Tomato Growing 2025

Next weekend or the weekend after for me. Need to decide on a shortlist....


Outside: nagina F1, merry gold F1, aurora and alfresco. So two blight resistant ones and I'll try a couple of plants of the other two which are bush tomatoes. Theses will be outside in pots and under my pop up greenhouse if I can get another year out of it. Or I just do blight resistant only which would be the sensible option

Inside: sungold, honeycomb, rosella. For cherries, maybe just two though.
Banan krasnyi - prolific Russian plum
Berner rose - supposed to be highly rated, tried once and it did not do well for me but want to try it again
Godorst sibiri- pride of Siberia, early and tasty beefsteak
Azoychka - early and prolific and tasty orange beefsteak
Bloody butcher - early and prolific salad tom.

So only aurora, alfresco and merry gold will be new to me, I tried aurora once and it got blighted before I could eat anything.

 

You've reminded me I have some san marzano redorta seeds from years ago, I might try germinating them and trying one plant to refresh the seeds for future years

 

I organised my seeds over the weekend and made my selection for this year.

Grown before:

Sungold F1 - orange cherry.
Green Zebra - green/yellow stripe medium, my favourite, I grow it every year.
Gardener's Delight - the OG red cherry which was revived by the forum a few years ago, again an all-time favourite.
Auntie Madge's - small red plum, a new favourite, very heavy cropper.
Michael Pollan (also known as Mint Julep) - green/yellow stripe pear, grew it last year and giving it another try as it wasn't particularly productive for me, similar flavour to Green Zebra.

New to me:
Garnet - dark cherry.
Santiam Sunrise - orange cherry.
Sgt. Pepper's - heart shaped pink/purple.

Tiny Tim - my only dwarf this year, a red cherry, already sown and enjoying life on a sunny windowsill.

The rest are vines and will be sown on St Patrick's day as usual.

 

Substituted a couple of no-shows and that's that for this year. Everything that grew is now potted up. Got my first open flower on one of the micros.

 

@Loofah Sorry, I've borrowed them until my new ones arrive. They're doing a good job on my chillis at the moment.

 

Sowed my tomato seeds in cells in the heated prop today, along with some chillies and peppers, feels like the season is now getting into gear.

 

I also sowed my tomatoes in the propagator yesterday. Cut back on the no. of varieties tho so for me it's Sungold, Choc. Cherry and Tumbling tom this year. All grown in the unheated GH and usually give a good harvest.........fingers crossed this year will be good too.

 

Conned by the warm sunny weather I sowed my 'Gardeners Delight' toms yesterday & put them in the plastic mini-greenhouse in the most sheltered corner of the balcony. I read today that from next week winter weather will make a return! I should have known better & waited till the 21st as I have done other years! Now I will be forced to bring them inside the flat till the end of April (or the seedlings! )

 

Oops! Might have just sown an extra half dozen seeds, as "back-up".

Meanwhile, the December sown micros are going into their final pots, mostly destined for new homes.

 

Sown them all today

Roll on July for the first harvests I guess

 

I sowed Gardener's Delight, Tigrella and Golden sunrise on 22/23 Feb in a heated propagator in my unheated greenhouse. All the Tigrella and GS have germinated, but the GD has had a very poor germination rate. Same compost etc. It's this year's batch from D T Brown, who are normally excellent. I think 3 are through so far.

 

Was going for the big sow today buts its freezing cold again so sod that. Problem is room, peppers already into their 2 ltr pots and the Vitapods full too