Tomato season so far?

In North Texas, we usually have a long season from early April to mid or late June for tomato plants to grow, bloom, and set fruit. Once the high temps of late June arrive, tomatoes normally either die or become dormant. They stop growing and blooming, but the fruit already on the vines ripens through July. In late August, we normally start having cooler nights and the plants still alive start growing and blooming again producing a fall harvest.

Last year I planted some seedlings in mid July in the middle of the hottest part of the summer. They started growing and blooming in early August and produced large tomatoes until the first frost in November. I harvested about forty lbs. of green tomatoes before the frost and we still had some ripe tomatoes at Christmas.

This year, in mid May; it felt like someone threw a switch and turned the heat on that normally doesn't arrive until mid June. The tomato plants immediately slowed their bloom production and I now have less than 1/2 the small fruit I normally would have growing on the vines. The plants are very healthy and growing rapidly, but the blooming has almost stopped. It looks like my spring tomato season will be a bust, but I can hope for a robust fall season.

Since I had success last year with plants planted in the middle of the hottest part of the summer, I am trying to put out new seedlings of different varieties about every four weeks and see how they will do.

Next week, every day is forecast to have high temps in the mid 90's with low nightly temps in the mid 70's. To the best of my knowledge, that is not tomato growing weather. They can take the day time temps but the high night time temps seem to stop them in their tracks. We may still have a small cool spell before the real doldrums of summer set in. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Ted