My best producers this year are 3 plants that are grown in containers.
I have a Rutgers that I'm growing in a large pot that has been outstanding, very high yields.

I have a Burbank Slicing and a Linda's Faux growing in a strawbale and they too have and still are producing heavily.
I also have these varieties growing in the soil and they are o.k. but not as good as the ones in the pot and bale.
Go figure.

Interesting.

As always, my best producers are in the ground, but they are planted in pure aged manure.

The ones in the whiskey barrel usually are earlier than the ones in the ground, but this year the ones in the ground won the race. I think it's because it's been so hot so early.

This has been a crazy year

Do you fertilize the pots and bales more often? That could account for higher yields.

my tomatoes are all in pots this year, and I actually have tomatoes. The last few years, I put them in the ground and got a few just before the frost. This year I've had ripe tomatoes for almost a month. I will not have enough to put any up, but we are having some lovely fresh.

Speaking of strange things..... what causes tomatoes to sometimes have wierd pointy protrusions growing out of them?

I've wondered that, too, Mary. I googled and all I could really find was this:

http://www.portlandnursery.com...

This photo is from an actual tomato that was brought to our information desk at our Stark street location. We weren‘t sure exactly what to make of it at first, but some research yielded a pretty good idea. It is caused by a mutant recessive gene, generally called CLAUSA. To avoid too much technical jargon, it appears to be a mutation in the fruit that occurs when flower grows indeterminately instead of ending when the ovary is produced. In simple terms, the flower tissues continue to grow past when they are supposed to. It is a disorder but not a disease, and does not spread between plants. For more information about this, you might try an internet search with the keywords tomato, CLAUSA, and mutation, or some similar keywords.

Thanks, Dave.