Attack of the hornworms! I saw one on the Black Cherry plant today.

It was the little ones that got me last year. I knew they were there but I just couldn’t see the darn things. I had to wait until they were big and juicy.

I’ve been picking off their eggs.

If I’m not mistaken, this little bud on the Early Girl (I can’t bear to call it MY Early Girl) contains the first set tomato. The leaves are wet so I dare not touch it.

Explosive growth on the Cherokee Purples is on a jailbreak. I was trying to keep it tucked in the cages. Purely anecdotal, but I sprayed them with kelp, worm castings, and a little Dawn the day before yesterday.

Definitely a couple of tomatoes on that Early girl.

Fruit set on one CP.
I’d say a king blossom, but many of the flowers are huge on both plants.
Looking at the forecast, there may be much more fruitset in the next week.

I’m guessing we had about 3” of rain overnight. The potting soil on my beans stayed perfectly in place and all the plants actually look very happy.

The forecast for good fruit setting looks very good into the first week of May at the least.

@MarkAndre You might get where you are some extra time going into June for very good fruit setting weather in a typical year when most of my tomatoes are starting to struggle setting on warmer nights that develop in that timeframe hereabouts.

In the photo above is Hoy from August 1st, 2022. So large heirloom types can set fruit well into June here in the coast, we just have to get a stretch of time of slightly cooler nights. I think some other heirlooms would also do fine and set some fruit all summer if the various bugs and fungal issues could be kept in check. Beefmaster, late in August 2022. Beefmaster being a hybrid with all those letters afterwards can surely set fruit all summer here on the coast because it will fight off diseases that the heirlooms apparently cannot. That tomato was likely set in mid-July. Beefmaster, mid September, 2022. Same Beefmaster late October 2022.

I'm just waiting for one stinking little tomato to turn red.

@karstopography Impressive would be an understatement. To have plants at all that deep into the season, with fruit set no less, is quite the feat. I’ve never grown Hoy and can’t remember much about it, but it was on the radar at some point. I tried Beefmaster once years ago but it didn’t produce any fruit. Do you follow a fungal regimen?

It would probably pay dividends for me to dig more deeply into your past posts. There’s an alliterative sentence for you.

@worth1 On the counter or on the plant? I can’t remember the last time I intentionally ripened one on the plant.

MarkAndre wrote: ↑Fri Apr 21, 2023 6:47 pm @karstopography Impressive would be an understatement. To have plants at all that deep into the season, with fruit set no less, is quite the feat. I’ve never grown Hoy and can’t remember much about it, but it was on the radar at some point. I tried Beefmaster once years ago but it didn’t produce any fruit. Do you follow a fungal regimen?

It would probably pay dividends for me to dig more deeply into your past posts. There’s an alliterative sentence for you.

I don’t use any specific anti-fungals

I do at times use kelp spray.
I have also used hydrogen peroxide to combat spider mites. I understand h2o2 is an anti fungal agent.

MarkAndre wrote: ↑Fri Apr 21, 2023 6:49 pm @worth1 On the counter or on the plant? I can’t remember the last time I intentionally ripened one on the plant.

On the plant.

Picked the tomatoes with some color this morning ahead of the rain. Pink Tiger, Principe Borghese, and the one Brandywine OTV. The others are Sungold and Black Cherry. I’ve eaten one Sungold, yummy.

I’d be curious to know what you think of OTV, when and if you have an opinion. I’ve toyed with putting it on my list, but it doesn’t get much ink anymore.

Potted up whatever was left that was worth potting up of the summer tomato experiments. I’m pleased, I thought they were all going to succumb to whatever it is that wipes out my unplanted seedlings this time of year, but there are quite a few that look good. Galina’s went down, and maybe Matt’s Wild. I need to look at the notes. That’s actually good about the Galinas. I discovered I’d grown it before and I don’t think l liked it. I had been thinking a planting date around May 1, but I want them bigger. Maybe the 15th.

MarkAndre wrote: ↑Sun Apr 23, 2023 11:14 am I’d be curious to know what you think of OTV, when and if you have an opinion. I’ve toyed with putting it on my list, but it doesn’t get much ink anymore.

So far, not having eaten any, I will ding it for having horrible blossom scars. I should take a photo of the blossom end of this first one, but it is definitely NSFW. Maybe there’s seven or eight total tomatoes on the plant at the moment and all but two appear to have ugly bottoms, not blossom end rot, just ugly, large scarring.

I hope it is especially delicious because otherwise it probably won’t be grown again by me based on the excessively ugly scarring.

As far as production goes, I’ve been evidently under fertilizing this bed it is in as the eight tomato plants in the bed seem generally behind a little the other tomatoes in other beds. I’m trying to play a little catch up now and Brandywine OTV appears to be responding with better blooming and more robust growth. I’ll see how it does as the heat ramps up although the next week or so looks much cooler than average.

MarkAndre wrote: ↑Sun Apr 23, 2023 11:22 am Potted up whatever was left that was worth potting up of the summer tomato experiments. I’m pleased, I thought they were all going to succumb to whatever it is that wipes out my unplanted seedlings this time of year, but there are quite a few that look good. Galina’s went down, and maybe Matt’s Wild. I need to look at the notes. That’s actually good about the Galinas. I discovered I’d grown it before and I don’t think l liked it. I had been thinking a planting date around May 1, but I want them bigger. Maybe the 15th.

The same thing that wipes out your seedling wiped out mine yesterday. I think in my case it was gray mold. The seedlings (Porter's Pride, Black Plum, Abu Rawan) plus 2 Black Cherry clones looked great under my grow lights 2 nights ago. Then last night I checked all the seedlings were dead and the Black Cherry clones had some gray spots. Sprayed with hydrogen peroxide then an hour later sprayed with copper. Promptly ordered a few Improved Porter and Jaune Flamme plants from Chileplants.com since I'm not optimistic. I still have a few Juliets and SS100's and 1 Abu Rawan (struggling) potted up on the porch.

karstopography wrote: ↑Sun Apr 23, 2023 10:07 am E1A2CCC3-1BDC-45D1-BFD7-7E13989FEAC0.jpeg398A858C-2ADC-486B-8985-2A4F46BD49D3.jpegE5DAA0F7-1DE0-43A0-A9E3-84DBC035B3BC.jpeg

Picked the tomatoes with some color this morning ahead of the rain. Pink Tiger, Principe Borghese, and the one Brandywine OTV. The others are Sungold and Black Cherry. I’ve eaten one Sungold, yummy.

Curious how you assess their taste. For whatever reason the 3 Indian Stripe I've picked were extremely mealy while the handful of Blush I picked weren't much better. The S100 have been really good though tiny.

@Wildcat82 Sorry, that stinks. I do tend to have problems with tomato seedlings the later it goes in the season. It got frustrating, so this is the first time in a few years I have even tried starting tomato seeds. The plants in the ground came from a nursery. Whoever grows their plants does a good job.
I didn’t know about chileplants.com, that’s cool! I’ll have to take a look at their site.

Have you grown Flamme before? Do you know the seed source of their Improved Porter?

MarkAndre wrote: ↑Sun Apr 23, 2023 12:36 pm @Wildcat82 Sorry, that stinks. I do tend to have problems with tomato seedlings the later it goes in the season. It got frustrating, so this is the first time in a few years I have even tried starting tomato seeds. The plants in the ground came from a nursery. Whoever grows their plants does a good job.
I didn’t know about chileplants.com, that’s cool! I’ll have to take a look at their site.

Have you grown Flamme before? Do you know the seed source of their Improved Porter?

I grew Jaune Flamme last year and thought it was a very good orange saladette. Supposedly its pretty heat tolerant. I have no idea where they get their Porter seed from.

I've tried to do a summer grow out of the top heat tolerant types the past couple years but 2 years ago damping off/mites killed off everything then last year the Sahara heat wave/bacterial wilt killed everything. I refuse to be shut out 3 years in a row so I mail ordered a few plants. So for now, the first week in May I'll hopefully be planting 2-3 Juliets, 2 Porter improved, 2 Jaune Flamme, 1 Abu Rawan (if it can survive) and a couple more Black Cherries assuming I can get some clones.