2016 Seed Starting

Happy New Year!!!! It's been awhile since I posted on my blog. I thought I would do a post on seed starting for 2016. On Sunday I decided to start my first set of seeds. I sowed peppers, eggplant, Cape Gooseberries and tomatillos. This coming weekend I will be starting my Dwarf tomato varieties, cabbage and broccoli. It's a great feeling to be playing with soil and seeds again. I also placed my onion and leek order with Dixondale this morning for a March delivery. I plan on starting up my Tomato Tuesday posts again. Thanks for stopping by and hopefully I will have many more interesting posts to share with you.

Peppers:
Doe Hill
Chervena Chushka
Golden Treasures
Yummy
Sweet Chocoloco
Sweet Chocolate
Sweet Cayenne
Zolotistyi
Amanda
Ljubov Dlan
Winnie the Pooh
Liebesapfel Sweet
Corbaci
Aji Limon
Not Black Brant

Tomatillos:
Purple Tomatillo
Gigante Verde
Cisinero's Tomatillo

Eggplant:
Lavendar Touch
White Egg Shaped

Garden Season is in Full Swing

I have to apologize to my Tomato Tuesday readers, I have been busy in the garden and not on my computer. I will be taking a break from Tomato Tuesday for now until fall when I will be spotlighting the new varieties I am growing this year. I have many great new varieties to share with you in fall. I will still post throughout the season and update you on my garden progress. Thanks and happy gardening!

Tomato Tuesday- Prue

This weeks Tomato Tuesday spotlight is on Prue. This was another good paste/plum tomato I grew last year. Early in the season the plant looked sickly because of it's extremely wispy leaves, but as the season progressed it produced really nice tomatoes for me up until the first frost. Here is some info from Tatiana's site about it.

Indet. plants with regular wispy foliage, which is sparse and droopy. Fruits are large elongated red plums, some with a nipple at the bottom, some without, variable shapes, but mostly a variation of plum shape. 4-12 oz. Delicious rich flavor, juicy flesh, very few seeds. Originated from Tom Gallucci of Connecticut, seeds came from Tom's ex-wife's grandfather, Mr. Prue of Massachusetts, who was born around 1900 and had been growing this tomato in the 1940s or earlier. Original source is unknown.

Thanks for taking a look at my Tomato Tuesday post!

Stop by next week to see which tomato variety I will be spotlighting from my 2014 garden.

Tomato Tuesday- Grow List & Seedling Update



I thought I would do a post for Tomato Tuesday about the varieties I am growing this year. I listed below my grow list for my Home Garden and Community Garden Plots. I started my dwarf varieties on February 23rd and the rest of my varieties were sown on March 29th. I will be planting them outside into my gardens the middle of May. I have many new varieties to try this year thanks to all the seed trading I did over the winter. I traded seeds with gardeners overseas this year, which was very exciting. I will be doing future Tomato Tuesday posts about each of the varieties at the end of the season.

 



 



Community Garden Plots:

 

Cherries:

Sunrise Bumblebee

Iva's Red Berry

Lucky Tiger

Carbon Copy

Dwarfs:

Uluru Ochre

Pit Viper

Wild Fred

Sweet Adelaide

Plum/Paste:

Streak Lightning

Orange Banana

Wessel's Purple Pride

Smiley Worms

Justyna

Smoky Mountain

Small,Medium,Large:

Pennheart

Bradley

Carneal Tiger

Sailor's Luck

Heshpole

Janet's Jacinthe Jewel

Everette's Rusty Oxheart

Copper Penny

Wes

Noire Charbonneuse

Gail

Banded Amazon

Mexico

BKX

Pink Siberian Tiger

Green Copia

Le Cadero

Surpriz

Lithium Sunset

Damascus Steel

Wine Jug

Copper River


Home Garden:

Dwarfs:
Shamrock
Arctic Rose
Utyonok
Jackass Yellow
CT Large Red
Chocolate Lightning
Dwarf Purple Heart
CT Striped Plum
Shadow Boxing
Patio Song

Grinch

Cherries:
Angora Super Sweet
Sinister Minister

Med/Large Varieties:
Missouri Rose
Royal Hillbilly
Spudatula
Pink Lemon
Dark Copia Heart
Buffalo Soldier
Red Barn
Sgt. Peppers
NPS x Sgt. Peppers
Reinhard Green Heart
Dolly Parton
Texwine
Grosse Verte Rose
P20 x Beauty King
Captain Lucky
Marie Antoinette
The Thong
Spudayellow

 

Seedlings started on 3/29. I will be transplanting them into individual cups

this week.

Dwarf plants started on 2/23

Dwarf plants started 2/23

 

Thanks for taking a look at my Tomato Tuesday post!

Stop by next week to see which tomato variety I will be spotlighting from my 2014 garden.

 

 

Tomato Tuesday- Vorlon

Vorlon is a large black beefsteak tomato with a great flavor. The plants are indeterminate and have potato leaves. It is a mid season variety. My plant was not overly productive because it was unfortunately suffered due to disease. Vorlon is a stabilized accidental cross between Cherokee Purple and Pruden's Purple that appeared in the garden of Joe Fisher of Winterport, Maine. Said to be named for the enigmatic alien race of the T.V. program Babylon 5. I really liked the flavor of Vorlon and I will give it another try in my garden in the future.

 

 

 

Thanks for taking a look at my Tomato Tuesday post!

Stop by next week to see which tomato variety I will be spotlighting from my 2014 garden.

Dwarf Tomatoes

 Yes, there are tomato varieties that are called Dwarfs! A Dwarf tomato has certain characteristics just like determinate and indeterminate varieties have. Below is a list of the characteristics of a dwarf tomato that I got from the Dwarf Tomato Project's website http://www.dwarftomatoproject.net/

Dwarf Tomatoes

 



Plants vary in height from 60-140cm (2 to 4.5 feet) depending on which variety is selected.

Dark and dense crinkly (rugose) foliage, thick central stem.

Tomatoes of all sizes and shapes, including some large fruits around 500 grams (18 ounces)

A broad range of flavors - sweet, tangy, fruity, and even a hint of saltiness - something to please   everyone.

Fruit colors include green-when-ripe, bi-colors, stripes, blacks (purple & chocolate), pink, red, yellow, orange, white/ivory.

Easy to grow in pots, on balconies, or wherever space is limited.

Last year I grew a couple Dwarf varieties to give them a try. Most of my plants were grown in 5 gallon buckets and a couple I grew in the ground. I grew four varieties, which were Dwarf Mr. Snow, Sleeping Lady, Tasmanian Chocolate and Rainbow Dwarf. The plants in the 5 gallon buckets required minimal support, however the plants I had growing in the ground required caging because some grew taller than 4.5 feet. Some dwarf varieties stay compact and others can grow taller if allowed. I enjoyed growing the dwarf varieties so much I am growing many more this year. I started my Dwarf seeds the end of February along with my pepper seeds, because they take longer to grow compared to indeterminate and determinate varieties. Here is a picture of my Dwarf seedlings I currently have growing. There is one variety with lime green colored leaves, they are called chartreuse leaves. There are not many varieties with this gene.

If you have limited gardening space or do container gardening these dwarf tomato varieties are great! Be warned that some of the dwarf varieties will grow taller, especially when grown in the ground. I will be growing most of my dwarf varieties in 5 gallon buckets this year. These are the Dwarf tomato varieties I will be growing this year...

Sweet Adelaide

Pit Viper

Arctic Rose

Utyonok

Shadow Boxing

Wild Fred

Chocolate Lightning

Sweet Adelaide

Jackass Yellow

Shamrock

Uluru Ochre

Patio Song

Orange Pixie

Coastal Pride Orange

Rosella Crimson

Rainbow Dwarf

Sleeping Lady

Dwarf Purple Heart

Cherokee Tiger Striped Plum

Cherokee Tiger Large Red

Tomato Tuesday-Sun Sugar

This weeks spotlight is on a yummy little cherry tomato called Sun Sugar. If you like Sun Gold cherry tomato you will like Sun Sugar. Here is some info I got from Trade Winds website on Sun Sugar.

A medium-sized, orange ripening cherry tomato, sought after for its intense sweet flavor. The fruits grow to a bit under an inch wide, with a thin skin that is very crack resistant. Sun Sugar plants fruit in huge quantities, with a single plant often bearing hundreds of fruits in a single season. The fruits have decent storage capabilities, generally lasting off the vine for 1-2 weeks. Flavor is highly sweet, with fruity overtones, setting the Sun Sugar apart from many of its red counterparts. Plants are vigorous and may grow to 6-7ft, though it will fruit nicely in containers.

Thanks for taking a look at my Tomato Tuesday post!

Stop by next week to see which tomato variety I will be spotlighting from my 2014 garden.