Does tomato shape affect cracking?

creeker · July 5, 2021

After our hot spell (2 weeks of 100s) we got a week of off and on rain with much lower temperatures. Due to nematodes in the soil I'm raising in buckets on rain gutters (first time this year, so still learning the do's and don'ts). The gutters filled up with rainwater, buckets soaked up, and ripening tomatoes started cracking. All I could do was drain the gutters and pick all but the green tomatoes. Growing several varieties and it seems the flatter (oblate) ones cracked worst, rounds not as bad and a heart shaped one and some pear shapes not at all. I don't know if this is true in most cases or if it just happened, but it may affect my variety selection in the future. Comments please. Sorry, got this in wrong forum. sooo emberassed

slugworth · July 6, 2021

tiny dwarf tomatoes like tidy treat did fine.
But the tomatoes are the size of peanut M&M's

KarenO · July 6, 2021

Imo tomatoes with a flattened irregular or oblate shape particularly those with a large stem scar an/ or big sunken stem are much more likely to have radial cracking. And also a big core sometimes.
Concentric cracking is more related to variety than shape.
KarenO

July 5, 2021	#1
creeker Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Dec 2015 Location: Southern New Mexico Posts: 106	Does tomato shape affect cracking? After our hot spell (2 weeks of 100s) we got a week of off and on rain with much lower temperatures. Due to nematodes in the soil I'm raising in buckets on rain gutters (first time this year, so still learning the do's and don'ts). The gutters filled up with rainwater, buckets soaked up, and ripening tomatoes started cracking. All I could do was drain the gutters and pick all but the green tomatoes. Growing several varieties and it seems the flatter (oblate) ones cracked worst, rounds not as bad and a heart shaped one and some pear shapes not at all. I don't know if this is true in most cases or if it just happened, but it may affect my variety selection in the future. Comments please. Sorry, got this in wrong forum. sooo emberassed Last edited by creeker; July 5, 2021 at 05:53 PM. Reason: wrong forum. can the editors correct this?

July 6, 2021	#2
slugworth Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Oct 2014 Location: connecticut,usa Posts: 1,152	tiny dwarf tomatoes like tidy treat did fine. But the tomatoes are the size of peanut M&M's

July 6, 2021	#3
KarenO Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Oct 2012 Location: Vancouver Island Posts: 5,931	Imo tomatoes with a flattened irregular or oblate shape particularly those with a large stem scar an/ or big sunken stem are much more likely to have radial cracking. And also a big core sometimes. Concentric cracking is more related to variety than shape. KarenO