Almost too many maters.

[MissS]

Bill, I am so happy to hear that after so many years of battling diseases and bugs that you have had a year of PLENTY. No one hear deserves it more than you.

Your battles and ingenuity have paid off.

Congrats!

[Bipetual]

I agree. Bill, you earned those tomatoes and I'm so glad you have lots if nice maters to show for it!

[Tracydr]

Just looking at my table today. I need to pull out the dehydrator and canner this weekend!
Bill, do you ever can instead of freeze? Great space saver.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by Tracydr

Just looking at my table today. I need to pull out the dehydrator and canner this weekend!
Bill, do you ever can instead of freeze? Great space saver.

My wife used to can a lot of tomatoes but since I bought the Spreemy tomato machine we make them all into sauce and freeze it. I learned that it is much easier when you have plenty of fruit to just cut them up and cook them til they are soft and then drain most of the water off. I know it might seem wasteful but when you put up nice thick puree instead of a lot of water the concentrated flavor is better for most cooking. We do put up some with more of the water left in but label it for soup. We found out that cooking it down slowly until most of the water is gone really is a disservice to the flavor as the tomatoes get that overcooked flavor. Usually with 3 gallons of cooked tomatoes when the juice is really drained off good you end up with about a gallon and a half of pulp which is then put through the Spreemy and all the seeds and pulp are removed leaving a good bit more than a gallon of nice thick fresh tasting puree of home grown heirloom tomatoes. Talk about making spaghetti sing. It also means that over twice as many tomatoes are put up in the same space in the freezer. We put it all up in quart freezer bags but put different amounts in the bags so we can get out however much we think will work with whatever dish we are cooking.

I have been having abundant crops every year since I started grafting and using Texas Tomato Food but this is the first year that our freezer space filled so fast. I think it was just due to the fact that even though I wasn't getting any greater number of fruits each day I picked I was getting much larger size fruits on average. This has been a truly wonderful season and I hope everyone else has a great one also. It used to be a rare thing when I had a great year with tomatoes. I sure could have used Thomatoville when I started out gardening 40 years ago when I was a total novice at growing these unpredictable things. And another thing with my ability to put away food back then I would have really really enjoyed tomatoes.

Bill

[PA_Julia]

Start throwing them at passing motorists.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by PA_Julia

Start throwing them at passing motorists.

I'm giving them away as fast as I can and still some are rotting before I can unload them. We may have to do one more sauce pot and cook up a big batch of spaghetti. Fruit production is dropping off now that mid summer is here and so it shouldn't be a problem anymore. Of course I am loving this problem.

Bill

[Bruinwar]

Congratulations Bill! Good problems to have.

-joe

[Dewayne mater]

Bill - great stuff on the tomato sauce! We've been eating home made salsa on everything imaginable, definitely one the best uses of heirloom tomatoes in my opinion.

I definitely feel the same gratitude for tomatoville! I wanted to personally thank you for the advice over the last couple of years! This year was my best year ever and although I've gladly received tons of advice from many folks here, there is no doubt that you and Raybo Ray Newste has been the biggest contributors to my success! Thank you from me, my family and friends and neighbors who've enjoyed many delicious tomatoes with your help!

Btw, I'm loving the pruning to 2-3 stems and vine training method. I'm not particularly good at it yet, but, the ability to control disease and insects has gone from absolutely impossible to doable with this method. Not every tomato has produced abundantly with this method, but, all have produced and about 50% have produced far beyond any other method I've used.

Dewayne Mater

[b54red]

Originally Posted by Dewayne mater

Bill - great stuff on the tomato sauce! We've been eating home made salsa on everything imaginable, definitely one the best uses of heirloom tomatoes in my opinion.

I definitely feel the same gratitude for tomatoville! I wanted to personally thank you for the advice over the last couple of years! This year was my best year ever and although I've gladly received tons of advice from many folks here, there is no doubt that you and Raybo Ray Newste has been the biggest contributors to my success! Thank you from me, my family and friends and neighbors who've enjoyed many delicious tomatoes with your help!

Btw, I'm loving the pruning to 2-3 stems and vine training method. I'm not particularly good at it yet, but, the ability to control disease and insects has gone from absolutely impossible to doable with this method. Not every tomato has produced abundantly with this method, but, all have produced and about 50% have produced far beyond any other method I've used.

Dewayne Mater

Dewayne thank you for the kind words. I have learned from many before me and from friends. I'm just passing on some of my experiences and I am glad they have been a help to you.

When I first tried the drop line system a couple of years ago I had no idea if it would be successful or not. I was just so tired of tying up plants and trying to keep up with all the vines intersecting. I could hardly tell by mid season what tomato plant a fruit was coming from because they had intersected and crisscrossed so many times on my trellis. I had seen it in greenhouses but didn't know if it would work outside. Using the cypress mulch really helped when tomatoes had to lie on the ground when the vines were lowered. In my four foot wide beds I had room for two rows of tomatoes and figuring out that they needed to lay in opposite directions was a wonderful discovery. It allowed me to just continue around the end of the bed and go down the other side. I first had them going all in one direction and when I got to the end of the bed I had a mess as you can imagine. Trimming off all the foliage and limbs below the lowest fruit was also a big help in cutting down on disease but a pain to do every week or so. It not only succeeded but it made brought the joy of gardening to new heights for me. It allowed me to spend a good bit less time fighting diseases and pests and more time just tending the plants which is fun. I also found that not every variety produced more fruit using this method but overall my production took a huge leap upward just due to the fact that the plants stayed healthy for so much longer and some varieties really thrived beyond expectations.

I have come up with another trick that helps with the drop line system. When you first put your strings down go ahead and have them at an angle in the direction you plan to lay the plants in. That way the plants are already starting to grow in the right direction with the stem leaning correctly. Before I used to just drop straight down to the plant but sometimes that created some real problems the first time I had to lower them. I first started doing that this season and it helps tremendously. Another trick is to just use one string to start with even if you are going to allow two or even three stems. It is really easy to add another drop line and you can always place it where it will work the best if you see what you will need by the way the second stem is growing.

Bill