2013 Tomato Growing

My Red Robins have been prolific croppers but their taste is bland to say it kindly. I will not grow them next year. Prefer Maskotkas any day,
Jenny

 

here's a piccie of them...


Anyone else growing them? Are they doing it right for you?
Jenny

 

Now the nights are getting colder I am wondering whether these tomatoes ( including Angelo) will ripen now? Such a shame as they are quite a decent size.
I would welcome your thoughts on this please,
Jenny

 

The 4 Maskotkas I planted in a window box decided they wanted to be cordons and had to be transplanted into pots, are very straggly and have only produced 3 ripe tomatoes.

 

Scrungee, I was referring to my Red Robins (#1443),
Jenny

 

End of year report part 1

Greenhouse Toms are getting to the end of their useful life & grey mold is appearing, so Ive started to clear them out to give as much light & space for chillies.

The first four plants to go are:
Roma: Done quite well, reasonable amount of fruit but huge amounts of green leafage & quite difficult to manage in the greenhouse with limited space, which I should have expected as its a determinate (Bushy) type.
Burpee Big Boy: First of my seeds from the USA, plants started well & grew huge but ultimately didnt produce a huge number of fruit (about 12-15, of which only 4 or 5 were of any size). Stem was over an inch thick at the time of cutting it down.
Brandywine Black: Difficult to germinate, I think my seed is a bit old. Grew nicely & produced some big fruit early on. Seemed to stall after that & in the end only produced 10-12 fruit, although all of them were a reasonable size.
Alicante: A favourite of mine, this plant went "strange", loosing its growing tip & then producing fruiting trusses right at the base of the plant. Despite that I had a reasonable amount of fruit (20-30) & they tasted ok.

Heres a picture of the rootballs from the Quadgrow once I had removed them from the greenhouse (in the same order as above) :

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Its clear that roma put on a huge amount of root, Big boy & Brandywine are about the same & Alicante has struggled a bit.

I think I made a couple of mistakes here - I started these plants too early for the weather (they went outside in April, and although I heat the greenhouse, its only to 7-8'c) & started the full strength nutrient feed too early 'cos Brandywine was starting to fruit heavily but the others were a little behind - since they share the water / feed reservoir they all get the same mix. This caused them to green up but not produce as much fruit as they could. I also dont have the space for growing Roma in the greenhouse.

Not sure what happened to the Big boy - the plant was strong, it just didnt seem to like the variations in temperature we have had day/ night this year (its been 40'c in the greenhouse in the day, but down to 15'c at night) - it seemed to perk up once the really hot spell was over.

So for next year, I might try four brandywine (new seed - maybe different types ?) in one quadgrow & see if that works better. Atleast, thats what Im thinking today...

 

Just back from hols and a bit of a review so far for info ...

Sun Baby - ripened early, excellent crop and excellent taste. Always reliable for me, this is my 'banker' tom. Been eating them and giving to neighbours for a while. Plenty more to come.

Ailsa Craig - earlyish ripening, good crop but the taste is bland and it is very fleshy (not something I personally like in a tomato). My first time growing this. Is this variety always fleshy?? If so I may give this a miss in future.

Alicante - Crop looks good but only 1 tomato near to being edible, rest are green. We'll see about the taste but a great disappointment this year. Doubt if many will ripen somehow.

Marmande - Not a bad crop, late to ripen, have eaten a few and the taste seems very good but time will tell. Plants don't look as sturdy as they should somehow.

All in all I think this is going to be a bit of a disappointing year on the tomato front. Was at my brother's in London recently and tasted his lot (he's a very experinced veg grower) and all of his tomatoes were really not anything special either, only Pomadoro were lovely tasting and top quality out of his 10+ varieties.

I was expecting with this lovely summer that the crop would be a good one, but seems not, at least for me. Just shows how deceptive things can be. Seems from my scanning of this thread that others have had a tricky year as well

I'm off on hols again next week so hope that when I return there will be a spectacular tasty crop from all my toms to come home to! Bit of wishful thinking in gardeners la-la-land I know, secretly just hoping they will survive ok and produce enough for some bottling etc.

Cheers
GG

 

My Tomatoes will just not ripen. I have had Gardner's Delite and Alicante, both grown against the south wall of the conservatory (outdoors) they are in 1/2 grow bags turned on the end, both have had lots of lush green growth and have fruited well all be it varying size fruits on same plant, however, I have only had 3 or 4 fruits that have ripened on each, they have been fruiting for well over 6 weeks now.

I doubt now that the cooler weather has come that they will ever ripen on the plant.

 

Thank you for your report FC,
I think your Millefleur may come neck and neck with Sungold for flavour. Hope to be able to swap mine for yours. Sungold are F1's though and I understand may not come true,
Jenny

 

FC it's good to know it's not just me.
Seems we have a very similar experience with Ailsa Craig and Marmande and I'm wondering if your Millefleur and my Sun Baby are a similar beast, they certain look similar.

I'm looking forward to what the end of season recommendations will be from everyone as I'm planning to grow a lot more varieties next year if I can sort out a favourable extra bed ...

Cheers
GG

 

@Gdnam I use the old banana skin trick works for me!