Tomato Growing Thread 2023

When potting up my lot (Sweet Olive and Big Mama) I found one Big Mama looking very sad and leggy as it was further away from the grow lamps. I threw it to wolves (blowaway greenhouse) a week ago, now it's sturdy and has a very good green colour

The daytime temperatures have been about 10-15C and nightime lows 3-5C. The greenhouse doesn't keep much heat but at least gives some protection from the winds.

But agree that normally Toms dislike outings when it's below 15C.

 

It is the lows that do it, not the highs, 4.5c overnight is, as you say, too cold, mid 20s during the day is fine along with good light.

The trouble I'm finding this year is low daytime temperatures, under glass, due to no decent sunshine, a temperature of 7c during the night and 8c during a cold cloudy day just lets the plants stagnate.

 

Well, here I am, one year to the week since contracting COVID and it's got me again, so this year, I'll be unable to taste the following;

Anna's Multiflora
Baby Boomer F1
Besser
Big Sungold Select
Black Hole Sun
Black Truffle
Blk Russian Cherry
Bloody Butcher
Brad
Cherry Roma
Cossack
Dark Stripe Micro
Dean's Jack i/t Box
Der Kleine Doctor
Dwf Mary's Cherry
Fat Frog
Florida Petite
Galina's
Gardeners Delight (JWK)
Gerald's Mystery
Gobstopper
Haley's Sweet Mystery
Haley's Winbox
Harzfeuer
Isis Candy
Karos
Latah
Lost Marbles
Mango Lassi
Minibel
Miss Kennedy
Moment Micro
Petite Chocolate
Pineapple Fog
RK's Purple Sugar
Ron's Carbon Copy
Santiam Sunrise
Sci-Fi 2007
Mystery Purple
Tamina
Tumbling Monsters
Xmas Purple Grapes
Zauberstab

Still waiting for Flonda to germinate.

 

These Burpee Big Boys have been growing under LED lights in an indoor tent for about four weeks, so I am starting to acclimate them to eventually go into the greenhouse.

 

Now you're making me doubt myself. Maybe I should take a look at the other 200 varieties in my seed box and pick a few more? Would hate to be left short.

 

Mine today. Sown 12.03. I was away for 9 days, those were sitting in a small greenhouse inside not to dry out, and became leggy. Now recovered. Short ones are dwarf varieties. Another 8 sown 15.04. See 3 of them out already.

 

I sowed a couple of seeds I saved from the very short Bloody Butcher plant last year. I also planted a seed from my original, purchased packet as a control. The saved seeds have produced very much more compact plants than the control. The short-arsed ones are flowering earlier, too. Wracking my brain to think if something could have cross pollinated with BB a couple of years back. The only candidate would be Stupice ( all the others nearby were regular leaf and any cross would produce the dominant regular leaf at F1) and there isn't much difference in plant size between Stupice and BB. Really interested to see if the new short plants crop as impressively as their parent. #nerd

 

My Florida Petite micro is making flowers at just 15cm tall. Bless!

 

My sungold tomatoes are nearly ripe. These weren't grown from seed this year, I took cuttings last autumn and overwintered them on a windowsill.

I was intending to just use them as cutting material this spring, but I let them flower and fruit.

 

Ripe cherries in April! How jammy is that?

 

I'm bringing the tomato seedlings in at night & putting them out in the morning. They seem to be colouring up a little now & becoming a little firmer, but the will never be the short, stocky plants they should be & have been other years. I've grown toms on the balcony for the last 20 years.

 

Even though I've grown toms for over 20 years on our balcony I'd never heard of such a thing being done before! I've always grown them from seed very year; never did it occur to me you could save cuttings over winter!

It's hardly worth the effort but as our kitchen window gets practically all the available sunlight all year round from about 1pm, I could give it a try this winter, even though I've still got loads of seeds of 'Gardener's Delight' left I bought online last year. Just as an experiment! Might be fun!

 

It isn't something I've ever tried before. I was watching a Charles Dowding video on YouTube and he pointed out in passing a hybrid tomato in his greenhouse which had been discontinued and he explained how he takes cuttings each autumn so he can keep growing it.

Since I'd used up all my sungold seeds I thought I'd try for myself and it was very easy. I popped some side shoots in water to root, then potted them up in compost. The cuttings just sat on the windowsill all winter with an occasional watering. I wasn't expecting them to fruit so early though. I hope they taste good.