Alphabet tomato garden for my toddler-need an "X"

[linzelu100]

I'd like to put together an alphabet tomato garden for my toddler next year with 26 beds and a tomato variety in each, that begins with the letter it is in. For example-
A-African Queen
B-Bumblebees
C-chocolate stripe

and so on. She is getting more into gardening and I think we will both like it But I am stumped on finding an X tomato. Tatiana's has listed:

XUXA
XANTHI

but no current suppliers. Any "X" suggestions?

Lindsey

[GunnarSK]

I think any unnamed cross is valid as an X. But your rules may be different.

[habitat_gardener]

Someone ought to use the name Xocolatl for a spicy black tomato.

I've been enjoying a dark spicy chocolate with that name made by Dagoba.

Or you could try anything with "Cross" in the name. I'm growing one this year: Mandarin Cross.

[TomatoDon]

KBX. Kellogg's Breakfast X.

They already have a "Carbon Copy" so maybe someone will come up with a "Xerox".

But even more intellectually stimulating is the rare, and still unknown, cross that produced a floating tomato for someone here a few years ago. We have photographic evidence to substantiate the claim.

7-20-10. 999bbq2. Floating Blueberry2..jpg

This thing needed to have been featured on the X-Files.

[linzelu100]

Originally Posted by TomatoDon

KBX. Kellogg's Breakfast X.

They already have a "Carbon Copy" so maybe someone will come up with a "Xerox".

But even more intellectually stimulating is the rare, and still unknown, cross that produced a floating tomato for someone here a few years ago. We have photographic evidence to substantiate the claim.

Attachment 35351

This thing needed to have been featured on the X-Files.

I was thinking of KBX, but still seems cheat-y. Xerox is a great name! lol I'll have to keep looking, because the OCD in me thinks using a cross or something with X in its name is cheating. My OCD is definetly flaring up again!

Lindsey

[Barbee]

Originally Posted by linzelu100

I was thinking of KBX, but still seems cheat-y. Xerox is a great name! lol I'll have to keep looking, because the OCD in me thinks using a cross or something with X in its name is cheating. My OCD is definetly flaring up again!

Lindsey

How about something that starts with ex?
EXample:

EXplosion
EXtreme Bush

[linzelu100]

Originally Posted by Barbee

How about something that starts with ex?
EXample:

EXplosion
EXtreme Bush

I like that idea!

[Tormato]

Originally Posted by TomatoDon

KBX. Kellogg's Breakfast X.

They already have a "Carbon Copy" so maybe someone will come up with a "Xerox".

But even more intellectually stimulating is the rare, and still unknown, cross that produced a floating tomato for someone here a few years ago. We have photographic evidence to substantiate the claim.

Attachment 35351

This thing needed to have been featured on the X-Files.

That's a spitter, at the apex of its... "flight".

Dr. Lve Apple

[ddsack]

I would have thought that by now, some commercial source would have come up with an Xtra Sweet of some kind!

[emcd124]

I'm going to break a cardinal rule and offer an alternative. As a fellow parent I'll hesitantly wade in and suggest that perhaps for a toddler something like multiple colors might be something that she can see and touch and take in with her senses and might be therefore both easier and more enjoyable for you both than alphabet based on variety names.

I could see variety names as something a second grader with reading proficiency could appreciate, perhaps even have fun reading through catalogs and picking the named varieties. but it seems so advanced that it would go right over the head of a younger child. Or if you want to do alphabet, what about instead of named tomato varieties, just going with actual vegetable names instead? So the "T" bed has tomatoes (and maybe turnips), the L box has lettuce, the B has beans, and the Z has zucchini. It would expand her knowledge of plant names, engage the alphabet at a more visual level (discerning a zucchini from a tomato vs Azorean Red tomato vs Bloody Butcher tomato), and introduce her to the value of diversity in foods.

If you go with colors there are many beautiful amazing tomato colors, and also some really lovely color choices for other vegetables, like beans. In my son's preschool garden we've curated a color garden that has seven different tomatoes (primarily cherry toms) in different colors, beans that are purple, beans that are green, and runner beans that are black and pink speckles inside. We have a variety of different mini pepper plants, so they can see all the different red, yellow, orange green hues for peppers. And then multi colored carrots: purple, white, orange, red, yellow etc. Things are all sized so kids can harvest themselves and eat out of hand, snacking style.

[linzelu100]

Originally Posted by emcd124

I'm going to break a cardinal rule and offer an alternative. As a fellow parent I'll hesitantly wade in and suggest that perhaps for a toddler something like multiple colors might be something that she can see and touch and take in with her senses and might be therefore both easier and more enjoyable for you both than alphabet based on variety names.

I could see variety names as something a second grader with reading proficiency could appreciate, perhaps even have fun reading through catalogs and picking the named varieties. but it seems so advanced that it would go right over the head of a younger child. Or if you want to do alphabet, what about instead of named tomato varieties, just going with actual vegetable names instead? So the "T" bed has tomatoes (and maybe turnips), the L box has lettuce, the B has beans, and the Z has zucchini. It would expand her knowledge of plant names, engage the alphabet at a more visual level (discerning a zucchini from a tomato vs Azorean Red tomato vs Bloody Butcher tomato), and introduce her to the value of diversity in foods.

If you go with colors there are many beautiful amazing tomato colors, and also some really lovely color choices for other vegetables, like beans. In my son's preschool garden we've curated a color garden that has seven different tomatoes (primarily cherry toms) in different colors, beans that are purple, beans that are green, and runner beans that are black and pink speckles inside. We have a variety of different mini pepper plants, so they can see all the different red, yellow, orange green hues for peppers. And then multi colored carrots: purple, white, orange, red, yellow etc. Things are all sized so kids can harvest themselves and eat out of hand, snacking style.

Thanks for the input, but we did that this year with all the colors. I'm trying to change it up next year. I couldn't do all the different veg in different boxes b/c it won't work out with my rotation schedule. I use one big area for each crop. Thanx though.

[tlintx]

I second the vote for a "Crossbreed" -- my little guy is too little to appreciate it yet, but I can't wait to share the excitement of "what will this one look like?" with him in a couple of years.

emcd, what a lovely idea! I will squirrel it away for next year, when he'll definitely be old enough to help.

Some other tomatoes that I think would be interesting for a toddler -- Lutescent (or Honor Bright), Silvery Fir Tree (toddlers apparently love petting things.. and then YANKING them), anything cherry or currants... Elberta Peach, because it's fuzzy!

(I wish I had space for 26 boxes -- I'm so jealous!)