THE TOMATO GROWING THREAD 2018

Taste much nicer than the supermarket rubbish. First ever homegrown. Can't wait to eat more.

 

First lot of Moneymakers to turn red





And my first San Marzano



I have a question though. Have I still got time to grow more as I have loads of flowers and tiny tomatoes on other plants but the weather here in the North East not been to good.

 

Should I even purchase a little paraffin heater to try and help?

 

Calm down a bit Jane

We're only 3 weeks into Summer. I was picking Tomatos well into November last year with no artificial help at all.

 

Were you really! Just seems the weather here is awful so I was getting rather worried about the time lol

 

My edge of village polytunnel tomatoes normally finish early October when the first frost wipes them out.

A couple of years ago there was almost a frost towards the end of August.

Another year I had -3 deg C in the first week of June.

 

Funny thing is that at the end of the season the plants are much tougher than at the beginning.
So they tend to be able to put up with lower temps and poorer conditions than those tender plants you planted in early May.

In recent times I've found blight to wipe the plants out a long time before the weather does, I used to be able to pick outdoor toms in early Nov some years, but in recent years the weather has been so damp that last year blight wiped them out in early Sept.

 

Most of my plants have now started setting fruit i think the only exception is San Marzano. The only ones that have produced ripe fruit are the Gartenperle. I'll be doing them again next year. The next most productive appear to be aurora and these were germinated quite a bit later than the others as they were a last minute addition. So two candidates for next year so far. As they're both bush types they're also pretty low maintenance. I will see how the rest turn out and see if there are any other winners.

 

I've been picking fruit for about a month; first was Sungold, followed by Tumbling Tom (both red and yellow), then Orkado and Sweet Aparitif at about the same time. Only had two Black Russian (one had blossom end rot). All but Black Russian are yielding well so far......gonna have to make some chutney as we can't keep up with eating them now!

 

I decided I wasn't growing any toms this year, I only really do outdoor ones and blight has been pretty nasty for the last few years.
Anyway, I came across a plant called "mountain magic", supposedly blight resistant.
First fruit ripening now.

If it is anything like a blight resistant variety I tried a few years ago it will be pretty awful, and that one didn't turn out to be blight resistant either.

 

From the 2017 tomato taste thread:

 

Ahhh, but was it grown outdoors with almost zero watering and temps of 28C plus for weeks.

I live in hope.