How are your tomatoes growing this year? What varieties are you growing?

Mine are all finally setting fruit....I will post my list soon, and hope you do the same.

Linda

with all the rain we had.. mine are not happy

Mine are unhappy from drought. Leaves on a couple of plants are turning yellow, looking more like fried tomatoes. They are setting fruit, though. No rain in sight either, but at least temps are a little cooler today.

My whole garden is suffering now. I can't keep up with watering.

Karen

Oh dear!---too bad we can not even the weather out.
We are getting lots of rain---tomatoes just planted out,
but they do have flowers on some.
My final list is different than what I planned.
Glacier
Red Siberian
Super Fantastic
Tumbler
Sweet 100s
Amana orange
Yellow Perfection
Yellow Pear

Purple Cherokee too!

I have tried so many different varieties of tomatoes! But DH loves Beefsteak, so I planted those for him and some Sweeties (yummy marble sized cherry tomatoes) for me. And that's ALL! The ones in my Earthbox are doing very well; the ones I stuck in regular pots, eh, not so much. And there are still a few suffering in their tiny 4" pots I'm seeing several little green fruits, tho.

Caroline--my final selection ended up very different than what I started with also!!! I finally just ran out of time and made some quick decisions.
My list includes:

Pineapple
Sungold
Margeurite
Goose Creek
Black from Tula
Pork Chop
Mary Robinson's German
Orange Minsk
Top SIrloin
Cherokee Purple

At least, I think that's my list I try to grow something of each color--I like variety, and try something new every year. The only repeat on this list is Goose Creek--I grew it last year and loved the few tomatoes I got from it. But, it was a dismal tomato year last year so couldn't really give it a fair trial.

Already I have forgotten what I planted!
There are two Cherokee Purple also.
I like them as they have sort of a smoky barbeque flavour.

Caroline--that's why I am sure to put labels with all of my plants. I can never remember what I planted! I know I'm missing at least one tomato from my list as well. I will have to go look at the plant tags tomorrow

I wanted only 6 plants this year. My plan was
2 Matina
2 Snow White
2 Beefsteak (for my husband). One of the beefsteak was very late sprouting, so it's still pretty small. But it's the only one the deer didn't eat a few weeks ago. They ate the tops off all the other plants.

As usual, I used the wintersowing method for my tomato seeds, started them in March. I also grow some extra Snow Whites for friends.

Still no rain here, with temps in the high 80s and 90s. Forecast is 80s today, with 90s after that, up to 98°. And our only shot at rain is a 30% chance next Sunday. The drought is just getting worse.

Karen

Sounds like you're having a time of it, Karen! I am so glad I don't have deer coming in here! They did so much damage to my plants when we lived in Oregon. It's funny, our neighbors have to fight them all the time, but they don't bother us.

I thought I had missed a whole year of tomatoes because I was too busy to start any seeds.

Then, swpring and summer have been so cold that I didn 't mikss much.

Then, Fred Meyer had 6-packs of Sungold saeedlings for $3, and how could I resist 50 cent tomato starts?

A question: One cell in the 6-pack has two tomato seedlings.
Another cell has three.
They are much too tangled to split apart.

What do you think: is there any point to planting out two or three seedlings with their stems practically touching, or should I just cut the stem at soil level on 3 of the five crowded sprouts? They're all about the same size and vigor now.

I have no open bed space, so 3 or four cells will go into 5 gallon buckets (one tomato per bucket).

I use a lot of pine bark in the mix for aeration and drainage, but with containers this big, maybe I should mix in some soil-potting soil also. I plan to use soluble fertilizer.

I MIGHT try putting 1-2 cells into some not-very-good soil over clay and pebbles, and see if they can grow in partial shade and maybe climb a holly tree.

If I don't just kill the duplicate seedlings, I would put those two cells into the ground this way, making it a double-experiment. What do you think - is there any point to giving cherry tomatoes a chance this slim in a summer that will not only be cool, but short?

This vendor claioms 57 days to maturity, but I won't have ideal conditions. Two months from now is late August , getting cool and rainy again.

Or just give the extras away after potting them up to what look like 3-quart pots!

I dragged a pot of Sungolds indoors before it froze one winter and actually got a few tomatoes off it. I'm not crazy about Sungold, and DH didn't care for them at all, but they actually did pretty well indoors.

I'd probably snip off the extras, leaving the best looking plant.

I was away for the weekend. Since returning I've found aster yellows in 3 coneflowers. Two of my tomato plants look like they're frying, with brown crunchy leaves. I'm worried that those might have aster yellows, too. It could be just the heat and drought, I've had that happen before in similar weather years.

Our weather forecast continues to be dreadful, with temps of 103° tomorrow, and no rain in the next 9 days.

Karen

Kill 'em. I guessed that might be the only option.

To keep thinmgs fitting in available space, I will probably also have to cut vines short when they get too long. I'll make some string trellises, but exp[ect them to be over-run.

For me, Sungold or Sun Gold stood up to cool late-summer weather better thanm Stupice

Same weather here, Karen. Trying to make sure my drip irrigation is keeping up with everything as I will be on vacation next week. Keeping fingers crossed that everything holds up without problems.

They've been cancelling 4th of july fireworks displays here already because it is so dry. No watering restrictions yet in our community, but we're trying to water judiciously. When my shrubs start drooping,I know it's time to do something--I cannot afford to lose all of my landscaping.

I think I may have aster yellows in some coneflowers, as well. I didn't think it could affect tomatoes?

So much for a good growing season this year...we were off to such a great start, but are really paying the price now

wow that's not good

Yes, Linda, it affects tomatoes, too.
http://web.aces.uiuc.edu/vista...

Karen

Linda, note what it says about heat treatment in that article I linked:
"High temperatures inactivate the bacterium in insect vectors and plants.
Leafhoppers can be freed of the organism by exposing them to a temperature of
88°F (31°C) for 10 to 12 days. Thus, when a hot spell lasts for more than two
weeks, the infectability of the vector is much reduced and symptom remission
may occur in infected plants. This explains why this disease is rare or absent
in hot areas of the world"

So I'm hoping that our hot weather will kill the disease in the bugs, at least, and keep the infection from spreading. BTW, there's a discussion of this topic going on in Cliff's echinacea cubit
http://cubits.org/echinaceas/t...

Karen

Thanks for that information, Karen.

It got up to 106 here today, with not much relief in sight, unless you consider 102 tomorrow to be a cooling trend.

I'm so thankful for my drip irrigation set up on my containers....but we're keeping busy trying to keep the trees and shrubs watered. It worries me when I see well-rooted shrubs with droopy leaves. We just keep a drip hose going and moving it from place to place. I would hate to lose any well-established trees or shrubs.

They are saying if we dont get several inches of rain in the next several days, the corn/soybean crops will be a total failure in Indiana. We already lost most of our apple crop due to the early warming and late freeze. I fear produce is going to become very expensive.

It's much the same here. 102° yesterday, 100° today, 90s for the foreseeable future, no rain. My plants are all suffering, too. I water by hand in the morning, then run sprinklers for most of the day. It was 78° at 6 a.m. A pop up shower possible, not likely.

Karen