This year's garden report

[tomatoguy]

This season certainly got off to an inauspicious start but has turned out to be the best year for tomatoes, since 2006; the first year for my raised bed. I had some contamination problems with part of my starter mix, then was bitten by two late frosts. The second frost was 12 days past our "frost-free" date. Go figure. I wound up pulling about half of my original plants and buying replacements from various local sources. Here are my results.

Mary Huddleston - This year's prize winner. I bought this plant, at the co-op. MH is a Tennessee heirloom I had never heard of before. It was absolutely great, for me. It is a large, productive pink, with taste and texture that rivals Brandywine. You can bet I saved plenty of seeds.

Bradley - This old standby outdid itself, this year. I had four of them. Everything about them was good and they are still producing.

Early Large Red - Thanks to "retiree", I acquired some seeds for these, dated 1998, and managed to get almost all of them to germinate. They were true to type and very tasty, just like I remembered them. I saved some seeds for future use and to send back to my source.

Black Prince - Tasty, early, a little sweet for me but good enough. Very productive but succumbed to some sort of blight which took it out in about 48 hours but did not spread to the other plants.

Earl's Faux - Excellent as usual but less productive due to starter mix issue.

Marion - Another new discovery, from a store-bought plant. Medium to small red tomatoes with a nice tangy taste. Very productive.

Mark Twain - My staple plant for mid-season production. Low production due to frost but very nice, once again. These MT fruits had a faint yellow striping, over their orange-red skin.

Caspian Pink - Very good but not very productive.

JD's Special C-Tex - Very large black tomatoes, very productive. The color was a bit unusual, not like other black tomatoes. These were the favorite variety of several of the folks who get my surplus tomatoes. Too sweet for me.

Pruden's Purple - I was not impressed with this one at all. Okay taste, okay texture, poor production.

Rose - Average production, nice taste, poor texture, due to a large green core.

Rose Quartz Multi-Flora - I am not a cherry tomato guy but these were tasty and, as usual, productive beyond your wildest dreams, as in around 1500 fruits, per plant. I am planning on growing these, in straw bales, for sale, next year. I will probably add Millefluer and Riesentraube, to give me a pink, a red and a yellow. These are still producing, like crazy. They have grown out the top of my 7' cage and are now taking over adjacent cages.

Terhune - Every single one of them split at the bottom, even when there was little or no rain. I will take a pass on these, in the future.

mater

[greenthumbomaha]

After reading about the troubles of many this year, its good to hear another "great year" report. I grew a few of the same varieties as you, and they did well. There wasn't really bad apple in the bunch this year.

Our weather was hot, dry (over one month no rain) and sunny, after a very cold wet extended spring. Not as much disease once the temp went up and growing season started. Similar conditions?

[tomatoguy]

We had the cold, wet, extended Spring. However, our Summer was unusual. It was mild and rainy, compared to the heat and drought we often experience. I can only remember a couple of days when we surpassed 95 degrees and maybe 10 where we passed 90. Not your typical Summer, in Middle Tennessee.

mater

[shelleybean]

I, too, have had a great season and we seem to have had the same weather you have had in Tennessee. We had a colder than normal winter and spring, followed by a mild and wet summer. At the beginning of the season, I thought all the tomatoes were a little bland, maybe flavor diluted by all the rain. However, as the summer wore on, flavor improved a lot. Glad some of us had a good summer because I know a lot of people didn't. And I had a terrible tomato season last year. This year makes up for it.

[tomatoguy]

Last year, we had record high temperatures, with over a week of highs around 112 degrees. I picked last year to solarize my garden and let it lie idle. Lucky choice, I suppose.

mater