The early tomato thread

[bower]

My tomatoes were started in early march indoors under lights, and transplanted to the greenhouse (unheated) mid-April. That's a month earlier than the usual transplant date for greenhouse tomatoes at farms in this area. It was cold, no doubt about it. Many of the plants set and grew just one tomato early on, like it was their last chance to seed themselves. There was a gap of at least a week between the first two Kimberley and others coming on, same for Beaverlodge Plum and I expect to see the same with others. The Kimberley crop is really coming in now at the same time as Stupice, although it was pretty amazing to have even a lone ripe fruit of any kind in the middle of June!
I picked my first slicers today, yep they're still pretty firm and I'll let them ripen a bit before we taste em...

[johnwin]

I'm blushing now! My Ditmarsher ripened 89 days from seeding, not 70.
The other early producer under the guise of ABC Potato Leaf is a 2oz. red, slightly ribbed oblate fruit. No wonder this variety is hard to find!
My earliest medium is Verna Orange, 111 days from seed and weighing in at 1lb 14ozs.

Thanks Bower: I have Kimberley and Beaverlodge Plum on my 2014 list, along with Mater's choice, Clear Pink Early.

John

[cythaenopsis]

Originally Posted by bower

Many of the plants set and grew just one tomato early on, like it was their last chance to seed themselves.

That's kind of what happened to me with my Black Krim. I'd bought it as a seedling and planted it outside around May 20th. We were still getting kind of chilly days/evenings and I feared I might have put it out a little too soon. One flower pollinated and got going with a fruit shortly thereafter and then for nearly two months I had NO NEW FRUIT. I'm container growing for the first time so I don't know if there was one or two other factors influencing the hesitation. But it certainly felt like this plant just wasn't going to produce. Finally my luck changed. With a little help from a vibrating floss device I may have caused a good bit of pollination. Now I just have to hope that the newly set fruit will go the distance.

So from the transplant up until picking that one initial fruit, it was about 8 weeks. I'm certainly hoping the others will grow at a faster rate as the warmer temperatures are in full swing. Anyway, that lone tomato started to give with a little squeezing so I knew it was ready. I don't remember seeing mid-July offering up fresh farm tomatoes in my area, so I guess you could call it an early tomato. And I finally got to tasting it this evening... wow, was it delicious!

[bower]

Mmmm, and my early slicers were delightful too!
Zolotoe Serdtse was slightly under-ripe on one side but still, my favourite of the three, very fruity, I like it!!
Pervaya Lyubov was sweet with a perfect texture.
Black Early was a mild tasting black, 'smoky' but not sweet nor complex or fruity. Pretty inside with the red center, very nice texture.
First fruit are often mealy or not tasty, we didn't do too badly this time. It can only get better.

In the early small reds, I rated Kimberley and Stupice as best tasting so far this year. Siberian Pink is tart and cherry sized and a heavy fruiter; Al Kuffa has sweet flesh with a mild and pleasant, faintly floral taste, neither is strongly tasty. Beaverlodge Plum placed last, it is very fleshy with little gel and few seeds, and the flesh is very bland.

[snippits]

Has anybody tried Fourth of July by Burpee? Burpee's description says 49 days. Good customer reviews too.

[jennifer28]

Originally Posted by Eirik

There might be a conclusion that Clear Pink Early tastes good in cooler weather, sounds perfect to me!

And when it comes to Native Sun, isnt this a "desert" plant, wich will create alot of foliage to protect itself from the sun, now is that a bad or a good thing in a wet and cold climate?
Are any other early in this category?

Camo: Thanks so much for these new suggestions, the number of names piling up suggest Ill be trying new tomatoes every year for at least five years straight!

Tracy: Ive ordered some dwarf seeds, I think alot of the varieties from the project will do very nicely for alot of people in many different garden settings.

Hi I think it depends on what kind of tomato you like and what size.

I prefer slicing tomatoes to beefsteaks, but I will grow some beefsteaks.

I also prefer the black tomato flavors and some others like pink berkley tye dye, and pink boar.

Now that I have said this I have to tell you I really do not like early wonder pink.

I recommend the following:
Sibersky skorospelyi from Heritage Tomato Seed or Tatiana's Tomatobase.

Bloody Butcher

Eva Purple Ball

Also I have some seedsI can send you. This is not a general offer for everyone, I can't do that right now because I am too tired.

[SharonRossy]

I'm growing bloody butcher for the first time. Glad to hear you like it. Also growing black Krim, Black Russian , black from Tula and Tims black ruffles for the first time. Any advice?

[SharonRossy]

Just wanted to add that Anna Russian is finally starting to set fruit, and slowly at that. Not sure if its a question of weak seedlings or what. The plants are tall, but wimpy.

[jennifer28]

I don't usually grow anna russian but it's in the heart family and a lot of heart tomato plants have wispy leaves that make them look sickly. It is in the genes of the tomato plant, I think the actual name of the gene is wilty, I could be wrong since my memory is not what it was before I had a head injury... but you can look it up here

http://tgrc.ucdavis.edu/Data/Acc/Genes.aspx

I've never grown Tim's black ruffles.

I'm not really great at giving growing advice because I am a little unusual in how I set things up - I am a teacher and I coordinate edible gardens at public schools too...

I set things up differently at school but -
If you are growing at a home you can put down weed fabric for mulch, cut holes in it for the plants, and then if you don't want do be bothered with drip irrigation I set up this thing called an aquacone and then I attach old soda bottles to the top and it makes a wicking system.

I have more expensive plant supports this year, I'm using a few cages, which I would consider to be a waste of money but I was really injured this year so I couldnt use my old wood posts to make a Florida weave.

I like the Florida weave if I were well enough to do it
Heres some pics on how to support tomatoes

http://www.settfest.com/2009/01/supp...-plants/#weave

I use compose mostly and seaweed from the beach (I live near the ocean) and also some Neptune's Harvest. It is stinky but works well.

My compost is usually composted manure of some kind. I get weed seeds with it but the mulch fabric blocks them anyway.

Hope I told you something useful

[Redbaron]

Here is a pic of my first real tomato (not counting cherries). The miracle BPF. Not a large tomato but surprisingly good. The first one had blemishes and minor concentric cracking near the stem, but it looks like there will be many more coming that are so far looking perfect. I hope they maintain the size since Tatiana's says these can be around 2 oz which would be too small to market as a "regular" tomato.

[discoprincess]

Originally Posted by cythaenopsis

So from the transplant up until picking that one initial fruit, it was about 8 weeks. I'm certainly hoping the others will grow at a faster rate as the warmer temperatures are in full swing. Anyway, that lone tomato started to give with a little squeezing so I knew it was ready. I don't remember seeing mid-July offering up fresh farm tomatoes in my area, so I guess you could call it an early tomato.

Here in New York, most of the vendors at the farmer's market aren't selling field-grown vine-ripened tomatoes yet...including hybrids. Early indeed.

I am so jealous; I'm so sorry I had accidentally killed my Black Krim seedling.

Some of my Sweet Million cherries are finally ripening. In previous years, it would have happened earlier than mid-July.

[Tormato]

My "early" trials so far...

Kimberley - 50 DTM - OK flavor (6 out of 10)
Sophie's Choice - 50 DTM - OK (5.5)
Beaverlodge Slicer - 55 DTM - Not good flavor (4)
Mountain Princess - 55 DTM - Not good (4)
Early Wonder - 56 DTM - Not good (4)

The flavor results are likely caused by way too much rain. Hopefully later fruits will give me some indication of what they should really taste like.

Dr. Lve Apple

[jennifer28]

Originally Posted by Tormato

My "early" trials so far...

Kimberley - 50 DTM - OK flavor (6 out of 10)
Sophie's Choice - 50 DTM - OK (5.5)
Beaverlodge Slicer - 55 DTM - Not good flavor (4)
Mountain Princess - 55 DTM - Not good (4)
Early Wonder - 56 DTM - Not good (4)

The flavor results are likely caused by way too much rain. Hopefully later fruits will give me some indication of what they should really taste like.

Dr. Lve Apple

I have an intense dislike for early wonder. It tastes like a refrigerated store bought tomato crossed with a rotten cherry or something. It's just bad bad bad

[Tormato]

Originally Posted by jennifer28

I have an intense dislike for early wonder. It tastes like a refrigerated store bought tomato crossed with a rotten cherry or something. It's just bad bad bad

Jennifer,

It came to me labeled as a "full flavored" early tomato.

Hmm...
maybe the full flavor of a refrigerated store bought x rotten cherry.

Gary

[Father'sDaughter]

I'm at 65 days from plant out, and so far nothing in the way of blushing on my slicers. I have, to date, picked ten Kimberley's, three Yaponskiy Karlicks, and today I had a blushing Casino Chip. So far we've sampled one YK and three Kimberley's and while texture was a bit on the soft side, taste was pretty good for earlies -- certainly better than anything we've purchased over the past eight months. I have enough fully ripe ones to put the first tomato salad on tonight's dinner menu.