Tomatoes, direct-sown

[digitS']

If you wanted to try, which variety would you choose?

It is almost unimaginable to me to have the opportunity to sow tomato seeds in the garden and ripen a crop. Volunteers are kept every year and less than half the time will I get a single ripe tomato. Too often, I don't know what the volunteer is until that moment, just before first frost. Sometimes, I don't know then since there are so many hybrids in the patch each year.

Here's one I know will work. I even made it more difficult, tilling it's bed, early and late: Coyote!

This is what Tomato Growers has to say about it: Delightful little cherry tomatoes are creamy ivory with hints of yellow and an absolutely unforgettable taste. The flavor is not only sweet but is also marked by a fruity complexity. ... Indeterminate. 65 days.

It probably isn't 65 days but Tomato Growers is in Florida so ...

Here's one I used to grow: Gold Nugget. Territorial is in Oregon and they say: Always among the first to ripen, Gold Nugget attains an unusually rich, sweet flavor when mature. Vigorous and determinate.

Determinant means that the plants would produce then die! But, that was from greenhouse starts.

Both of these are amazingly quick! What would you direct-sow?

Steve

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

I was walking past the compost bin this morning and there are 2 tomato plants that came up from seed and covered with flowers. I have no idea what they are. Most likely a San Marzano or cherry tomato from last year. They look healthier than the rest of the tomato plants in the garden. If I had covered that spot and knew there were tomato seeds going to sprout, I bet they would have been producing long ago.

 

[digitS']

From yesterday, this is a ripe Coyote fruit.

It is embarrassing to admit what happened to this plant's relatives. I can't blame the tractor guy because it was me tilling the garden this year. It was June before the bed was planted, Rogue the rototiller and I went through the bed sometime about the middle of June and destroyed the weeds and tomato volunteers!

Two Coyote seeds sprouted after that. The small plants are only about 8 weeks old (56 days?!) and I'm thankful to have them. I can save 2016 seed from them ... even that very first ripe tomato! However, frost has never hit my garden before about 8/28 and that was years ago ... As warm as it is this year, these Coyote plants have another 6 weeks of growth, not 10 days . There will be lots more of these tiny cherries .

Steve

 

[Ridgerunner]

If you wanted to try, which variety would you choose?



Both of these are amazingly quick! What would you direct-sow?

Steve

Which one do you most want to eat?

It's an intriguing thought but I'm not sure how it would work for me. Most years I struggle to get as much tomato production as early as I can before the heat and dry sets in, which means most plants stop production until the cool of fall. If I can keep them alive during the heat and dry I get a respectable percentage of my annual harvest after things cool off and they start to set back on. That means I need to get the transplants out as early as possible. If I direct-sow I would almost certainly not get that early harvest before the heat sets in.

Occasionally I leave a volunteer where it sprouts and have even moved a few. I hardly ever get decent production form them, probably climate-timing related as much as variety. Or they turn out to be a cherry tomato. The only cherry I want is the one I plant next to the garden gate so I can eat a few when I go in and out. I get more from that plant than I can eat. The cherries usually continue to produce during he heat, which is a good thing, but I just don't use them other than fresh eating. For fresh eating, I think cherries are hard to top.

 

[so lucky]

Some years I have volunteers cropping up everywhere. This year I only had a handful. If left to grow, or transplanted, they never do much. I presume because they are from hybrid seed. A direct-sown cherry would be fine. I could do that.

 

[digitS']

Coyote.

It's such an unusual flavor. Oh, it's "tomato" but Coyote is different than anything I have ever grown.

Gold Nugget is fine. A nice, productive cherry but it is a determinant. I hated watching them die after producing all that fruit! However, if they were direct-sown, frost would be what would take them out.

Of course the local environment influences but varieties respond differently. Not a great deal differently but some. (I don't live and have never gardened in the South.) There is good reason to start plants early ... but, there just might be reason to drop a seed, here and there.
'
Steve

 

[thistlebloom]

I just went to Tomato Growers Supply and ordered next years tomatoes. Coyote was the reason for going there but I found all kinds of fun stuff! I blame Steve.

I think Coyote will be a fun one for the kids to grow.

 

[Chickie'sMomaInNH]

this year i have a plan to pre-plant my tomatoes so they will sprout for next spring when they feel the conditions are right for them. i never got around to putting what i wanted in the garden & the few i bought stayed in their pots & eventually dried out too much to bother transplanting.

i let the volunteer tomatoes take over & i have many clusters of Roma type tomatoes but they certainly aren't determinants! i have yet to plant tomatoes in that bed since the 1st year we moved in & every year i get a few volunteers. this year even with the 'severe drought' that they say were are in i have only had to touch that area a couple times with the hose. they willed themselves to come up through a thick layer of coop cleanout that never got tilled when it should, & had i tilled it i still would have volunteers. earlier this week they appeared to be getting lighter green & i'm hoping that means i will be getting some ripe 'maters soon!

 

[Gardening with Rabbits]

I just went to Tomato Growers Supply and ordered next years tomatoes. Coyote was the reason for going there but I found all kinds of fun stuff! I blame Steve.

I think Coyote will be a fun one for the kids to grow.

I will be buying Coyote and Kimberly and I blame Steve too. lol

 

[Blue-Jay]

That's the thing about tomatoes. They need that extra 7 or 8 weeks of growing time that you give them by starting them in early April under your grow lights. By the time you set them out in the garden they are almost two months old already, and have a few early blossoms on them. Last year in 2015 I had some volunteer "Gardeners Delight" that produced tomatoes although not as large of a volume that they would normally do starting in early September. I got the "Gardeners Delight" a large cherry type tomato from a fellow in Israel. They do seem to mature faster than most vareties of tomatoes that I've seen. I wonder about direct seeding these real tiny tomato varieties. You know the kind that can be grown in small flower pots. I got some seed from a gal in Indiana a couple of years ago. I haven't grown them but she called them the worlds tiniest tomato. How about one called "Spoon" tomato. Supposed to produce ripe tomatoes in 65 days. 10 of them will fit in a spoon. They are probably about the size of a Currant. Supposed to be very flavorful also.