Hearts

[tyrupp]

Are there any oxheart tomato's with heavy foliage or potato leaf, It would be great to find one that does not suffer from sun scald

[b54red]

Last year was my first year growing a bunch of hearts and I found two that had relatively heavy foliage, at least until I lost leaves to foliage diseases on the lower portion of the plant. The one with the heaviest foliage was Linnie's Oxheart and the other was Wes.

[Tormato]

Tyrupp,

I had a PL heart show up in my garden this year. There's no guarantee the saved seed will produce PL hearts. But, if you'd like to try 'em, send me a PM.

Tormato

[tomatoaddict]

Tormato!! I want to know if you planted the greasy bean seeds??? and the result!

[b54red]

Tormato what was that potato leaf heart like? How did it taste? Color? Productivity? Size? etc.

[carolyn137]

I'm trying to think of any PL heart varieties and me wee mind just isn't working tonight.

I do know of one fantastic, outstanding PL red heart but unfortunately I don't have any seeds to spare. I don't have enough seeds to SSE list and I don't even have enough seeds to offer in my free seed offer here.

So look for Kukla's Portuguese Heart in the future. The same person sent me a heart, a paste and a beefsteak and I got some seeds off the first two and no beefsteak fruits at all, which wasn't uncommon this past season since it was such a lousy season I didn't get fruits off of half of my plants. I may send some seeds of the heart to some of my closest SSE and other tomato friends so don't get upset if you see it on someones 2011 grow list when I just said I don't have seeds to share.

So all three are regrows for next season.

And I'll try to visualize many of the other hearts I know as to the degree of foliage cover.

But I'm a bit curious. In the past have you had problems with sunscald and hearts b'c of wispy droopy foliage and that's why you're asking the questions you are?

Where I live and garden I've never had sunscald on any of my heart varieties. The only time I get sunscald is after I've started harvesting fruits and the vines have been rearranged and that goes for all the varieties I grow which are mainly indeterminates.

[tyrupp]

Carolyne, Ive had a problem with sun scald the last few years with the exception of suddeth brandywine. Out here in Kansas (zone 5) I was not able to grow Kentucky wonder pole beans, they just cooked on the cattle panels . I have a well so water is not a problem. Heavy foliage is a bonus , our annual rain fall is about 20 inches. The indians didn't even want to live around here in the summer

[b54red]

Tyrup, we had a very dry, very hot summer this past season and I had a lot of trouble with sunscald on most varieties. Like Carolyn I did not have much trouble on my hearts except for German Red Strawberry and none on Linnies or Donskoi. I found that Indian Stripe seemed to suffer less from sunscald than any other variety even though it didn't have particularly heavy foliage.

[Tormato]

Originally Posted by tomatoaddict

Tormato!! I want to know if you planted the greasy bean seeds??? and the result!

Terry,

How did "Terry's North Carolina Long Speckled Greasy Cutshort Variant" beans do? Well, the weather was so brutal here, that there are more letters in the bean's name than there were beans produced. So few that I didn't get to taste any, I only saved seed. Next year, if the creek DOES rise.

Gary

[GunnarSK]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

Look for Kukla's Portuguese Heart in the future. The same person sent me a heart, a paste and a beefsteak and I got some seeds off the first two and no beefsteak fruits at all, which wasn't uncommon this past season since it was such a lousy season I didn't get fruits off of half of my plants.

And I'll try to visualize many of the other hearts I know as to the degree of foliage cover.

Spudayellow Strawberry (related to German Red Strawberry and surprisingly enough not to Orange Strawberry) and Craig's Potato Leaf are PL hearts, and Grightmire's Pride which I haven't grown myself is supposed to "behave" almost as a non-heart.
And maybe Tormato/Gary found something interesting.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by GunnarSK

Spudayellow Strawberry (related to German Red Strawberry and surprisingly enough not to Orange Strawberry) and Craig's Potato Leaf are PL hearts, and Grightmire's Pride which I haven't grown myself is supposed to "behave" almost as a non-heart.
And maybe Tormato/Gary found something interesting.

Gary just PMed me about his PL heart and we're talking about it.

I think by Craig's Potato leaf you must mean Little Lucky Heart which is PL, which I'd forgotten about. And yes, I knew about Spudayellow Strawberry.

And yes, I've grown Grightmire's Pride, years ago, and it's RL but does throw some hearts and beefs on the same plant.

Now don't get upset with me for how I feel about this but what I'm trying to remember are PL hearts that are known family heirlooms, not ones that arose through chance X pollination or were deliberately bred.

Nothing wrong with a chance X pollination leading to a family PL heart heirloom variety, but it isn't very common. In fact I've seen it estimated that perhaps 95% of the varieties we know today arose in that manner and the other 5% were from mutation from a pre-existing variety.

I'm trying hard to remember a variety I grew, name starts with an "m" one of the first years after I joined SSE, but I haven't come up with the name yet.

[Tormato]

Originally Posted by b54red

Tormato what was that potato leaf heart like? How did it taste? Color? Productivity? Size? etc.

Red,

The taste was excellent. Sweet, like most hearts. However, almost every variety in my garden this year tasted excellent, with one dud, and one beyond excellent. With too much rain or watering, it probably wouldn't taste as good.

The color was pink.

Production was excellent, 30 tomatoes. Kosovo is the only heart I've trialed that has better production. And, it was still flowering and setting fruit up until the killing frost at the start of November. I don't think I've ever had a heart variety make it past mid October.

Size topped out at 13.5 ounces. But, all of my varieties were running 1/3 smaller than previous years, so maybe this one can produce 20 ouncers. I restricted watering to an extreme this year, to see what would happen. I wound up with great tasting, but smaller fruit.

This was the healthiest looking tomato plant, in all my years of gardening. That's close to 1,000 plants. Not a spot on a leaf until sometime in October.

Gary

[beefyboy]

I am growing Kosovo,Sylvan Gaume, orange strawberry, Anna Russian, Prue, and all are cranking out tomatoes as I write this. My surprise had been Sylvan which is put out the first tom. of the yr. and beat out even Stupice in setting fruit. I am amazed by the vigor of this plant as am Orange Strawberry. My Kosovo and Anna Russian production are doing very well also and this is going to be a fantastic yr. My Sudduth is the biggest plant I have and seems to love earthboxes along with Earls Faux. Most productive in my garden is by far Bills Berkely wich I got from B54red! On one plant have over 35 fruit and it is only beginning! Sorry I am rambling on here!, and more to come.

[kath]

Ramble on, beefyboy! Those of us who can't grow now are loving reading about how the maters on next year's list are performing well for others.

[coastal-tony]

I just started five Kosovo & Gary O' Sent plants from the seeds you sent. Thanks again. I started ten other seeds on 9-1 and some of the plants are close to 3' tall and LOADED with blossoms.

Originally Posted by b54red

Tyrup, we had a very dry, very hot summer this past season and I had a lot of trouble with sunscald on most varieties. Like Carolyn I did not have much trouble on my hearts except for German Red Strawberry and none on Linnies or Donskoi. I found that Indian Stripe seemed to suffer less from sunscald than any other variety even though it didn't have particularly heavy foliage.