Hey Fellow Floridians - Year 2

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by Imthechuck

I know! I'm debating......

They only do it once per year. You spend once, and you'll have them for 25 years! They dont degrade or breakdown in sunlight. What's holding you back?

[MarlynnMarcks]

All my fall tomatoes look great and are filled with blossoms, but the only one that has little green tomatoes is a potato leaf cherry. I don't know what it is because my niece lost all my markers. It is short and I don't remember planting a short cherry.

[Gardenboy]

Always glad to see another Floridian on the forum. Port St. Lucie is where I catch most of my white anchovies ( Manhaden) bait fish to make my homemade fish emulsion. Welcome to Tomatoville!

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by Gardenboy

Always glad to see another Floridian on the forum. Port St. Lucie is where I catch most of my white anchovies ( Manhaden) bait fish to make my homemade fish emulsion. Welcome to Tomatoville!

Hi Douglas,
I just used your fish emulsion yesterday. Such a beautiful smooth texture. Nice stuff.
Are you harvesting lots? Mine are coming in now, even a few of the larger fruited ones. A few plants have yet to set fruit.

[Barb_FL]

Marilyn - Welcome. For a potato leaf cherry, the only one I know of (from growing) is Brandywine Cherry Pink. My plants are medium size, but not many flowers.

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Marsha - that is a nice present.

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Fruit set finally on Cosmonaut and Pierces Pride. Both plants are super healthy and not located in the pool area.

Still waiting on fruit set on ALL my new Artisans, KBX, Red Rose, Sweet Scarlet, Wherokowi, New Big Dwarf, both Captain Lucky, and BCP. All wispy plants have struggled; restarted Maglia Rose.


The Artisans Jazz and Orange Jazz has flowered and I've buzzed, but nothing. Same with Orange Caprese.

[Barb_FL]

Adding Kays post from the old thread.

Originally Posted by kayrobbins

I have most of my Christmas shopping done so now I have started my 2016 seed ordering. I decided to take a break from growing Datil seeds for Baker Creek and grow as many different peppers as I have wanted to do. I had my list ready but saw this really neat purple pepper at Baker Creek that I just have to try.
http://www.rareseeds.com/presenting-...ippen-peppers/

Will check out that pepper.

Is everyone else getting deluged with rain the last few days>
Now the wind is back too.

[kayrobbins]

Thanks Barb, don't how I got on the old post when I did my search. Sometimes my multitasking skills are lacking. When you check out the pepper be sure to look at the salsa recipe using it and my favorite - chocolate.

We have not had rain in about a week but it is cold and windy. I have volunteered to spend the day helping out at the herb festival and I am not looking forward to the cold wind. I can always duck into the greenhouse to thaw out.

[MarlynnMarcks]

It has rained like before the flood for several days now in Port St Lucie. Tomatoes are flowering and a few have set fruit. New seeds are germinating, too. Maybe they like rain or maybe the rain is putting more water soluble fertilizer in the soil.

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by Barb_FL

Adding Kays post from the old thread.




Will check out that pepper.

Is everyone else getting deluged with rain the last few days>
Now the wind is back too.

Deluge is right! Yesterday was a new record for rainfall in a 24 hr period, by a whole 3/10ths of an inch!

[Barb_FL]

Marsha - I've been following you Karma thread - nice job. I remember sowing my new Artisan Seeds within a day or 2 of your Karma seeds. Flowering on the Jazz was about the same. The difference is that I still haven't had any fruit set on ANY of them despite buzzing).

BTW - the Tomato Maker you use for seedlings is $6.45 on Amazon right now. The last time I looked it was $14+; I'm just about out of Bio-Tone so ordered it.

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Made my first batch of sauce today. I did the SunGold recipe but use tons of tomatoes - not SunGolds. Used some Ildi and the remaining Garden Gems.

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We've been eating lots of tomatoes including Rebel Yell (first year of fruit), PBTD, NAR. RY and PBTD beat out NAR on flavor for both DH and myself.

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Observations for next fall:

1. Don't grow Kelloggs/KBX (plant gets too huge without much Fruit set). 2 tomatoes on 4 plants (although one got pulled when the molding fell on it).

(Now I know why my 2014 Fall season was so terrible - grew a lot of Kelloggs/KBX).

2. Don't grow anything whispy.
Same comment - grew Fall 2014 - gross; grew spring 2015 and great.

3. Don't grow anything with BRANDYWINE in it's name or possible parentage. (exception being BCD). BC-Pink is a total DUD - huge plant, start of buds that barely flower. I should cut one down to give it's EB mate more sun.

Red Rose (the free pack from TGS) a total dud too. BW is a parent along with Rutgers.

Larry - Big Brandy has set fruit; so much better luck that either parent - NBD or Brandywine (which I gave up on a few years ago).

4. Dwarfs - wait until it is cooler to sow. Arctic Rose and Sleeping Lady seem to be the exception. Everything else has been a disappointment.


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Haven't been very good about spraying b/c I'm going OOT for 2 weeks over Christmas. But over the last couple of days started redoing my drippers.

[ginger2778]

Barb, thanks for the heads up on Amazon. I saw it for $6.20 with free ship over $35. I have to see what else I want to buy, i dont need 6 packages of Tomato Maker!

I agree about BC pink, very much plant, very little fruit. BC dark is doing fairly well.

I have lost an entire round of fruit making due to the constant deluge for 2 weeks that we had down here. All the pollen stayed wet and the blossoms just dropped off. I had a fierce battle cutting off diseased leaves, some of the plants look very thinned out. Then spraying, 3 rounds of trimming and spraying. So far all have survived, but it's shaping up to be the worst year ever.
Lots of fruit just rotting on the vine before ripening, also from the rain. We gardeners are optimists, I keep thinking it has to get better this season. At least no rain yesterday.
I am harvesting, but not enough for sauce yet.

[Zone9b]

Originally Posted by Barb_FL

Marsha -
3. Don't grow anything with BRANDYWINE in it's name or possible parentage. (exception being BCD). BC-Pink is a total DUD - huge plant, start of buds that barely flower. I should cut one down to give it's EB mate more sun.
Red Rose (the free pack from TGS) a total dud too. BW is a parent along with Rutgers.

Larry - Big Brandy has set fruit; so much better luck that either parent - NBD or Brandywine (which I gave up on a few years ago).

Barb,
Did you grow Brandy Boy, the hybrid which is supposed to taste like Brandywine but with productivity? Some rave about how productive it is and it's taste. I've been tempted to grow it, but was afraid I'd just grow more big vines with very few tomatoes.
Marsha,
Sorry to hear about your problems with the weather.

I haven't had a great fall but at least some success. Champion II F1 indeterminate is a good producer of medium sized red fruit. Taste is nothing to shout about but ok. I should get a fair amount more fruit from them. Granadero F1 plum did fairly well but fruit is slow to ripen and I've eaten better tasting plum tomatoes.
If nothing else I have lots of Winter Red and Lacinato kale. Oh, and the Premium Crop broccoli did fairly well, but it is all but gone now and I'm about to plant more.
Larry

[Zone9b]

I attempted to grow several of the dwarf tomatoes. All I can say is been there done that. I did had modest success with a couple of Indian Stripes. Have several that a friend picked and put in the refrigerator. I'm guessing the refrigerator killed the taste but I had one left in the garden and I picked it and ate it in the garden. It tasted very good. Probably the best I've tasted or maybe I was just real hungry.
I also grew 4th of July and Stupice side by side in 10 gallon grow bags. Amazingly, if I hadn't given them name tags, it would been somewhat difficult to tell them apart. Vines looked the same, fruit looked the same - smallish, round and red. For my taster they even tasted the same, which was they tasted good. Both coped with Early Blight fairly well but main difference was that 4th of July was distinctly more productive than Stupice.
So for now I have 2 keepers, that being Champion II F1 Indeterminate and 4th of July F1. I will regrow Granadero but I hope to find a better plum tomato. I intend to give Yaqui a try soon.
Larry

[Fiishergurl]

Had to pull all tomato plants as they were dying from the TYCLV which also spread to the peppers, basil, cilantro and petunias. Been trying to get the garden ready for spring.

Ginny

[Zone9b]

Originally Posted by Fiishergurl

Had to pull all tomato plants as they were dying from the TYCLV which also spread to the peppers, basil, cilantro and petunias. Been trying to get the garden ready for spring.

Ginny

I didn't know that was in the US. I believe Tomatovillian fusion_power once posted that it was common in Central America. The only variety that I remember reading about that was said to be resistant is Champion II F1. I'm guessing that there may be others. If you took any pictures it would definitely be interesting to see them and of course how you deal with would be an education for us. Also a guess on how it got into your garden would be of huge interest.
The best of luck in dealing with Yellow Leaf Curl Virus.
Larry