Tomatoes. Tomatoes are my bane.
We’re past the last average frost date, which my local weatherman says is 4/30/21, but despite most days being above 40, we’ve had a few nights that are flirting with frost. This week alone we’ve had (or will have) two nights near 34F. Augh! I’ve had to bring in my nasturtiums and tomatoes that I’ve been hardening off. The calendulas and zinnias would have liked to have gone inside as well, but they are already scattered throughout the garden, as well as the basils. Luckily I have plenty of back-ups of the basils and zinnias and calendulas are not hard to grow from seed outside.
My tomatoes, however, are another story. (Sigh. Tomatoes.) I can’t even eat fresh tomatoes due to acid reflux issues (cooked tomatoes are easier on my stomach) but I’m determine to grow tomatoes, as they are easy to grow in my climate and I want to be able to put up some sauce for winter. I’ve also got tomatillos growing, but they won’t be put outside until June at the earliest.
Today I went to check in my greenhouse downstairs, and found that the pots are drying out almost every day and many of my tomatoes are 8″ or taller–way too big for their 2″ pots. They are fine standing upright when smooshed in with 20 other plants but when I take one out of the tray to check on it, the stems, though thick, are a bit limp. As the weatherman is not recommending any planting until next week, I decided that I’ll go ahead and up-pop the tomatoes into much larger pots now.
I have several sowings of 9 different varieties b/c some seedings either were burned from over-fertilizing or were eaten by my cat, or whatever, and at this point I’ve lost track of how many of which variety I have, so I just keep sowing back-ups. Today I’ve brought up most of my oldest seedlings, which are the ones that need to be up-potted. The tomato bed is almost ready for them, and should be completely ready come this weekend. It’s built and 75% filled with soil–as it is 3×9′ long, that’s a lot of soil. Once I get them up-potted, I can harden them off; then, some this weekend, I should finally be able to put them into the bed. What a relief!
These are the varieties I’m planting this year:
| Tomato, Barry’s Crazy Cherry | Baker Creek |
| Tomato, Bonnie’s Best | MI Gardener |
| Tomato, Carbon | Baker Creek |
| Tomato, Dad’s Sunset | Baker Creek |
| Tomato, Paul Robeson | Baker Creek |
| Tomato, Sun Gold Pole Cherry | Botanical Interests |
| Tomato, Thornburn’s Terracotta | Baker Creek |
| Tomato, White Tomesol | Baker Creek |
The white tomato was a freebie from Baker Creek; if it grows, great; if not, oh well. It’s mainly a novelty. The two large orange slicers (Thornburn’s and Sunset) were from a list I read on a blog somewhere, and as I’ve never grown orange tomatoes, I thought I’d give it a try. The purple slicers (Paul Robeson, Carbon) are supposedly the best tasting tomatoes, and they are my main plan for making sauce. (I tried San Marzanos last year; in my opinion the flavor does not make up for the fact that they are small and it takes a ton of prep work to make a good amount of sauce.) Bonnie’s Best is also supposedly a good sauce tomato. The cherry tomatoes (Barry’s, Sun Gold) are both yellow cherry tomatoes that are supposedly very tasty. I’ll mainly give these away to friends and family.
Gerd's Garden 