing season.

That's why it's helpful for folks to put their location and growing zone with their profile, as you have done.

I may as well attach this photo to this same post. Here is my pitiful early harvest, but at the rate the fruits of my labor are disappearing thanks to predators, I wanted to bring in a handful of these Candyland tomatoes in the hopes they will ripen on my kitchen counter. Just in case some critters nab the remainder of the crop, I'll at least have sampled a few. I'm getting sort of enamoured by these diminutive little fruits!

The green beans I think I will place in a jar with pickling brine to be eaten in salads, because I doubt I will get enough to have a steaming bowlful of green beans with melted butter dripping off them. It will be to the farmers market for those quantities.

One piece of good news is that I've changed my opinion from slugs back to deer, so here's hoping the netting over my squash plants has worked to deter the mighty herds. I did not notice any further damage to my squash this morning.

 

[Zeedman]

I always start my tomatoes in mid April in pots on my enclosed back porch. That's about a month and a half before the last frost. That variety I planted last year simply matures too late to escape the early frosts. I did get several bowl-fuls of tomatoes, so it wasn't a huge loss, just frustrating to see so many still-green tomatoes killed on the vine by frost.

I too dislike seeing lots of otherwise good green tomatoes go to waste if they are still hanging when the freeze arrives. If that happens, you might want to consider Piccallili, green tomato relish:
Green tomato relish

I've also used firm green tomatoes in a roasted tomatillo salsa recipe, as a substitute for tomatillos, if there are not enough tomatillos for the batch. I think you could use all green tomatoes, although I've never tried it.

 

[Zeedman]

All gardening is local, @Dirtmechanic .

Yup. It's amazing how much difference there can be a few miles away - or even just across the yard.

Personally, I prefer my tomatoes to ripen late. First, because that is close to the same time as the peppers. Second, because vegetables don't care if the house is too hot for canning, and the weather is usually cooler then.

 

[SPedigrees]

Years ago, I was reading about Early Girl and how some sort of survey of US gardeners was done. It was the most popular variety, north or south.

I think we grew Early Girl tomatoes back in the 1970s when we had our big vegie garden.

 

[SPedigrees]

I too dislike seeing lots of otherwise good green tomatoes go to waste if they are still hanging when the freeze arrives. If that happens, you might want to consider Piccallili, green tomato relish:
Green tomato relish

I've also used firm green tomatoes in a roasted tomatillo salsa recipe, as a substitute for tomatillos, if there are not enough tomatillos for the batch. I think you could use all green tomatoes, although I've never tried it.

I absolutely should have done something like that, but I think I was just too busy at the time to try unfamiliar recipes for green tomatoes.

On edit, in my own defense, last year I had a bumper crop of cucumbers, and I did make pickles, so many, both dill and bread-and-butter, that even after giving 8 or so jars to my sister, I had enough pickles to last all year. I think I used up the last jar last February or March.

 

[heirloomgal]

Nearly every plant is ripening tomatoes as of today. This is a new one for me, 'Green Bulgarian Striped', first fruit. Tried the first green when ripe beefsteak ‘Ananas Vert’ for lunch and it was really good, surprisingly tart and sweet. Hope this one is as good.