Review of last years toms plus plans for 2010

Last year I grew the following tomato seedlings:

Lemon Boy, Sweet 100, Viva Italia, Better boy, Red Zebra, Early Girl, Pink Brandywine
Bloody Butcher, Tiny Tim, Container Choice, Zhongshu #4, San Marzano

I kept at least one of every plant except for Better boy and Early Girl.

Tiny Tim and Container Choice I grew in 5 gallon SWC (self watering containers). The others I grew in the dirt.

My top three plants from last year were:
3) Viva Italina (roma variant) - prolific and useful
2) Lemon boy - very prolific, early, tasty
1) Red Zebra - prolific, large plant, tasty

I honestly couldn't tell any difference between the taste of the hybrid Viva and the San Marzano OP variety and the Viva was more prolific.

Tiny Tim in the SWC was unbelievably prolific but the taste was very forgettable and most of the fruit just withered on the vine. Same with the taste of Container Choice.

This year I am going to grow Chocolate Cherry instead of Sweet 100 (for myself) I will still make some Sweet 100s for my friends and family.

I will definitely plant my top 3 again. This weekend I am going to look through my seeds and see what else I will try that is new. Mortgage Lifter or Rutgers perhaps (I think that I have both).

If I gave you plants last year which ones worked out the best for you?

Garden dreaming

It has been ages since I posted here but I am starting to think about gardening for twenty-ten even amidst the cold and snow.

Just this morning I decided that I was going to start some perrenial herbs pretty soon in order to get a better jump than last year. Specifically rosemary, sage, thyme and maybe a couple more depending on what I have around.

I am going to try not to buy any seeds this year; I have a ton of seeds around so I will try to make do with those. I am sure that the temptation will be overwhelming but I will try to stand firm.

Speaking of temptation, around New Year's eve I saw someone post on GardenWeb that they were starting tomato seeds (someone in zone 5 type of climate) and I was sorely tempted. I am going to hold out until at least 2/15!

Peas

I was just looking back at the post before last; in those pictures the peas are about 18" high. They are twice as high now, I'll get a picture later and put it up.

8 is enough

Planted the last tomatoes in the garden tonight. Now there are eight tomatoes.

Sweet 100
Lemon Boy
Viva Italia
San Marzano
Brandywine Red
Red Zebra
Zhongshu #4
Bloody Butcher

I also put in two peppers tonight (one bell and one Jap). I just have another Jap and a bunch of herbs and I will be about done with the garden.

First pea blossom today.

Blossoms

The big plants have blossoms!







Tomato volunteers (spontaneously sprouted from seed)



Peas



Chive flowers

Paydirt

On May 21st we planted out our first 4 tomatoes!

Here are the candidates



The plants in big pots are 59 days old in this picture; the little plant (San Marzano) is 44 days.

A hole 'to China'



Filled with good stuff




Nice roots (sweet 100)



Lemon Boy on left, sweet 100 on right



Roma on left, San Marzano on right




You can see that the sun was set by the time we got them all squared away. It felt really good to see them in the ground.

More Plants in big pots + all tomato names

Took the training wheels off of 8 more plants tonight. Now there are 22 plants in large pots.

Someone asked about which plants we have; here is the whole list of what we have growing:

Better Boy
Bloody Butcher
Brandywine
Container Choice
Early Girly
Lemon Boy
Red Zebra
Roma (Viva Italia)
San Marzano
Sweet 100
Tiny Tim
Zhongshu #4