Best zone/state/etc. for tomatoes

[MJACTIVIST]

SAN JOAQUIN VALLEY!!
No questions about it. LOL
L8
MJ

[b54red]

chalstonsc, below are pictures of some of the tomatoes and peppers from my fall plants set out from late July til late Aug. The first picture is tomatoes picked in late Nov. and the second is of tomatoes and peppers picked on Dec. 3. I ended up having a fairly good crop of tomatoes considering the heat and drought we went through. I did lose a lot of plants to disease especially the first week or so after planting in the blast furnace that was my garden in late summer.
If you want to make some tomatoes in harsh conditions my number one recommendation is Big Beef hybrid. They will set in high heat conditions better than any of those so called heat varieties. My second favorite was Indian Stripe, followed by Old Virginia, Stump of the World, BTD Pink, Gary O' Sena, Black Krim, JD's Special C Tex, Mule Team, Linnies Oxheart, and Marianna's Peace. I had one tomato plant that out set even Big Beef in the heat. It was a fluke plant from some BTD Pink seed and it produced a small to medium pink tomato and set constantly during the days when the temps were hovering around 100. I picked 135 tomatoes off of it from late July through August. I'm calling it Bill's Berkley Pink for lack of a better name and will be growing it out to see if it is stable. If you would like to try it just PM me and I'll send you some seed.
It is very important during the high heat to basically over water your tomatoes. I know this goes against the grain but before they are full of fruit they need to set fruit and I found by watering frequently and heavily during the really hot times that the plants set much more fruit than the ones lightly watered. You have to stop doing this once the tomatoes develop some size or you risk splitting.
I also try to replace tomatoes that die throughout the summer with varieties that I think can take the poor conditions and live through them to eventually make some fall tomatoes. I lose a lot of plants and keep a lot of seedlings on hand and hardened off to replace any that look sick or seem to be struggling. Instead of babying a sickly plant I have found that I am much better off just pulling it up and replacing it if it is not past August.

[rwsacto]

Hello!

Sacra - tomato of course

Home of Campbell's tomato soup

hot days, cool nites, no rain all summer

No season is complete without a tomato spill closing two lanes of the interstate.

[dustdevil]

I think Hawaii could be the spot you're all looking for. Fly me out there and I'll do some research for you guys

[tam91]

Nah, it's my thread - fly ME out to do the research!

[dustdevil]

Compromise...I have a large travel trunk and I'll drill a couple air holes in it for you

[tam91]

Gee, you are so generous. I'll travel in style!

[chalstonsc]

b54,
Thanks....I grow in containers so am trying to find semi-determinates and determinates....I have tried JD's and Indian Stripe, but they stopped during the summer also.

[rodger]

Charlestonsc I am in Little Mountain sc. I am a half zone cooler than you. I will tell you there are very few tomotoes no matter how heat tolerant they are that will survive from being sown early Feb set out plants in early April (for us) to first freeze end of Nov for us. That is 10mos from seed. A good reasonable livespan is 3-4 mo except for cherries which always go till freeze and this is for plants planted in the ground. Container plants are much shorter lived even on cherries. To have a continuos supply of tomatoes you have to make successive plantings just as stated by B54red in Ala. The bulk of the tomato crop is the early spring planted and nearly ever variety will perform well and these harvest June and July about 6-8weeks of harvest. I plant again in late May for Aug and Sept tomatoes using heat tolerant varieties. The yield is less but the fresh plants perform well giving nice size fuit and good taste. I plant for fall in Late Jun early July using cuttings from my favorites from the spring planting that are now in peak production. These will produce earlier than seed planted in late June and for seed planted varieties in late June early July choose the determinates and early producing indeterminates to do well. The fall crop will produce nice large fuit up till frost or hard freeze if protected . This late crop is not as sweet due to less sun but still very good. Old plants (>5mos ) if still producing in the fall will make small inferior fruit. So after the big flush of fruit I pull the plants to make room for something else. So starting in Mid July for the early spring crop I begin to yank plants that are overgrown and are looking ratty. The rest of the spring crop is gone by first week in Aug and replaced with fall vegetable crops or field peas and fall beans. The late tomatoes planted in Late may early June and early July for a late summer and fall crop stay in till frost. I typically plant around 200 plants of 100 varieties in early spring for my main crop to sell and have tomatoes for my tomato tasting each 3rd Saturday in July.I plant about a dozen plants of 3 or 4 varieties in late May early June for Aug and Sept then another dozen or so for fall till frost harvest.Rodger

[chalstonsc]

Rodger,
Thanks very much for jumping in here....I'm going to find out where Little Mountain is! I have no problem with multiple plantouts, but have all kinds of trouble controlling foliage diseases, which may well be a major part of my problem in getting plants to set fruit in the summer....any suggestions along those lines will be greatly appreciated, as well as revealing any varieties you may have found more productive than others at various times of the growing season....again, thanks. Tom

[remy]

I know most of you will be surprised to hear me say this but WNY is a mighty good place to grow tomatoes. Our average temps, 75- 80 day and about 60 at night, during the growing season are conducive to tomatoes. We also average between 3-4" of rain a month, and we have more sunny days than any other city in the northeast.
http://www.weather.com/weather/wxcli...81?from=search
If the season was just a bit longer, it would be perfect!
Remy

[b54red]

I thought that some of the determinate early varieties would work great for fall tomatoes and all were a disappointment. I have never had much luck with determinate plants in the heat of summer because of the dense foliage which leads to major disease problems. The only one that did ok in the summer for me was a hybrid called Floralina; but it still is much better as an early spring plant.
The reason I went to a trellis system instead of staking and caging was to allow the plant to spread more and thus have better air flow and drying in my very humid hot climate. If I lived where the air was dryer I would certainly use cages because they are easier to tend. You have to constantly be on the lookout for limbs that need tying up with a trellis. I also prune my plants to stop any really dense areas from developing because it will inevitably lead to major foliage disease down here. I also spray with Daconil regularly and use the bleach spray at the first signs of disease. I also have to keep a constant eye out for spider mites, aphids, whiteflies and those little things that spread TSWV. If the pests ever get a good hold on your plants the diseases will surely follow and vice versa.
I'm not kidding about the extra water for bloom setting in the heat. When your new plants that you set out in May for your summer crop start blooming give them extra water until you get a good fruit set. Try it on a few of your container plants and I think you will be surprised. I had a container plant that looked like it was finished in July but I sprayed it well and gave it some fertilizer every week along with a good watering nearly every day and the thing came back and produced until September.

[lowlylowlycook]

I don't really have any first hand experience but it seems to me that the highlands of Ethiopia must be pretty good for tomatoes assuming you can irrigate them. Outside the rainy season, you'll get all the sun you could ever need but the high altitude keeps the temps from being too high.

[camochef]

Having grown up in New Jersey, I couldn't let the remarks about Jersey Tomatoes just Vanish into oblivion without commenting on a few facts. New Jersey was known as the "Garden State" for a reason. Back in my childhood it was known for two things. It's Jersey Tomatoes and Mosquitoes! There was a third but I won't delve into that.
Now the town where I grew up was a small rural town on the banks of the Hackensack River in Bergen County. That town was called Little Ferry and it was a couple feet below sea level. I only mention that fact because the town used to flood regularly. I'm not talking just about hurricane season, but anytime a nor'easter struck or sometimes just a good thunderstorm.
The river would rise and carry lots of sediment with it. Leaving behind this rich, black colored soil that was just the greatest thing for gardening. I used to compare it with the Nile in Egypt in my childish mind when in grammer school. You could accidently drop a seed and it would grow...no need for fertilizer...no need for compost...no need for manure. It would grow on its own just from that dark rich soil.
The town was for the most part a farming community. I remember acres of corn, cole crops, alliums, peppers, but most of all I remember tomatoes. Everyone grew tomatoes. Not just a few, but rows of lush red tomatoes on the largest green plants. Occasionally, someone would grow an Orange or yellow tomato, but for the most part they were red tomatoes. Those few people that didn't grow their own could stop at any one of dozens of farm stands along the main roads and buy a bushel of "Jersey Beefsteaks", for $1.00. Large succulent tomatoes many weighing well over a pound each, some over two pounds each. These weren't like the beefsteaks grown today. You eat a couple of these beauties and you had little fever blisters form on your lips and tongue. They were much moreacidic than todays fruits, ormaybe less sweet, depending on how you look at it.
I must point out that this was North Jersey, South Jersey was sand. It didn't have the rich soiled truck gardens. It had Pine Barrens! There was a reason they called them Pine Barrens. Not much grew there. Pine trees, brambles, some grasses, but they were more weeds and would be considered undesirable by todays standards. But they still grew tomatoes. Not as large or as lush as those from the richer soil up in the northern part of the state, but they were still tomatoes.
People would swarm out of Philadelphia heading to the Jersey shore and they would stop at the roadside stands and buy ear corn and tomatoes. Some was grown locally but a good amount came from a little further north where the soil was so much better. They would return to the Pennsylvania cities and towns with their treasures in bushel baskets and burlap bags and the reputation of Jersey Tomatoes grew greater and more embellished every year.
Today I live in Pa. and we have terrible soil here, mostly red shale where I reside and I have to bust my butt to grow tomatoes like they grew back in my hometown. I employ compost, manure, lime, fertilizers, water and although I get tomatoes, it's not like I remember as a kid. But is it ever?

[tam91]

What a great story - thank you !