Notes on this past season

Ok,everyone has had time to finish their harvest and begin thinking about next year.

What tomato do you remember from this season that you were happy...surprised...dissapointed...thrilled about?

I'll go first.

Happy...well,that I got a harvest at all.I start plants on Valentine's Day for a mid-April plant out. This year,the spring floods kept me from planting these pitiful,stressed,overgrown seedlings till June 8th! ARGGGGGGG!!!!

Surprised...hmmm....Cherokee Purple,which is usually reliable was not it's productive self this season.I usually have them running out my ears.This season,they were special treats.

Dissapointed...Red Brandywine.Just so-so.Doux Dougats Di Napoli...just another roma.

Thrilled...Wes...a beautiful,large,fragrant,delightful experience.Rose Beauty...a yellow beefsteak that consistantly produced large,tasty fruits right up till frost.Dr.Carolyn Pink...little morsels of tomatoey essence.I usually don't like the cherries because they are too sweet.These are like fine Champagne,just the right amount of sugar to get your attention,but the depth of a much larger fruit.

Arkansas Traveler was my mainstay and backbone.Beautiful pink globes that never scalded or cracked.Each one was always perfect and harvest was plentiful.
My bi-colors were wonderful this year...they colored up well and had that marvelous taste that I love.Lucky Cross beat Old Flame by a nose as far as taste goes.It just had more depth.I love bi-colors dearly and this was a good season.The only problem was that I didn't get any till nearly Sept!!That's almost 2 months late!

OK,that gets the ball rolling.Lets hear from everyone else.I know you've got opinions and we need to get these fora active again!

I really love the brandywines we grow, but want to try something equally tasty without the problems of the skins splitting. Has to be red, though... somehow I can't abide another color, LOL.

My pleasant surprises were my Supersteak hybrid....a single plant that really outdid itself, and Annas Peace....three plants that just kept producing lots of nice pink brandywine type tomatoes.

Another pleasant surprise was a salad type tomato that came from some unknown seeds.....It had hundreds of salad sized red delicious 'maters on it right up to freezing weather; a giant vine that I plan on planting seeds from again next year.

My main disappointments were caused by the hot dry summer and virus on some of my favorite varieties....especially on my Red and Pink Oxhearts and my Hillbilly variety.

I will stick to the same varieties next summer, and try to control viruses better with more frequent sprayings of Daconil.

Owen

Brandywine did me well, considering that I planted so late. I am still harvesting some (green, now). I need to take them out before the frost gets to them, which will be soon.

I just got a fence, so just put some out in mid-June.

I will be doing different tomatoes next year, thanks to the generous traders here at DG. (Thanks, Owen!)

Very happy this year with Juliet F1 and Red Agate F1, both paste tomato seeds I purchased from Johnny's Select Seeds. My husband's project at work ends the beginning of next year and when I was planning the garden I was worried about him being out of work, so I planted as many paste tomatoes as I could. Well, if we need to we could live off tomatoes for about 2 months now.

I will plant these again, maybe not quite so many.

This summer's tomatoes were a big disappointment. I had a few "okay" tomatoes. Everyone else said they were delicious. I'm blaming the hot weather and the drought. I'm so looking forward to the spring when I can start all over again with all new varieties (thank you Owen).

Hope they do well for you folks:)

we had a very late freeze (may 28th) in upstate NY this past season so that set the tomato effort back as well as eliminating the apples we normally make cider with. In the end,though we had a fair crop with the best yields and flavor coming from red brandywine and ole reliable Burpees supersteak. I also grew cherokee purple which did well but isn't as tart as I prefer. Also tried sungold cherry type and jean flamme. I'm not nuts about either of them and won't grow them again. Next year I'll plant supersteak, red oxhearts (from Owen thx), red brandy, sweet one hundreds and Johnny's 361's based on Horseshoes' glowing reports about them. Maybe dabble with some others.

I feel silly posting here, only planted two types, Jaune Flamme and Tip Top. Like Darius, I'm a red tomato fan and while the J.F did well, I wasn't really too crazy about it. The Tip Top, on the other hand, did really well and I love them! I have cut my garden space to minimal due to health concerns, so next year will be planting Tip Top and maybe one or two others, depending on what Melody and I get cooking. I didn't preserve any, just ate them as they came until the end, but I did cook up a batch at the very end to get them in before the hard freeze. They made a passing sauce for angel hair pasta mixed with sausage and herbs.

In the main garden:
Pleased with the old standbys Prudens Purple(Darius - you might want to try this in place of Brandywines as they don't split easily and are large and very tasty,)Burpees Supersteak, and new to me Aunt Ruby's German Green.
Dissapointed with Cobalt, Pineapple,Magnum, and Whopper.

On the porch in 5 gallon buckets with 2'square by 5' high trellis:
Very pleased with Stupice, Manyel, and Kellogs Breakfast. Also in 2 gallon conainers with no support: very, very pleased with Window Box. An extremely forgiving and prolific 1' bushy plant with 1 1/2 - 2" globe with tip red tomatoes that were very tasty, early, and yet lasted through September. We harvested over 35 tomatoes off of one plant!!!

Hey Tim, I am intrigued by your experience with Window Box... Where did you get your seeds? Chuck Wyatt? Veseys? Did you grow anything else in 2 gallon containers?

Hey Phred - Yes, Window Box Tomato came from Chuck Wyatt. Also my loverly wife informs me that I lied about size of tomato - they were only 1"- 1 1/2" size ! Most of my "deck plants" are in 5 gallon containers (tomato, eggplant and etc) because of need for larger root system than a 2 gal. will offer. But 2gal. is good for bush beans, rotating crops of spinache,lettuce,radishes and many of the smaller pepper plants (Jingle bells,purple beauty, jalepena, peter,and trifetti).
I drill lots of holes in bottom of bucket, thin layer of pebbles, then a rich compost planting medium with a top covering of mulched leaves to hold in moisure.