2013 tomato crop

[Rgold1963]

78 daytime, 70 nighttime right now. Big$$$$$ heating this time of year.

[Rgold1963]

And one week later.... The support strings are all in place and the pants are growing about how I would expect with the weather we are having. Really expensive week with the night temps in the very low 20's and not even making it above freezing so far today.
I will be adding the first clips and removing the first suckers this week.

[GnomeGrown]

thanks for keeping tomatoville updated on your crop, Rgold1963

[Alpinejs]

Wow! Santa...I want one of those structures!!!

What varieties do you grow and how do you market them? Tomatoes, that is.

[Fusion_power]

Notice the temperature in the greenhouse. He is maintaining 78 degrees daytime which is an ideal temperature for tomatoes to grow vigorously. This is smack in the middle of the goldilocks zone for tomatoes. The only thing I see is that there is not enough sunlight to make the plants color up properly.

DarJones

[aclum]

Rgold,

Wow, very impressive!! What spacing are you using for the tomato plants and will you be stringing up 1 or 2 vines per plant? Also, I that red string material baling twine or something else?

Thanks,
Anne

[Rgold1963]

Originally Posted by Alpinejs

Wow! Santa...I want one of those structures!!!

What varieties do you grow and how do you market them? Tomatoes, that is.

This year I have over 50 varieties in that I am trialing. It's a real pain having so many due to growth habits and sizing but my customers really enjoy the fact that I have so many different types for them to choose from.

A little over half are sold at a local farmers market and the rest to a privately owned store and 2 small restaurants(same owner) I used to sell to over 20 stores and restaurants in Portland and even up to Seattle at one point with some being shipped to Alaska but have downsized quite a bit over the last 10 years, got my organic certification and now run the entire business myself. A lot less headache with no employees and not having to deal with all the shipping logistics.

Ron

[Rgold1963]

Originally Posted by Fusion_power

Notice the temperature in the greenhouse. He is maintaining 78 degrees daytime which is an ideal temperature for tomatoes to grow vigorously. This is smack in the middle of the goldilocks zone for tomatoes. The only thing I see is that there is not enough sunlight to make the plants color up properly.

DarJones

Living this far North, we have very short days this time of year with very filtered(at best) daylight. Since the plants have no fruit load on them, they still grow ok this early on and by the time they start setting fruit, our day length has increased enough to support it. Keeping the plants from becoming too vegetative right now is my main goal as that can drastically impact the overall yield, especially the earlier fruit which I need to maximize to afford the cost of heating right now! By controlling the feed, temperature, and humidity, I can keep the plants steered generatively even though they tend to be a bit lighter in color. As they set fruit, I make small changes in all of these factors and they will quickly darken up.

Ron

[Rgold1963]

Originally Posted by aclum

Rgold,

Wow, very impressive!! What spacing are you using for the tomato plants and will you be stringing up 1 or 2 vines per plant? Also, I that red string material baling twine or something else?

Thanks,
Anne

Each row has 2 overhead wires that are 60cm apart. The individual plants are 18cm apart and every other one is tied up to the same overhead wire above which give a final plant spacing of 36cm. The orange twine is just a synthetic bailing twine that I can get for a great price. It takes 4-5 miles of twine each year to get through the whole crop so cost is important as well as strength. Each plant is grown with a single head but in the event of a broken top or removed plant during the season, a second shoot can be allowed to grow to fill in the space. Growing the plants with 2 heads tends to be a bit more generative but not quite as productive later in the season. Some varieties simply don't have the vigor to support that kind of load over such a long period.
I plan on trying some grafting next season and might have to go to a 2 head system to keep the plants from becoming too vegetative though depending on the rootstock I use. I'll figure that out when the time comes!

Ron

Could you post a closer photo of the gutters where you grow the peppers? It sounds really neat.

[Rgold1963]

Here are a few videos of the end of last years crop. You can see some peppers in the gutters during part of them. Also, a picture of last years yellow ghost peppers all grown in the gutters.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbNjFQHpqI0

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FhtJwIxN80

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZbGF5iWZ9k

[riceke]

Seeing videos of these plants convinces me I've been a failure in gardening

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by riceke

Seeing videos of these plants convinces me I've been a failure in gardening

There is no failure in gardening. Just smaller successes and hopefully better luck next year.

[Rgold1963]

Originally Posted by Redbaron

There is no failure in gardening. Just smaller successes and hopefully better luck next year.

Exactly! I can't tell you how many mistakes I have made over the years. The important thing is to never stop learning from them and try not to repeat them!

Ron

[Fusion_power]

Have you tried reflective plastic mulch?

Also, grafting is tricky to match scion to rootstock. If you start with a low producing less vigorous scion, then a high vigor rootstock seems to increase production the most. The converse is true with a highly vigorous scion, a generative rootstock makes the best crop.

Are you using double layer plastic for your greenhouse covering? I've seen it cut heating bills by 50%. You lose a bit of sunlight but gain so much on heating bills that it is worth it.

DarJones