plans for next year

[habitat-gardener]

This summer we had earlier, longer, and hotter heat waves than before. I got very few tomatoes from my OP indeterminates. Most of my tomatoes came from a few early indeterminates and from some indeterminate cherries, and one hybrid indeterminate.

So, in addition to planting much earlier so that tomatoes can set before the heat waves come, I'm thinking about not planting any more OP indeterminates!! Or at least not more than a couple. I got zero tomatoes from an old reliable, Pruden's Purple. Rose de Berne had an uncharacteristically small yield. Two tomatoes each from Captain Lucky, Aunt Ginny's Purple, and Purple Brandy. One so far from KARMA Apricot. Maybe 4-5 from the best of the big purples, Polaris.

[Tormahto]

So then, what do you plant?

[Rockoe10]

What about determinate? My understanding is that many hot and/or humid growers stick to determinate varieties.

[JRinPA]

I don't think I'd be too drastic with the change. How about 50% as usual, 50% with the new regimen? And what can you replace those OP purples with? Big Beef and a can of Krylon Fusion? When I was buying plants, I'd never even heard of black or purple tomatoes.

[habitat-gardener]

Ok, ok, I know every year is different, and I like to try new things every year, and it’s a treat when the luscious indeterminates do well, but the summers do seem to be getting hotter, so…

Last year. I planted four beds of indeterminates.
This year, two. Another bed was determinates, and the fourth was dwarf varieties. About 11-16 plants per bed, plus, of course, several more plants scattered about the garden to bring the total to 50-60 plants. So I could pare it down to one bed of indeterminates, if I can figure out which ones might be worth trying (or trying again). This is really the first year I’ve had a dense tomato jungle with so few fruits. I add compost at planting time and water in thoroughly, but I don’t fertilize, and I water sparingly through the summer.

(The dining room table is still covered with tomatoes for a few months, and I can still make a tomato sandwich most days even if I have to use small tomatoes, but it’s discouraging to get zero to two tomatoes out of monster plants.)

Purple Boy F1 is a pretty good indeterminate purple, and it lasts a pretty long time after it’s picked, too. Polaris did better than the other dark indeterminates, so it may have earned a slot for next year.

My neighbors at the community garden love Early Girl and Juliet, (and they plant only a handful!!) and even they thought it was a bad tomato year. Of course I’m not going to go all tasteless hybrid!!

Unfortunately, my fellow OP enthusiast across town who plants in early March also had a poor year, so changing the timing may not help much.

I’ve been asking around to find out what did well for local gardeners, and here’s my list so far.
Bobbie, early red indeterminate oxheart
Russian Persimmon, orange indeterminate

These did well in my garden:
Early Pink Wonder, medium pink det.
Saraev Vesennie Zamorozki, det. Small red
Zolotoe Serdtse, large orange det.
Pink Princess, pink cherry indet.
Indigo Cherry Drops, red cherry indet.
Sleeping Lady, dwarf purple
Komohana grape, det. Red small grapes
Strelka, det. Red long thin with almost no seeds or gel and a unique taste (most are quite small, though— I’d like to try it in a different location)

Uluru Ochre outproduced all the other dwarf varieties, but it cracked and I didn’t like it as much as I thought I would. I love the way the plants look, though, and I’m excited to try more dwarf varieties.

[karstopography]

Capitol of hot and humid here.I realize Central California isn’t Coastal Texas, but if excess heat as it relates to tomatoes is an issue maybe there’s an overlap.

My buddy nearby did well with Black Krim. It produced a good number of pound and near pound sized fruit. I saw the photos. My one Cherokee Purple did well, I harvested over 8 pounds of fruit from that plant but that doesn’t count whatever the squirrels got. The pound count was likely much higher as I left town for a few days during the peak ripening period. These two OP indeterminate types might be ones to consider for tasty OP largish purples.

For Orange tomatoes, my friend there on Clear Lake knocked it out of the park with Amana Orange. Big, pound plus, pound and half tomatoes, great flavor, plenty of them. It was a little later than some of the others, but that didn’t seem to be a negative and later here means the tomato is up against more heat.

Hillbilly and Pineapple, both bicolors, have done well both years I’ve tried them. Pineapple hangs in there with the heat a little better than Hillbilly. When I tore out my plants in July, there were very small, recently set immature tomatoes still on Pineapple meaning they were still setting fruit in the hot and humid. I wanted to do a solarization on my bed was the main reason for removing plants with tomatoes, that and the squirrels had moved in big time.

Pineapple was a dud for my bud, though. Just didn’t produce. He didn’t grow Hillbilly. Pineapple has blueish tone foliage, a very skinny columnar growing habit, and is a super tall tomato plant here. By the time I tear them out, they are 10’ or more.It’s happened with every one I’ve grown. Sets a ton of fruit, some plants seem to mature much bigger fruit than others. Don’t know what that is about.

Hillbilly PL is rangy and not so skinny, kinda fat to be truthful. Much Lighter green tone foliage than pineapple with nothing blue about it. Doesn’t grow nearly as tall. Wants to mature big fruit.

[Shule]

Don't forget about fertilizer, too. It seems to be more important when it's hot. I recommend foliar sprays to circumvent the problem of some nutrients not being available due to the heat.

Specific nutrients that are supposed to help in the heat include at least potassium and magnesium, but I think a fertilizer with lots of kinds of nutrients is great.

[Rockoe10]

To add to Shule, you can try adding wood ash to your composting regimens. I use quite a bit in my garden, and I've had great results.

[Amateurinawe]

I too use a lot of wood ash but I needed to correct my soil ph early this year.

I got me some okra seed and some saffron crocus corns this week for next year.

And I didn't do a heat bed or protection for my aubergine like I said I would this year, hence only having small bullets of aubergines. So I shall sort that next year.

I also have some seed that never made it this year, so will the next such as swoon.

And I shall pay more attention to the peppers and chillies. Note: do not separate pot from label.

And I need a better labelling option to lollysticks because of birds.

Fred Limbaugh will have one of the five slots alongside a Cherokee purple in the greenhouse, three slots need to be decided on.

I will take more care when chopping chillies.

I need to think about more selections for friends next year, they loved the plants this year.

My pipe carrot will need more thinking, more on this in the grow log shortly.

[JRinPA]

Labeling option...this year I picked up a set of venetian blinds that were out for trash. That one set makes a whole lot of 5/8" wide plastic stock that won't degrade or get stolen by birds. It still took me a while to match an OLD permanent marker to it, one that would not fade or wash off like the new ones do.

[Amateurinawe]

@JRinPA the birds flicked them out the soil whilst they were digging for worms. I think a label around the stem might be the best option.

As for me pulling out the sticks when there is no germination, that's a different matter. I need to be more patient....

[slugworth]

Labeling option...this year I picked up a set of venetian blinds that were out for trash. That one set makes a whole lot of 5/8" wide plastic stock that won't degrade or get stolen by birds. It still took me a while to match an OLD permanent marker to it, one that would not fade or wash off like the new ones do.

black china marker that you have to peel like the good old days.
Can still read it 2 years later exposed to the weather.
With creative cutting you can have pieces with the hole close to the end for hanging on plants like an xmas tree ornament.
Initially I have them in the ground next to the plant,but after mulching and the plants getting bigger,the in ground labels get buried.

[GoDawgs]

Two biggies for next year:

A. A much better shade structure for the tomatoes in the garden
B. Some way to deal with the thieving squirrels.

Minor putters/daydreams:

- Try planting a small second round of Irish potatoes a month later than the main batch to see if they can deal with the heat. Pushing the envelope. And IF they make, see how they actually deal with being left "stored" in the ground after the tops are cut off. Maybe cover them with newspapers and a pile of leaves to simulate some sort of clamp.

- Maybe play with just one cattle panel arched between two adjacent beds to cover the walkway between the two. Perhaps plant cukes or other climber alongthe base in each bed and let them meet in the middle over the walkway.

@JRinPA , I second @slugworth 's china marker suggestion if your new permanent marker fails. I've been using those china markers (also called grease pencils here) on cut up window blind markers for a long time. The writing lasts forever.

[Amateurinawe]

It seems the Venetian blinds have it! How do you make a Venetian blind.....?

[MissS]

It seems the Venetian blinds have it! How do you make a Venetian blind.....?

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=venetian+bli ... -doa-p_2_8

Just cut them to the size that you want and use your favorite marker to write on them. They make fantastic plant markers.

[JRinPA]

Show him a naked Madonna?

[MissS]

It seems the Venetian blinds have it! How do you make a Venetian blind.....?

You can place these all around your plants as well when they want some privacy or to protect them from the sun.

[slugworth]

I tried the "permanent" marker route and the sun/weather erased them all.
Talk about chaos.

[habitat-gardener]

I tried the "permanent" marker route and the sun/weather erased them all.
Talk about chaos.

I always make a garden map! Either on a sheet of paper that gets muddy while I’m doing the actual planting and gets transferred to the garden journal that night, or a pencil sketch directly in the garden journal. I use pencil because things change as I make planting holes, fill them with water, and decide not to plant anything if drainage is too slow or too fast (too fast means there’s a gopher tunnel!).

I didn’t label my 16 eggplant varieties or 20 or so pepper varieties in the garden this year at all. I did make a good map, and made sure to lay out the plants so that any varieties that might look similar were not planted next to or across from each other.

[slugworth]

It is tough using a "treasure map" in my jungle.
You have to start counting paces from landmarks.
120 plants in the ground this year so I just threw my hands up and surrendered.
The old reliables I can tell by sight/leaf type,but I had a lot of new varieties this year.