What were your best preformers this year

I have to say in order of performance for 2012

Cindy's West Virginia
Linda's Faux
Daniels

I picked tomatoes today, lots and lots of them so the tomatoes did fabulously for me this year. I picked, WHOPPER, EARLY GIRL, BEEFMASTER, BIG BOY, SUPERFANTASTIC and BETTER BUSH and lots each. Really lots and lots of the Whoppers and Early Girls.

Hi Paul,

Just east of you!

I had a great year for tomatoes. My plants are still going strong; previous years they have succumbed to disease by late July/ early August.

They've all produced so well, I can't really pick a winner, but these have been the most prolific:

Black from Tula
Pantano Romanesco
Gigantesque
Bradley
Black Cherry

Of these, I'll only grow the Black from Tula and Black Cherry again. Their flavor is really outstanding, although the others were great in roasted tomato sauce!

Trying to figure out what else I want to grow next year right now...

Well, If I have to list my best producer than definatly it is my Juliet Grape tomatoes. Juliets are large fruited for grape tomatoes but they produce like crazy, just like most of the cherry and grape types do. I love those Juliets.

I was looking strictly for tender skin and good flavor, and none of the big ones really worked well for those two goals. The medium tomatoes gave me just what i was looking for, and next year i will replant,
BLACK KRIM,
SWEET CARNEROS PINK
CHEROKEE PURPLE,
EARLY GIRL,
BRANDYWINE,
EVA PURPLE BALL, Which was a slow starter, but an excellent late producer.
I will only plant one small tomato, probably a TommyToe.

That will leave me room to try two or three new varieties.

San Marzano
Cherokee Purple
Lemon Boy
So many tomatoes, so little time.

First year with heirloom tomatoes and grew these in a hoophouse.

Most productive (through entire season):
Black Cherry
Striped Cavern
Moonglow
Lemon Drop- splits super easy though

My favorite- about 2 tomatoes/week per plant
Gold Medal- red and yellow bi-color beefsteak size.

Most Productive and great taste

Black Cherry
Chocolate Cherry - Hard to tell difference between this and the Black Cherry
Sun Sugar (hybrid)
Brad's Black Heart - fantastic flavor
Cowlick's Brandywine - big and scrumptious (is that a word?)
Cherokee Green - fantastic flavor
Momotaro (Hybrid) - always reliable

Favorite orange but not as prolific is KBX - terrific flavor
Other great ones taste wise but not as prolific are Pruden's Purple, Amazon Chocolate (produced more and longer than other years), and Danko

mine were
stupice
floradade
black cherry

they are the only ones that survived out heat and are still producing

I was surprised by some of my results. I had grown some of the Livingston tomato seed just for fun and wasn't really expecting more than some good conversation about the oldtime tomatoes, but several turned out well. Maybe the composted chicken poo?

Gulf State Market (Livingston strain)
Livingston's Giant Oxheart
Little Lucky Tomato (I just bought because of the name, but it was good!)
Turkey Chomp Tomato (another one I just bought for the name, not a big producer but what I got was good)
Sungold
Extreme Bush Tomato
Heinz VF Tomato
Homestead
Livingston's Favorite
Celebration F1
Mountain Pride
Margo
Long Tom (just bought it for my Good Neighbors tomato bed--tuned out to be good)
Barnes Mountain Yellow (thank you passiflora_pink)

I will definitely have the above back in the garden next year. It was a good year for tomatoes in my garden and best of tomato-luck to you all for next year!

This was an abnormally wet summer here east of the Alleghenies, and the tomatoes suffered accordingly.

However, OTV Brandywine and Dr. Lyle both produced tasty fruit throughout and were the best out of twenty-four varieties. Also, after being underwhelmed by Limbaugh Potato Top the past two years, the taste this year has been superb.

It's been one of the hottest(and humid) years I can ever remember here on the coast. Down right unbearable at times. Got so bad, I'm considering dropping a good chunk of change on getting A/C installed before next summer. Not gonna go through a summer like that again. I will never complain about May Gray, June Gloom or any overcast days again :) Most of the tomatoes seemed to like the heat, maybe a little less productive but made up for it in size and a good strong flavor.

Big Beef and Cherokee Purple, like always produced heavily and tasted great with perfect texture.

Fioletovyi Kruglyi was a wonderful first time tomato for me. Definitely gonna be back next year. Much better than Black Cherry imo. Bigger, more productive, a lot less splitting and better tasting.

Sweet Carneros Pink, cool looking and much better tasting than I imagined. I really liked the strong flavor. It will be back again next year.

Stump of the World, good flavor and texture, like always.

Tasmanian Chocolate and Rosella Purple were some nice tasting dwarfs that I will grow again.

All 3 hearts I grew this year(Anna Russian, Danko, Kosovo) were flavorful like they have been in the past. But they just don't last as long as the others when the diseases start flowing in. Will of course grow them again, but will cut down on the number of plants. Maybe only 2 of each.

I had good flavor and excellent production from hybrids: Homestead, Big Beef, and Jet Star. I had okay production and excellent flavor from the heirloom Indian Stripe. Most of the others had good flavor, but very limited production.

David R

I would have to agree with Ray_Der_Phan about Sweet Carneros Pink. Great salad sized tomato with a combination of taste and beauty, and it really never slowed down. Tsar Kolokol had so many huge hearts on one branch at the same time, they came out misshapened. This was also a very meaty and flavorful pink heart. I am including a picture of one days picking of Summertime Gold. Flavor was very good but a bit milder. This is one of Dwarfs from Tomatoville. And I couldn't eat the Cherokee Greens fast enough to keep up. Great Green-When-Ripe variety. These are a few that come to mind.

That is a nice looking plate of tomatoes.

Hello, could you post from whom you ordered Tsar Kolokol? I have come up empty handed. The Cherokee Greens, is that a tomato or greens? Thank you.

Tatianas Tomato Base lists 3 sources for the Tsar Kolokol for 2013. http://t.tatianastomatobase.com:88/wiki/Tsar-Kolokol#tab=Seed_Availability
I got some in a Seed Exchange 2010 and will be planting them for the first time this year.

Happy to see that others have had the same good experience with the Cherokee Green, which is a tomato that stays green when ripe. It is sort of an amber green but I had to feel it to make sure it was ripe. I grew that for the first time last summer (2012) but it will remain a standard in my garden from now on. Tatiana lists 15 vendors offering it for 2013!
http://t.tatianastomatobase.com:88/wiki/Cherokee_Green#tab=Seed_Availability

Nancy, thanks for the picture of the Summertime Gold. They look wonderful. That will be another new one for 2013. I have just sown all my seeds for this season.

I had a bad case of wilt last year so the only thing that did well for me was 4th of July - but they were great tasting, early fruiting, and the first flush had very large fruit. It kept going all year, altho the fruit got smaller as the season went on, but I had plenty to give away to friends and co workers.

This year I'm growing more 4th of July, as well as Parks Whopper and Marglobe as they are all supposed to be wilt resistant - we'll see. I can't rotate crops cause it's just a small raised garden bed so I have to try resistant varieteis. I'm also going to try Power Pops cherrys (they succombed to the wilt last year) in a brand new containers with some Miracle Grow potting soil and hopefully they'll do alright.

I've had good luck with Marglobe over the years. It is not one I would grow everytime as I'm too curious about various other tomatoes. For example, I'm trying out Burpee's Porterhouse and Burpee's SuperSauce this year for no other reason than curiosity. And the fun of it, of course!

Yep, I like trying new ones too but I can't now with this wilt. The 4th of July were the only ones out of 7 varieties that survived it last year. I was lucky I had them - they were in a little tiny Burpee Kit I found at Lowes with a few seeds, 6 peat pellets and a tiny little starter tray and dome, and I bought it on impulse.

Two that I have had good luck with growing in large pots are Margo and Golden Bison. I grow Extreme Bush in the ground, but it is determinate and you might have good luck with that one in a pot as well. That wilt sure sounds crummy! Hopefully you can find an alternative and satisfactory tomato growing process. Also, according to Southern Exposure Seed Exchange (right there in VA), Neptune and Ozark Pink are said to be good southern wilt resistant varieties. I have grown Neptune and it is sprouting on my porch right now as I am growing it again this year. I do have to agree that it was healthy as a horse when I first grew it two years ago. And that was a truly wicked hot year. Not good for tomatoes at all.

Good luck to you and I'll keep my eye out for your report on how 4th of July does for you this year!

Thanks. You know, even the ones I grew in pots last year got wilt. I set up some new raised beds last year and bought bagged soil and compost from Lowes and filled the beds and my large vege pots with it and I believe the soil I bought was infected. I was pretty upset about it. I'd actually been growing tomatos in that spot for years with no problems, and decided to build a raised bed in the same spot to make it easier on my back. It never occurred to me that I might bring in some bad dirt.

I am going to try a small tomato variety this year that I tried last year (Power Pops), but this time I'm going to try a different soil and get a brand new pot and see how they do.