Tomato Growing Thread 2012

A bit like this man (sorry for poor quality but I was up in the gods in the cheap seats last night):

 

Scrungee: My affected plants have the same problem as yours:

I've pulled up one plant (Black Krim) it was the worse affected and even the leaves were blackened. Apart from Ferline all my other outdoor varieties are suffering with it in varying degrees, but the blackening appeared a couple of weeks ago and hasn't got any worse. The top growth is nice and green and healthy on all my remaining outdoor plants. I've had a few ripened fruit off them so it doesn't seem to be terminal.

Are you growing Ferline?, it's supposed to have some resistance against blight and so far mine are not affected by this disease. However my two Ferline plants have yet to yield any ripened fruit.

Here are my outdoor plants, with the Ferline on the right, about 5 foot tall:

 

My indoor plants are also very variable. Some varieties are doing well and others are yet to ripen.


This photo taken with a fish eye lens:


Most of my plants have reached the apex of the greenhouse and now being trained down the other side. I'm getting a few fruit, but by this time of year I'm usually inundated.

This year has shown that it's useful to grow different varieties because my old favourite Gardeners Delight hasn't been very prolific, also Sungold have been tiny, like marbles. Some of the others have more than made up for it though, this lot I picked yesterday.

 

Nice one Angelina

Sheal, yes it's definately the weather. We just haven't had enough sunshine.

 

It's time to think about stopping (nipping out the top shoot of) your tomato plants now folks, if you haven't already done so.

'Stopping' the plant diverts it's energy into the developing fruit rather than new leaves.

Timing depends on your first frost date, in Surrey that's usually mid-October, so really there is little point in leaving any more flowers on the plants as they just won't develop in time. However if you like green tomatoes for chutney or are in warmer locations hang on for a couple more weeks.

This applies to cordon types. If you have bush varieties just let them do their own thing.