Name Your Heirloom Tomatoes For This Year!

[the lemon tree]

I got a little carried away at the garden shop and picked up a few varieties I didn't plan on growing so unfortunately I have to get rid of a handful on my original list.

Now the important question at hand is:

BLACK KRIM OR BLACK PRINCE?

What do YOU prefer?

 

[barefootgardener]

. . . Keeping fingers crossed I have a better garden year than last, for tomatoes..

Ginny

for you Ginny!

Please do the best you can keeping track of your varieties in the garden. An heirloom could be defined as "handed down in the family" or "unique to a particular part of the the world." Knowing the performance of these could and should be of interest to your gardening neighbors and family members - maybe, for years and years to come.

Don't be like me last year and get the Yellow Submarines mixed up with the Ildi's in a hopeless situation . And, I was looking forward to establishing the Yellow Submarine as a family heirloom .

I've had good tomato gardening years for about the last 3 or 4. That's what lures me into having 29 varieties of heirlooms and hybrids this year. (That and the example and encouragement of others .) It would take courage to make a commitment like you have after 1 or 2 bad seasons. Bravo!

for your tomatoes!

Steve

Steve, Thank you for the words of encouragement. I appreciate it. After all the hard work I put into last years garden, along with all the Heirloom Tomatoes I had growing..It was a huge disapoinment..Critter/deer problems..(despite a fence) weather..etc..What Tomatos that survived did not ripen, except for one Aunt Rubys GG and some cherries..

After that, I told myself I was not going to have a big garden this year..Getting a little older and less flexible..Grin..
But you know how addicting garden can be..and I have been gardening for many years..After resting over winter..The urge and madness begins again..

I am keeping records of all my Heirloom plants I started from seed..Dates when sowed , names, germination..who and where the seeds came from, and also taking pics at various stages of growth..

I also made sure to label all plants..Twice..By Marking on the containers and also w/ a marked and labeled small wooden clothespin/popsickle stick...but I do have a few , that as luck w/have it..The label faded and the markers came out..So those tomatoes will be grown w/ a question mark, as to what variety they are..Until I get mature, ripe tomatoes, and figure out what they are..I guess out of more than 250 tomato plants, that is not to bad..

I have been growing Heirlooms for at least the past 20 years..And have grown a # of diff. varieties of H. Tom's..But this is the first time I am trying to grow that many varieties in one year...Call me crazy!!

I will be saving seed..unbagged..And if all turns out well, I will have plenty to trade, or share..

I am so glad you had a great garden these past few years..I always look forward to your post's/pictures and enjoy reading them..

Happy Gardening!

Ginny

 

[barefootgardener]

I got a little carried away at the garden shop and picked up a few varieties I didn't plan on growing so unfortunately I have to get rid of a handful on my original list.

Now the important question at hand is:

BLACK KRIM OR BLACK PRINCE?

What do YOU prefer?

Why not both? ..GRIN...
mato forums
I have not tried BP..But I love BK, and grow every year..I have to say, I am a member of several tomato forums, and the word on Black Prince, is it is just OK on flavor compared to other Blacks..HTH

Ginny

 

[mistyfeather]

i will be putting out some mister strippey , cherokee purple, and brandywhine this year , i did not get an early jump on things like i usualy do i guess i will have more hybrids this year
i am new on this site and must say that this is a cool post!

 

[ninnymary]

I've planted:

Hillbilly - 2 of them, my favorite
black krim - first time
garden peach - first time
roma
stupice - first time


Also, early girl (because they are my fail proof ones) and San Francisco Fog (suppose to do well in my area)

Wished I had more room for more!

Mary

 

[HunkieDorie23]

Its official, next year I will plant no less then 30 tomato plants because you guys have me interested in SOOOOOOO many new types now!!!!!!!

I am definitely growing Black Krim next year, maybe some bradywine.

 

[Kim_NC]

I'm testing these heirlooms for the first time this season
White Queen
Basinga
Black Seaman
Mountain Spring
Mountain Gold
Aunt Ruby's German Green
Dr Carolyn (yellow cherry shape)

And growing these again - kind of 'standard' in our gardens each season
Brandywine
German Johnson
Mr Stripey
Yellow Pear
Green Zebra
Roma
Grape

Cherokee Purple - inspite of their popularity, I've 'sworn off' this variety. They just split too much. By that I mean just before fully ripening, they split open, spoiling the fruit. The little scarring around the top that some heirlooms have, which still allows the fruit to fully ripen, doesn't bother me.

We're also growing some popular hybrids. Over half of our tomatoes have blooms and/or small green tomatoes.

 

[the lemon tree]

Cherokee Purple - inspite of their popularity, I've 'sworn off' this variety. They just split too much. By that I mean just before fully ripening, they split open, spoiling the fruit. The little scarring around the top that some heirlooms have, which still allows the fruit to fully ripen, doesn't bother me.

I've never grown Cherokee Purple before, but am planning to this year. Do you think I could avoid the splitting by harvesting the fruit earlier and letting them ripen off-vine?

 

[digitS']

Kim will know better than I do about Cherokee Purple (especially since I've never grown them ). But, I believe that harvesting early will help with the splitting, Lemon Tree.

My garden environment makes tomatoes especially prone to splitting . I water with sprinklers, the soil is very porous, and I usually can only schedule irrigation on 2 days out of the week. It is also a dry growing season here.

Some tomato varieties will just split, split, split. So, I grow those that don't . . . or, at least, aren't likely to split.

After growing SunSugars for a half dozen years, I grew Sungolds to compare with them in 'o9. I didn't have much trouble with them splitting but other gardeners have complained about Sungolds and their splitting. What I did notice was that they have a little tougher skin than SunSugars. SunSugars almost never split.
A tender skin is no reason to expect a tomato to split. Yay ! In fact, the opposite may be true: the tender skin may have more "give" to it. I don't know.

Ruffled tomatoes DO seem to split more readily. I grow Thessaloniki, which is an heirloom but perfectly round. It just never splits.

I also grew Maltese last year and was real happy with it. It had only a small chance of developing splits. I think we could call its shape "oblate" but, whereas Thessaloniki is only about 7 or 8 ounces, I had one Maltese that was 1 3/4 pound. There were probably none as small as 7 ounces, so you can find large, old-fashioned heirlooms that aren't inclined to split. Thessaloniki and Maltese are early-ripening Mediterranean varieties.

I always enjoy talking about tomatoes but I'm probably prattling on here because I'm afraid that Cherokee Purple will split in my garden and may not even have time to ripen, so I'm feeling deprived . I should grow one called "Green with Envy" but it would probably split . . .

Steve

 

[the lemon tree]

I have to shamefully admit that I have relatively limited experience growing tomatoes (or anything for that reason) so I'm hoping to learn a lot through this season's trials and errors. After all, as C.S. Lewis said, "Experience is a brutal teacher. But you learn, my God, do you learn." Until then, I refer often to my steadfast, always reliable knowledge-of-all-things guru known only as " The Google" to answer most of my encumbering questions about growing these specimens. From my research, it seems that splitting can be partly attributed to inconsistent watering (which you addressed, digitS). Since I'll be doing most of my growing in Earthboxes this year, I'm hoping the self-watering feature will minimize that. As a last resort, I'll pick them a little early and hope that they'll taste just as delicious as their vine-ripened counterparts. Either way, split or unsplit, I can't wait for the first bite into my first ripened homegrown tomato. I look forward to posting pictures of my harvest!