2017 Tomato Growing

Removed all my growin points last night too

 

I'll probably remove them from my San Marzano (AKA Heinz) and Shirley plants this weekend, but all my cherry toms (Sungold, Mountain Magic, Suncherry, Floridity, etc.) will be allowed to grow all over the place at high level, hoping to keep them cropping for as long as possible, then pick the green ones just before frost gets in the tunnels.

 

I'm growing San Marzano 2, are they Heinz 57? @"M" gave me the seeds

One of Our Mandy's Shirleys has ripened

 

Cut away the lower leaves so I can get some air round me plums

 

I went to pinch out the growing points of my San Marzanos, but they had all naturally stopped producing top shoots all by themselves, every single one of them

Some of my giant Bulgarian toms look like they might exceed 1Kg.

 

Dancing with smurfs.. tastes delish.



Black Russian



Black icicle



Heartbreaker vita f1.. ok tasting.



Can't remember what this one is..



Minibel.. this amazes me every time I look at it


Striped stuffer finally ripening

 

Got blight!!!
Overnight blight has attacked my tomatoes. Huge crops of green and ripening tomatoes.
Removed every affected leaf....lots and lots of them.
I am hoping the fruit will ripen and be fine to eat.
The past few days have been very wet and humid....perfect for blight.
Such a disappointment!

 

Yup. very sad. Outdoor tomatoes in this country is too hard to grow. Next year I am going to go with the James way. Plant them tightly and only keep 1-2 trusses per plant. Trusses above the second one don't stand a chance to ripe before blight hits anyway.

 

First blight in years and in the gh???
I put too many plants in and foliage was exuberant and plentiful. From superb summer weather it went to damp days and nights recently.....perfecf for blight.
Tomorrow I will remove every leaf and expose fruit totally.

 

Seems to be a good year for tomatoes here, no blight problems and my Gardener's Delight and Beefmaster in the greenhouse are both cropping well.

Even the Manx Marvel plant outdoors in the veg patch is romping away, with plenty of rapidly swelling fruit which look as if they'll start ripening fairly soon.

One thing is puzzling me though. While the Gardener's Delight are as sweet and tasty as ever, the Beefmaster are distinctly lacking in flavour this year. I've grown them for several years now and always found them very tasty, I've not done anything different this year and yet they taste very bland and insipid compared to previous years.

 

@Verdun I think you're done for because the blight will already be inside your tomato fruit. I know I've stripped all the fruit off in previous years when the plant had got blighted and over the next few days the fruit developed big spots on it and couldn't be eaten. You might be better off making chutney with the fruit on any plant that's clearly had it.

 

You may be right Cinnamon but the blight, as it does, appeared almost overnight and I took immediate action so, we will see. Fruit today was fine. Some reading suggests I have done the right thing in acting immediately. Every leaf removed now on my toms.......crops look wonderful; healthy and plentiful from green to ripening so hoping they will be fine
I think I know too how I made matters worse.....I liberally damped down the soil too often, against my better judgement because I usually keep foliage and soil dry. At times I am my own worst enemy
Trunky, no two summers are the same......more sunshine or less, drier or damper air are things beyond our control and affect the taste of our produce.

 

Currently eating insata caprese using peel black trifele tomatoes and the rubbishy basil I had in the tomato pots. Yum.

 

Was there a taste testing thread? Or was it combined in with tomato growing.. anyways..




Top left Black Russian - sweet, slightly smokey, thick walled and juicy. 9/10

Top right. The forgotten one. (Edit: think it's latah)
Slight tang, not too thick and not too juicy. 8/10

Bottom left. Minibel - peachy coloured. Acidic/tangy but not much flavour, quite watery. 5/10

Just below and to the right. Dancing with smurfs. Smokey, good flavour, sweet. 10/10

Next over 100s and 1000s. Strong flavour, acidic. Thick walled. 9/10

Bottom far right. Heartbreaker vita f1. Thick walled, juicy. Not much flavour 5/10.

German lunchbox, striped stuffer, san marzano, black icicle and tumbling tom to go. Also bought sungold and another one thats slipped my mind reduced, no flowers as of yet.