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Jun 2, 2014 4:12 PM CST
Name: Rita
North Shore, Long Island, NY
Zone 6B
Charter ATP Member Seed Starter Tomato Heads I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! Vegetable Grower Lover of wildlife (Raccoon badge)
Birds Garden Ideas: Master Level Butterflies Celebrating Gardening: 2015 Roses Photo Contest Winner: 2016
Hurray! Hurray! Hurray for tomatoes starting.
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Jun 2, 2014 6:31 PM CST
Name: cheshirekat
New Mexico, USA Zone 8 (Zone 8a)
Bee Lover Dog Lover Herbs Garden Procrastinator Vegetable Grower
I am happy for everyone getting their tomatoes to set. You can share the first taste of the fruits of your labor. I won't mind. I will be eating some bland store-bought tomatoes tonight while imagining they are from my garden. But I am still sad for me and my poor plants in this heat.

Several days this week it will get to 99F. I wonder if I could bring my big tub of tomato plants inside under the swamp cooler tomorrow. I think I will very carefully water this evening so I don't get any of my tomato leaves wet. Poor babies didn't know they were going to grow up to be tropical fruits.
"A garden is a friend you can visit any time." - Anonymous
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Jun 3, 2014 7:13 AM CST
Name: Glen Ingram
Macleay Is, Qld, Australia (Zone 12a)
(Lee Reinke X Rose F Kennedy) X Unk
Amaryllis Hybridizer Canning and food preservation Lilies Native Plants and Wildflowers Orchids
Plant Lover: Loves 'em all! Pollen collector Lover of wildlife (Raccoon badge) Plays in the sandbox Sedums Seed Starter
I have so many volunteer tomatoes. I am just pulling them out as I do the mulching for winter. Sniff.
The problem is that when you are young your life it is ruined by your parents. When you are older it is ruined by your children.
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Jun 3, 2014 10:23 AM CST
Name: Rita
North Shore, Long Island, NY
Zone 6B
Charter ATP Member Seed Starter Tomato Heads I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! Vegetable Grower Lover of wildlife (Raccoon badge)
Birds Garden Ideas: Master Level Butterflies Celebrating Gardening: 2015 Roses Photo Contest Winner: 2016
I have lots of seedling volunteers myself here. I just pull them as who knows what they might be like. I don't need extras in the tomato beds anyway.
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Jun 3, 2014 3:24 PM CST
Name: Rita
North Shore, Long Island, NY
Zone 6B
Charter ATP Member Seed Starter Tomato Heads I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! Vegetable Grower Lover of wildlife (Raccoon badge)
Birds Garden Ideas: Master Level Butterflies Celebrating Gardening: 2015 Roses Photo Contest Winner: 2016
This year I planted an entire six pack of Vivia Italia. Last year I only had one plant, couldn't find six packs. But the year before I had a six pack. And I made stewed tomatoes. It was really easy to do and I used my crockpot. I blanched them, peeled the skin and then just let the crockpot cook them. Do not add water, there is plenty to make the stewed tomatoes without adding water.

Anyway, I guess one could make stewed tomatoes out of any ones you have growing but I really love the Vivia Italias for home made stewed tomatoes. Then I simply froze them. I put them in those quart sized plastic containers one gets when one buys soup from the chinese takeout. I save them and they come in handy.

The reason I was thinking about this is that I saw tiny green tomatoes on some of my Vivia Italia plants. Thumbs up I will be making my own stewed tomatoes again later in the summer.
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Jun 3, 2014 4:56 PM CST
Name: cheshirekat
New Mexico, USA Zone 8 (Zone 8a)
Bee Lover Dog Lover Herbs Garden Procrastinator Vegetable Grower
How do you get volunteer tomato seedlings?

I have never gotten one, here or back in my garden in Denver after many years of growing tomatoes.
"A garden is a friend you can visit any time." - Anonymous
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Jun 3, 2014 5:00 PM CST
Name: Rita
North Shore, Long Island, NY
Zone 6B
Charter ATP Member Seed Starter Tomato Heads I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! Vegetable Grower Lover of wildlife (Raccoon badge)
Birds Garden Ideas: Master Level Butterflies Celebrating Gardening: 2015 Roses Photo Contest Winner: 2016
They grow from the prior years tomatoes when some fall to the ground and rot. The seeds stay and come up in the spring. I have them all over my tomato beds. Have to pull them out as they don't come true since I don't grown heirlooms.
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Jun 3, 2014 5:21 PM CST
Name: cheshirekat
New Mexico, USA Zone 8 (Zone 8a)
Bee Lover Dog Lover Herbs Garden Procrastinator Vegetable Grower
You mean when the tomatoes fall to the ground and rot, or the seeds? I don't think I have a chance of volunteers because I never leave tomatoes on the ground for fear they will start disease or cause bugs to try to eat it and their arrival will cause disease. Also don't see how seeds could come up the next year because I don't usually grow tomatoes in the same spot. Although I am sure a few seeds make it to the compost.

I know I have volunteer sunflower, amaranth, and even watermelon seeds sprouting up all over the place. Because we would never throw watermelon seeds in the trash, but in the compost. And the amaranth and sunflower came up because the roommate, needing something to do, forgot I told him not to put weeds in the compost or turn the amaranth and sunflower seeds into the soil when he tilled. Although they are easy to just pull up, it takes much time and bending over to get all the volunteers out of the garden.

You can see some of the amaranth growing with my beets here.
Thumb of 2014-06-03/ckatNM/3d9918 Thumb of 2014-06-03/ckatNM/fc4cf4

I don't know whether amaranth competes with the beets for nutrients, or the roots choke out other plants, or adds beneficial nutrients to the soil, so I pull them when they are growing close to my edibles when they are big enough to grab easily with bare fingers. I usually just sit on the ground, on the nice cushioned straw to pull weeds and volunteers. Otherwise I am unsteady on my feet when bending over.
"A garden is a friend you can visit any time." - Anonymous
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Jun 3, 2014 5:29 PM CST
Name: Rita
North Shore, Long Island, NY
Zone 6B
Charter ATP Member Seed Starter Tomato Heads I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! Vegetable Grower Lover of wildlife (Raccoon badge)
Birds Garden Ideas: Master Level Butterflies Celebrating Gardening: 2015 Roses Photo Contest Winner: 2016
Yes, some tomatoes fall to the ground. They split or cracked or started to rot. Whatever reason but they were no good for eating. The fruit rots and dissapears but the seeds come up on the late spring.
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Jun 12, 2014 7:42 AM CST
Name: Linda
SE Houston, Tx. (Hobby) (Zone 9a)
"Godspeed, & Good Harvest!"
Region: Texas Vegetable Grower Seed Starter Garden Ideas: Master Level Canning and food preservation Gardens in Buckets
Tip Photographer Charter ATP Member I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! Ferns
I read somewhere once that a youth remembered his grandfather walking down the tomato line. He'd pull off any of the rotting tomatoes, drop them and mash them into the ground with the heel of his shoe.

Next season, all those tomatoes came up, right on cue! I tip my hat to you.

"Planned" volunteers!
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Jun 12, 2014 8:07 PM CST
Name: Sandy B.
Ford River Twp, Michigan UP (Zone 4b)
(Zone 4b-maybe 5a)
Charter ATP Member Bee Lover Butterflies Birds I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! Million Pollinator Garden Challenge
Seed Starter Vegetable Grower Greenhouse Region: United States of America Region: Michigan Enjoys or suffers cold winters
I just put my plants out a few days ago --

Viva Italia
4th of July
Cupid
Juliet
Pruden's Purple
Djena Lee's Golden Girl
Red October
Country Taste
Celebrity *
Mountain Magic *
Umberto *
Red Robin (in pots)

* New to me this year

Djena Lee's Golden Girl was a "gift packet" with an order of seeds a few years ago, and it's the best tasting yellow tomato that I've found, much more "tomatoey" than other yellow ones that I've had. Umberto was a gift packet this year, so hopefully I'll like it, too. Over the years I've discovered that if the seed catalog description says "mild," "low acid," or something similar, I'm not going to like it. Ideally I would like for all the varieties that I plant to be open pollinated so I could save my own seed, but so far haven't found that many varieties that we really like, or that produce reliably for us. What do I do with all my 'maters ? I make and can a lot of salsa, make roasted tomato sauce and freeze it, make my version of V8 juice (more like V5 or so in my case), can some plain tomatoes and freeze some. I love tomatoes, and the season is oh, so short up here in the north!! Smiling
“Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight." ~ Albert Schweitzer
C/F temp conversion
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Jun 12, 2014 8:42 PM CST
Name: Rita
North Shore, Long Island, NY
Zone 6B
Charter ATP Member Seed Starter Tomato Heads I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! Vegetable Grower Lover of wildlife (Raccoon badge)
Birds Garden Ideas: Master Level Butterflies Celebrating Gardening: 2015 Roses Photo Contest Winner: 2016
Nice list! Thumbs up
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Jun 28, 2014 8:10 PM CST
Name: Angie
Mackinaw, IL (Zone 5a)
Charter ATP Member Garden Ideas: Master Level Tip Photographer I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! I helped beta test the Garden Planting Calendar Region: Illinois
Irises Bulbs Daylilies Lilies Herbs Clematis
My garden is pitiful this year. I only have 6 tomatoes and 4 peppers, and the tomatoes aren't even my favorite varieties (with the exception of Cherokee Purple. I was so pleased to still find that one, with my late start!) Between work, constant demands with a teen and a preteen, and my parents' health issues, I just couldn't get the garden going this year. Something had to slide, and that was it. Crying

I know I'm really going to regret it when I don't have a freezer full of corn, beans, and roasted tomato sauce this winter! Oh, well. There's always next year. Shrug!
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Dec 14, 2014 9:47 AM CST
Name: Caroline Scott
Calgary (Zone 4a)
Bulbs Winter Sowing Plant Lover: Loves 'em all! Peonies Lilies Charter ATP Member
Region: Canadian Enjoys or suffers cold winters Million Pollinator Garden Challenge Garden Ideas: Master Level
Life (and the weather sometimes?) does have a way of getting in the way of gardening.
But there is always a new season, and we can start again!
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Dec 14, 2014 3:03 PM CST
Name: Sandy B.
Ford River Twp, Michigan UP (Zone 4b)
(Zone 4b-maybe 5a)
Charter ATP Member Bee Lover Butterflies Birds I was one of the first 300 contributors to the plant database! Million Pollinator Garden Challenge
Seed Starter Vegetable Grower Greenhouse Region: United States of America Region: Michigan Enjoys or suffers cold winters
Caroline -- I agree

Nothing like the thought of the next planting season to get us northerners through the winter !!
“Think occasionally of the suffering of which you spare yourself the sight." ~ Albert Schweitzer
C/F temp conversion

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