Sara's Galapagos -- anyone else here growing it?

[cythaenopsis]

This is the first time I'm growing Sara's Galapagos, and after a slow start with delayed germination the one plant I kept is doing extremely well (I gave away the others).

I realize this grows more like a bush than your typical spindly tomato plant, but I was kind of expecting it to grow tall. Mine is still under 2' tall but is now approaching 4' wide! This plant is sprawling out like a vacationer on a beach recliner. It seems to be very healthy and has already set nearly two dozen fruits. But height just doesn't seem to interest it. I'm growing it on the corner of a fire escape in a 12 gallon DIY SIP container. I can still get by it, but not without doing a little extra leg lifting.

I'll have to take a few more recent photos, as this was just last week:



(Yellow/orange colored leaves are due to lighting at sunset)


Anyone else here growing Sara's Galapagos? How are your plants looking?

[carolyn137]

But you already have a thread I think in the picture Forum, but it was mainly a back and forth between you and me.

Power went out last night, I'm way behind, the SESE folks are visiting today and more storms for today;

Are you still wondering if what you have is correct? I ask only b'c I thought I'd answered all of your questions in the other thread, being the person who introduced the variety.

So when I have time I'll just follow this thread as best I can but you might want to link to your other thread here so that folks will know what we discussed.

Carolyn

[linzelu100]

I grow Sara's Galapagos- it's great. Mine gets huge and unruly when I don't prune it, and puts out a lot of tomatoes. I am thinking yours is staying small because it is in a small pot.

[Garf]

I have some seeds for saras. I plan to try them this fall.

[cythaenopsis]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

But you already have a thread I think in the picture Forum, but it was mainly a back and forth between you and me.

Are you still wondering if what you have is correct? I ask only b'c I thought I'd answered all of your questions in the other thread, being the person who introduced the variety.

Hey Carolyn, I started this one to solicit input from other members on their growing Sara's Galapagos. My original one was primarily an exchange between us and you did answer all of my questions -- thanks! [link]

Originally Posted by linzelu100

I grow Sara's Galapagos- it's great. Mine gets huge and unruly when I don't prune it, and puts out a lot of tomatoes. I am thinking yours is staying small because it is in a small pot.

I haven't done any pruning at all. I figured it would find "it's own way" around and stop naturally, but now I'm thinking it might be a good idea to prune a little.

My container is a 12 gallon one. The plant is now 5' wide! It is drinking about 1.5 gallons per day. I'm a little worried it'll have a tough time of it when I'm gone for 3 days. I don't know what the climate is like on the Galapagos Islands. Rain every day? I guess the worst thing to face in that is blossom drop.

[cythaenopsis]

Ugg... well this doesn't look good. My plant has been doing extremely well, producing dozens upon dozens of these "large blueberry" sized tomatoes that are super sweet. All was going well when I started noticing a number of leaves going yellow a couple of weeks ago. A friend who I gave a Sara's Galpagos plant to was experiencing the same thing, so if figured it is a normal side-effect of the late season. Except that now I see black spotting... and it has been getting worse. I also noticed it starting on a nearby tomato plant.

Is this late season blight?