2017 Tomato Growing

Picked a couple more Manx Marvels this evening.

Think I'll try and save some seed from them as we're moving soon and the new garden has a smaller greenhouse, so I'll probably grow more outdoor toms next year. Manx Marvels seem to do quite well down here so worth trying a few more than my usual one plant I think.

I've never tried saving tomato seed before, any tips on the best way to do it?

 

Comparative tomato sizes for the clothing industry...

Small, medium and large are not a basis for lableling

 

Ferment them in a cup of water for a few days, then when they smell orrible, dry em out on kitchen towel

 

Ok, not sure how that'll go down with Mrs Trunky, I may have to do it in the shed to avoid controversy.

What's the purpose of fermenting them?

 

She'll love it

Breaks down the growth inhibiting compound that surrounds the seed

 

Ferment them in a sealed jar or they will stink the place out. Ferment them for three days no more no less. Wash off all mould and gunk which collects on the top of the liquid, strain the seeds out and dry on a plate or paper (they stick to paper if you use it so rather than try to remove seeds from paper come sowing time just tear the paper into pieces with a seed on each piece and sow that. Regds Sandy

 

Check them after 2 days as seeds from some tomatoes will start sprouting in the water after a couple of days, ruining them. Any sign of sprouting and get them out PDQ, and bin the sprouters.

 

Well for the first year ever, I've had outdoor tomatoes well before the greenhouse. The hot spell in June, really set the greenhouse toms back and pretty much fried all the flowers off them. Only now are the greenhouse ones starting to colour up! The outdoor ones on the other hand have been brilliant. I'm growing Crimson crush, both in the ground and in pots, which has proven to be pretty blight resistant. I've been cutting off every suspect leaf and I've been picking them for about 2 weeks now! I can recommend Crimson Crush for an outdoor variety. Good size, very tasty and good yield, especially from the ones grown straight into the soil!

 

Hi all,

I'm growing sweet million and gardener's delight outside (no space for a greenhouse, sadly) and have some nice trusses all ripening up now. Out of interest, is there a way to encourage a whole truss to ripen at the same time? When you buy vine tomatoes in the shop or are presented with some on a plate in a restaurant the whole truss is ripe, but with mine the earliest ripening ones (closest to the stem) start to split and over-ripen if I wait for those towards the end of the truss to start turning red.

Do other people have ways to ripen a full truss together, or do you just pick the individual fruits as they turn ripe and leave the rest on there for another day?

Cheers.

 

Hang a bananana on it

 

Haha! Of course!

I don't think mine would support the weight of an actual banana, but I guess the skin off a peeled banana would have the same effect?

I wonder what the commercial growers do - they'd have to get through a fair old whack of nanas using this technique on every plant...not sure their profit margins would be up to much after that!

 

Banana skin is good

Spoiler: Don't look @snorky

Commercial growers gas them with ethylene, so they go red even if they're not ripe, which is what we're doing with bananananas really so don't expect the flavour to be up to much.

I only do it to get stuff ready for the show

 

Ah, right. I think I might not have explained myself very well - my original question was not about ripening green toms once picked, but about possible ways to ripen the whole truss while it's still on the vine - just so as to be able to snip off the truss in one nice, ripe bunch, rather than taking individual toms as they become ripe.

More for aesthetic reasons that anything else tbh.

I'm not keen on the commercial ethylene option, or of hanging banana skins on the vine to achieve this naturally, if it'll turn them red but produce an inferior tasting tom.

I guess I'll just stick to picking off toms a couple at a time and forget about showing off my nice, ripe full trusses! Is this what everyone else does?

Cheers.

 

Yep