How's Your Tomatos?

... or any other veggies for that matter. Note: I cheat. These are in the greenhouse. Tomatos don't do very well outside here if you don't have a protected south bed.

My LOML is the veggie king... we're overwhelmed with butter and one other kind of lettuce, and arugula is slowly coming along. First tomato this week! Snow peas are probably ready to harvest, radishes are close, haven't seen green beans, peppers, zucchinis, broccoli, or squash yet. Ditto turnips, although I'd like to harvest some of the greens now! (That would be bad, right?) Leeks and garlic are finally showing up, asparagus is putting up shoots, strawberries are a no show, and he put in some kind of fancy grass -- oat, wheat, or ??? Oh, he just planted some onions.

I can't remember what else is there... marigolds are pretty much a no-show, so we bought a zillion lady bugs. The bees and butterflies are haaaaaaaaaappy!

Why can't you harvest greens? I've start chowing down as soon as they show up. Don't they bolt on you if you don't pick them?Colorado_Karen I'll send you some of my self-seeding-like-weeds marigolds. No fail. Sprinkle them on the ground in the fall. I weed them out by the tons in the spring. droooooool snow peas. I LUV snowpeas but no sunny spot for them sigh. Can they live with sweet peas in morning sun only?

Really?! I can harvest the greens? I thought it would weaken the turnips! Nobody's bolted so far... just a teensy chewed up by aphids...

Thank you so much for the marigolds!! (I sent you my address before re: blue delphinium seeds; holler if you still need it). I want to send you something! So far, nothing to share... but next year will be a different story.

I wish I could send you some snow peas! Ours are a teensy bit shaded by the radishes next to them, but have a southwestern exposure. I'd be worried about them and the sweet peas strangling each other... these really should have a trellis to climb. They spread out over the marigolds, which I'm guessing is why those are a no show.

WAIT sorry I thought you were talking about lettuce etc. greens. I know nothing about turnip greens. OMG I hope you didn't do it yet.

ROFL!!! Nope, I wanted to run it by the gardener in charge of the veggies first. I guess I need to be a lot more careful about what I write!

So far I've only been able to harvest cherry tomatoes (a bunch of Sungold, & yesterday we ate the 1st of the Supersweet 100's) but those never even make it into the house! I've got lots of fruit coming along on my Better Boy, Mountain gold & German Heirlooms. I started the heirlooms from seed I saved last year. I've NEVER been able grow tomatoes from seed before, so I'm really pleased with them.

As for other veggies, my snow peas were good but they're all done now - Karen how can you still have peas this late? And radishes? Mine bolted before they even got big enough to eat! I've had tons of lettuce, but it's threatening to bolt & I have to get it all picked soon.

Cukes, zukes & yellow squash are just starting to really produce. Still waiting on beans, carrotts & scalllop squash. I've got onions & peppers - as soon as I get those tomatoes (oh, & tomatillos) I can make salsa!

Great minds lisabees. Neither my Supersweet millions nor my arctic sunspots make it out of the greenhouse EVER ^_^ I think they are actually in the candy food group. I too only have been eating cherrys. The pic at the top is the ripest of my bigger guys. Congrats on seeding!!!! I luv starting seedlings when its brrrr -30 outside.

My dear heart is the king of veggie gardening... :) I don't know where he got the seeds or what variety they are, but he prolly planted late (the is our first year in the house, and the yard is/was a WRECK). Dunno, but I checked this morning, and it's prime time pickin' for the snow peas and bib and butter lettuce. I hope the soup kitchen takes some lettuce!! We always go overboard with lettuce... :)

We checked the radishes last weekend, and they're still small; maybe good by this weekend. Is there a trick other than pulling one out to telling when they're ready? They're blooming, if that's a sign of something. We waited til they got big enough last year, and they were TASTY!

I need to learn what we've got... the 'maters (sorry... TOmaters) were gifted to us by a friend who grows several kinds from seed. More fruit on the plants, but still green.

Will the grocery store maters produce fertile seed?

'Vine ripened tomatos' at the store sometimes do but its a messy, stinky job to ferment the seed IMHO so I always buy my seed.

Thanks for the tip on seeds, Dahl... I like a challenge, but I create too many noxious projects in the kitchen already. Which is why my DH does most of the cooking!

I have Giant Pumpkins, Kabocha squash in progress. The Tomatoes are blooming, don't know when I will see fruit.

I'm really living now out to the garden. Yesterday, fresh corn, sliced tomatoes, string beans, cukes , and for fruit mixed apricots and special Velvet gooseberries. All out of my garden, great eating.

Here is a picture of corn and tomatoes. the severe windstorm we had Jul. 10 blew over most of my corn stalks. I tied the worst blown over ones up to stakes and the rest finally slowly strightned themselves.

Colorado Karen, Our fences are quite similiar. My was put up to restrain the deer from eating everything, the fence encloses my 2 1/2 acres of irrigated garden area and poses some windbreak protection. We have a lot of wind in this area. I am at about 1500 feet elevation.

Here is another picture, one of my about 4 year old woodland garden. The trees are beginning to creat some shade.

Donna

Oh Rutholive, I'm so jealous of your harvest!

This is so embarrassing. I was always the vegetable gardener on this thread and this year I have no vegetables planted except for a few swiss chard plants in the iris beds ( formerly the veggie beds.) I have no tomatoes. I do have a few jalapeno plants but they only went in the ground when I heard about the salmonella in jalapenos. Our grocery store no longer carries hot peppers. This is tough! No salsa!

let me know if you want some seeds form the kabocha. I have lots!

Yum, Rutholive! We've had sour cherries (pie and some jam), a few currants, mulberries, service berries and a little chard. Herbs. Tomatoes are ripening but not many of them. We've had so much rain and cloudy days. It's raining now!

We have had no rain, just wind and sun. Yesterday 90 degrees and not much wind. I irrigate constantly, still difficult to keep everything wet enough. My hillside is mostly xeric. The tomato plants are reluctant to produce blooms when it is so hot, but there are plenty of small tomatoes from earlier bloom.

A friend invited me out last evening to pick some plums, peaches and she gave me some late cherries that she had picked. I have a couple of peach trees, one is a true dwarf and has quite a few peaches this year but the birds are at them.

Donna

Birds always get quite a bit of our fruit. This year we put netting over about half of the cherries, which helped. Watering is a real chore and I'm thankful for the rain we've been getting because we often don't get it. You must be doing a great job to have all those vegetables in a rough year!

I love fruit trees and home grown fruit. How can you ask for more than shade and food from one plant?
Roybird, I have heard of La Boca, but where is it? Since Barcelona has such incredible tapas I am afraid that ours won't be up to their standards. Maybe we should take them for margaritas and chips and salsa? I definitely want to introduce them to New Mexico food because it has nothing in common with Catalan food -- which is mostly seafood.
Picante, I didn't know that Catalan was the national language of Andorra, but it does make sense. The Catalans are very proud of their language because they weren't allowed to use it during the Franco regime which was very long. Now they require it to be used in their schools. The wife of one of our guests is a physicist who translates math and physics books to Catalan for use in the schools there.
Fascinating!

paj you know what's gonna be the best? Your hospitality! They are just gonna luv the NM experience cuz anyone would. Just do your thing and bring them along and I bet they will rave about it forever! wow this is very cool.

DN,
I hope so. I am going to do my best in spite of the fact that I am not a great housekeeper. I do give an excellent tour of the area, though!

Rutholive, I want to come eat dinner with you. ;-)

My tomatoes are, uh, out of control, but not in a particularly good way. June and July were so overwhelming I never got them going up their strings nor did I pinch suckers off. Now I have a monumental mess in the hoophouse because I have between fifty and sixty tomato plants in there.

Very slow to ripen any fruit, just a few now and then, nights have stayed so cool this year. As a clue, my two rows of peas are still bearing in there. I quit turning on the middle fans during the day and the tomatoes are responding to the heat by starting to ripen.

The green beans looked awful for a long time and now have decided to go for it with lush green leaves and blossoms, and even some beans.

One stubborn gladiolus has lived through the winter in the ground in the hoophouse for three years but never bloomed because it was too hot in the summer. This year it exploded into purple blooms, lots of them.

The squash is in experimental tubs this year, and had decided to start growing madly. I don't have them up on trellises as planned either.

The tetragonia, also in a tub, is finally growing well enough to harvest some.

Not a stellar year. I think of this summer as not being a real summer, more like a placeholder summer.

Paja, "La Boca" is on Marcy St. where "Paul's" used to be. You are an excellent tour guide! Mulch, I kind of feel like this summer hasn't been long enough. It was late in coming and now we are getting so much late rain and not as much sun as we are used to. In some ways ( rain! ) it's very good but not so much for tomatoes. Although we might have a long fall!

Any of you are very welcome to come and share the good eats anytime. Was very hot today, 100 degrees and still quite warm, and predicted hot again tomorrow. I don't go out much in the heat except to irrigate.

Donna

Nice of you rutholive!

Roybird, I doubt I will have a long fall. We have gotten killing frosts as early as mid August, although I hope it waits until September. Plus I will be away in mid September for a show and will not be able to put heat in the hoophouse then. Everything will have to take its chances.

:O naughty mulch said the 'f' word :O

oops...

Hehe...not the f word!!

Here's my huge bounty for the year...don't be jealous! Yep, one tomato. Out of about 10 plants, most of which haven't grown over 1 foot high this year. Very dissappointing, what's the deal?
This is an Eva Purple Ball, which I will no doubt savor. I also have one zuccini growing. My cabbage scorched and bolted, my lettuce got overtaken by weeds, and peas, soy beans, and okra never even came up.
Actually, my mom (in Houston) also had a very bad veggie year. She hasn't had any tomatoes still and her cuke vines are rambling like crazy with no blooms.

Ruth, I'm coming to your house for a fruit salad and fresh veggies, watch out! Sounds so yummy, my mouth is seriously watering.

Sure can't complain about this! I just went out to pick it...hope it's ready and not over ripe.

o wow that did well art_n_garden. My lettuce is bolting now but the toms. are coming on strong now that we FINALLY have some heat. YAHOO!

My tomatoes are in pots and just now getting ripe. Not many of them, either.

Woohooooo! I pulled two med red tomatoes yesterday, and the three bushes are PACKED with more! Also harvested more snow peas and FINALLY green beans, and of couse, more lettuce. Hubbie sowed some kind of squash that's going nuts too. We lost ALL the turnips a week ago (and no, I didn't get to harvest the greens... sob). I know they're supposed to be cool weather veggies, so maybe the heat wave got em.

The biggest squash is just over a foot long... :D

BEAUTY squash Colorado_Karen. I luv tomato season ^_^

Susanne, that is gorgeous! (Zucchini, right?) I think we have one or two zuccs we got at Home Despot; there are a couple vines at the back of the garden that are waaaaay underachieving. DH's seeds are kicking their butts!

Just took this pic of the toms... :D

Beautiful tomatoes!! But uh oh, that means that I'm doing something wrong if yours are doing fine so close. Hmm....

I agree, the ones that I started from seed are doing way better than the store bought. The zucchini I posted is from seed. I can't wait to cook it tonight. DH will be out of town and he doesn't like them, so it's all mine!!

Sarah's (friend that came to the Spring RU) tomatoes, zuccinni and peppers that she got from Amy and Paul are doing awesome! She got 2 big squash/zuccs (can't remember which) and has peppers coming out of her ears.

There's no telling, Sus... one thing that might be different is shade; these maters are at the back of the bed against the fence, and had lots of shade during the heat wave. Suddenly, the turnips that had shaded them croaked, so now they're getting good eastern sunshine all day, but are still shaded from the southern exposure.

My crazy DH hates zuccs too! You should make zucchini bread and taunt him with it... hehe!

mmmmmmmmmmmmm zuccinni bread mmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Interesting. I have a feeling it has to do with a combination of: my crapola soil (in the terrace), too much baking sun, crowding by weeds, and because they hate me. lol okay, the last one I made up. Last summer I had tons of cherry tomatoes, but this year I wanted a challenge so I didn't start any. I get what I deserve.

Mmm is right! Zucchini bread. Ya know, I don't think he'd even fall for that. He doesn't like pumpkin bread either, not even with loads of butter. How did I let this guy in???