Re: Tomato Tuesday 2012

Nonna.PapaVino 6/13/2012, 8:43 pm

GWN, when my tomatoes are young, I stick a straight stick (or broken aluminum arrow shaft) into the soil next to them, and weave a piece of acrylic yarn around the two of them. The stick keeps the tomato straight until I put it into the garden and surround it with a tomato cage. Doesn't hurt to leave the original stick in place. Does this help?

quiltbea 6/13/2012, 8:52 pm

@GWN......I have metal fence posts at the two ends of each northernmost row of my beds. I attached a wire from one to the other across the rows about 4-6" up from the soil. I attach my string to that bottom wire.

Tomato Tuesday 2012 - Page 5 05-23-14

You can see the wire running from one end to the other in this photo.

I tried using those long garden staples one year, tying the twine to the staple and hammering it into the soil. The staple often popped out during the season.

CapeCoddess 6/13/2012, 8:56 pm

the boxes are 10" high. But the middle scrap piece that I found is only 8".

I have TONS of yarn! Every color. Use to be a knitter until it kept hurting my fingers. Arthur, ya know... Rolling Eyes

OK, I'll use yarn. Now for something to tie them up to. I'll come up with something. Plenty of time. Altho, I have to say, when I planted them yesterday I laid them down like Mel says to do and today they have their little heads up off their pillows. I love you

CC

memart1 6/13/2012, 9:33 pm

I have trellis netting on conduit frames for my trellis. Quiltbea -- how about the selvage edges of your quilting material. My mother always used scraps from sewing, and I am using some fabric I was given (I don't think it was all-cotton). I just tear strips about 1-1/2 inches wide and tie the tomatoes loosely.

quiltbea 6/13/2012, 9:46 pm

@memart.......When I staked my tomatoes, I always used strips of spare cloth to tie the stems to the stakes. Being a quilter, I have lots of scraps. But I prefer the nylon tomato string when stringing. Smooth, strong, no threads to catch in the plant.

Goosegirl 6/14/2012, 1:11 pm

CapeCoddess wrote:I have TONS of yarn! Every color. Use to be a knitter until it kept hurting my fingers. Arthur, ya know...
CC

Arthur cut into my knitting time as well - isn't he a pest?! tongue

Used yarn for the grids in my tomato boxes last year. Went with dull brown. Maybe I should use yarn colors that match the tomato colors: Yellow, purple, orange, red, and white!

GG

Nonna.PapaVino 6/14/2012, 9:40 pm

Re: yarn in the garden: acrylic lasts and lasts; wool will degrade into good compost. With some all-wool yarn, I like to cut some leftovers into small sections, pull them apart and decorate the bushes in springtime. The birds pluck the fibers off and use them in nesting. Just yesterday morning, PapaVino called my attention to a lady chickadee industriously pulling dog hair out of the mat by the front door and taking it to wherever she was setting up housekeeping.

CapeCoddess 6/16/2012, 5:19 pm

I just bot 3 more tomatoes...what is WRONG with me??? All good size Sungolds for $1 ea! BUT...no MM to speak of.

Sooooo....I used unfinished compost (UC) to fill the other half the new box. I filled most of the box with the UC, then spread a little finished compost where the toms were going, laid the toms on top of that, poured the last bit of my MM over the roots and stems, and surrounded each little bed with UC and made blankets & pillows for the leafy ends of the toms with more UC.

The top half is the new makeshift garden:
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The buried stems are as long as the leafy part!
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Do you think this will work with all the UC? I can still change it. I have more finished compost...just no more MM.
CC

**Turan** 6/17/2012, 1:58 am

I hope it works. I stuck 9 orphan tomato plants in various pots full of corral shovelings.

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**Turan** 6/17/2012, 2:24 am

the sweet million in the hoop house has a cluster of green tomatoes.
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CapeCoddess 6/17/2012, 5:47 pm

Turan, you mean your corral shovelings are fresh? Not aged?
CC

**Turan** 6/17/2012, 6:02 pm

CapeCoddess wrote:Turan, you mean your corral shovelings are fresh? Not aged?
CC

It is from an area that has not been cleaned in a few years. So it has aged to various degrees. There is some fresh in there but I sorted out the most obvious apples. They are not looking happy today, maybe because the wind is howling and maybe because the soil is too heavy and wet or maybe transplant shock.
How are yours doing?

CapeCoddess 6/17/2012, 6:32 pm

Well, the one with the biggest pillow is not looking good at all. So I took out his pillow hoping that's what was causing the droop. The other two look good so far. I watered them like crazy this morning, but I'm mostly concerned about nitrogen depletion, but there are alot of coffee grounds in it. Plus I'm not sure if the compost will continue to breakdown or not at such at shallow depth of 6-8 inches. Guess it's an experiment.

We have hi winds here, too, a lot of the time. It's one reason I like the raised beds and don't mind the soil line being much lower than the top of the box.

CC

herblover 6/19/2012, 9:25 am

I use strips cut from old cotton t-shirts as ties; they are strong, smooth, and 1 shirt will give me eoungh ties for the toms and peppers.

My toms all have fruit on them; and the plants haven's even been in a month! We have had inconsistent weather (hot, cool, now HHH again!)

herblover 6/26/2012, 1:39 pm

Me again! Not much news except the toms are growing and all have fruit but none ripe yet.

WolfHeart 6/26/2012, 4:20 pm

Same here, Lots of fruit no ripe ones as of yet. I did have on disaster though, I was trimming the tomatoes after vacation and trimmed one branch and the bunch of toms that were resting on it apparently didn't like it and fell ripping away the 'skin' of the plant for a few inches Rolling Eyes

Here's to hoping that I don't cause further damage Tomato Tuesday 2012 - Page 5 3170584802

CindiLou 6/26/2012, 6:07 pm

I gots tomato Tomato Tuesday 2012 - Page 5 889526

Just a cherry but I ate it lol...have some on all of my plants now.

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Windsor.Parker 6/27/2012, 1:21 pm

This indeterminate variety is the "Bonnie Best"! Four plants were started "way too early" in mid-January, indoors, from 2010 seed. The seedlings were part of a "late Winter - early Spring experiment using deep water culture (DWC) hydroponics, and self-watering containers (SWC). Two went into a 17 gal. DWC, and two went into 5 gal. SWC. We've been eating their fruit for nearly 2 weeks.
Here's a pic of a couple of tomatoes before they became tomato salad!
Tomato Tuesday 2012 - Page 5 Bonnie10

laurainwinona 6/27/2012, 3:58 pm

Lost my two Amish Pastes, and wound up buying two Romas to replace them. The one Beefsteak I had left finally perked up and is doing nicely now. All are still small and have no blooms or tomatoes yet. Sigh.

herblover 7/10/2012, 9:33 am

Finally a break in the brutal heat so hopefully my toms will begin ripening! Lots of them and the plants look great.

yolos 7/10/2012, 9:39 am

I have six diferent varietes planted. Some hierloom and some hybrid. A few are just about ready to pick.

This is the brandywine.
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This is the early girl.
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quiltbea 7/11/2012, 10:16 am

No red toms yet but several green ones.

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above: My earliest producing ones are the Green Zebras.

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Next to them, my Red Zebras as smaller and producing a bit later.

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Above: My Chico III has some good sized toms. Its a determinate. The drawstring bags over the toms are to be sure they do no cross-pollinate so I can save seeds this year.

All in all, I'm happy with their progress here in zone 5a southern Maine.

yolos 7/11/2012, 10:44 am

Quiltbea - I do not see how your bag with all the large holes would keep the toms from cross pollinating. I thought the wind or vibration can help with pollination. So couldn't the pollen fall thru the holes in your bag ?? thinking

quiltbea 7/11/2012, 12:45 pm

@yolos.....Those holes are very tiny and small enough to keep insects out. Toms and peppers are self-pollinating. They will pollinate themselves if no insects cross them with other pollen. I just have to keep insects from doing that, hence the bags.

Usually I remove the bags when the fruits start forming and tag the branch with a colorful piece of yarn to mark it. But this year I am keeping the bags on even as the fruits are growing. I want to defeat any hornworms or other insects that can harm the fruit itself.

edited to add: I've done this in the past and it works just fine.

MasonGarden 7/12/2012, 6:18 pm

I'm a little late this week, but happy to report that my Brandywine plant has FINALLY decided to put out some fruit now that we are in the upper-80s/low-90s instead of 100+ degrees. Now, if i can keep the squirrels from getting their greedy hands on them before I do!

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Tomato Tuesday 2012