Green House Tomatoes, Johnny's.

[beeman]

I wasn't really happy with the toms I grew in the green house, for the first time this year. I tried out a number of heirlooms, and while the grew pretty good they were in some cases too big and some were bland. We did discuss it under "Disappointing heirlooms', can't find the thread.
Anyway, have just been looking through Johnny's list and note their 'Greenhouse' toms! Apart from the price which is a bit expensive, Does anyone have knowledge of them? They are listed for greenhouse use, So are they better than heirlooms for indoor use?
All comments gratefully received.

[KarenO]

What kind of greenhouse do you have? size? for personal use or do you sell produce as well? Might help in answering the question to know a bit about the conditions and the purpose of your growing.
I have a small greenhouse, for personal use only. I found the flavour of my heirlooms was very good in the greenhouse (planted in soil beds in the ground inside my greenhouse) but I also found they grew too large for the space and wound up getting a little out of hand. My plan for next season is to try indeterminate dwarfs in there to see if they do better.
Specific to Johnny's seeds, I would imagine anything listed as a greenhouse tomato will be an F1 hybrid. Likely, if I was growing for commercial use I would use hybrid seed for the uniform appearance and likely built -in disease resistance specific to fungus especially in a greenhouse. I think that flavour though is most likely a characteristic that takes a back seat to those other characteristics. For personal use, I like the variety available in OP seed as I don't want a boat load of very firm red medium tomatoes which is mainly what I would get from typical hybrids.
Again, depends very much on use and preference. For a large operation, cost may be a factor as well as Hybrid seed is often quite expensive, particularly special or new varieties

KarenO

[AKmark]

I have grown Trust, they are one of the best hybrids for a sweet tomato, my friend grows Tomimara Muchoo, it is ok. Those are two on Johnny's I am familiar with. This year Trust blew Jet Star, and Charger away, no comparison, they are other popular greenhouse tomatoes up here, maybe that's why the Trust seed is very expensive. They are also very manageable plants.

[beeman]

Originally Posted by KarenO

What kind of greenhouse do you have? size? for personal use or do you sell produce as well? Might help in answering the question to know a bit about the conditions and the purpose of your growing. KarenO

Hi Karen, Mine is a small family sized greenhouse, and there is just two of us, plus of course hangers on and grown up kids, so I don't want or need tons of toms.
I cannot grow in ground without digging out and replacing the soil, it suffers with the wilts. So by the time you take out the containers height it doesn't leave much growing space, plus my toms were bland. Someone suggested it was because they were container grown in the cool.
Perhaps your idea of dwarfs might be a good one to try, any suggestions of variety?

[Cole_Robbie]

I have an old thread here with a lot of suggestions for a compact determinate for high tunnel growing: www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=25071

I'm going to try Mountain Princess this year as my main red.

Johnny's has an orange tomato called Orange Blossom F1 that I really like. It's a compact determinate with very good flavor. Taxi is my favorite compact yellow determinate.

Although I'm a market grower, I don't like most of the varieties aimed at market growers. They tend to be much too firm for my taste.

[KarenO]

Originally Posted by beeman

Hi Karen, Mine is a small family sized greenhouse, and there is just two of us, plus of course hangers on and grown up kids, so I don't want or need tons of toms.
I cannot grow in ground without digging out and replacing the soil, it suffers with the wilts. So by the time you take out the containers height it doesn't leave much growing space, plus my toms were bland. Someone suggested it was because they were container grown in the cool.
Perhaps your idea of dwarfs might be a good one to try, any suggestions of variety?

I am working on a small collection of mainly dwarf project varieties but I don't have enough experience with them personally to really recommend particular ones. There are many I am interested in though and Salix was kind enough to send me some exciting ones like Wherkowhai and Dwarf Arctic rose and I am hoping for more to choose from in Carolyn's seed offer as well as from the swap. I like rosella purple, Tasmanian chocolate and emerald giant as ones I've tried myself. Some, like Emerald Giant, were fairly late so that's OK in the greenhouse here. I would like a succession from earlier to later rather than all of them ripe at more or less the same time. I grow outdoors as well but I thought I'd give all the greenhouse space over to dwarf plants this year as an experiment to see how they do and in hopes that they would be easier to manage in my small greenhouse as far as outgrowing their space.
Karen

[BigVanVader]

Originally Posted by Cole_Robbie

I have an old thread here with a lot of suggestions for a compact determinate for high tunnel growing: www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=25071

I'm going to try Mountain Princess this year as my main red.

Johnny's has an orange tomato called Orange Blossom F1 that I really like. It's a compact determinate with very good flavor. Taxi is my favorite compact yellow determinate.

Although I'm a market grower, I don't like most of the varieties aimed at market growers. They tend to be much too firm for my taste.

Interesting, the Mountain family of tomato is what most market growers here grow. Do you find people buy more hybrids or heirlooms from you? I have debated growing a dependable market tomato myself instead of strictly heirlooms but not sure if it would be worth the effort since every other grower has them and I cant grow on a huge scale.

[Cole_Robbie]

Most customers of mine can't tell the difference between an heirloom and a hybrid. Heirlooms that are not oddly shaped or catfaced tend to sell the best for me. The heirlooms I have chosen for next year, like Cosmonaut Volkov, grow "normal" looking tomatoes. Pretty colors are fine, like Lucky Cross, but heirlooms that have large shoulders and non-uniform shapes are thought of as "ugly" by most customers.

Big Beef is my favorite hybrid to grow. I sell a lot of the plants in the spring. I describe it to customers as a garden hybrid, rather than a commercial hybrid that produces firm tomatoes with a long shelf life. I really can't stand firm tomatoes at all, and I try to only grow what I like to eat.