Kitchen Garden Forum

I was very chuffed this morning when Christine counted five trusses on our twelve tomato plants. We had given four away so I hope they are doing as well. Half of them are Gardener's Delight which was a complimentary seed packet when we bought a polytunnel door kit from first tunnels.

I can't match that! I have two pea sized tomatoes appearing on one of my tumbling tomato plants and the first flowers appearing on one of my Gardener's Delight.

Goodness you both have trusses! I was chuffed to see flowers on two of mine! (Greenhouse obviously)!

Now just got to get the feed regime right to keep them progressing!

I never plant my tomatoes early I would sooner have fresh tomatoes in November than june

I have various stages of growth due to some late germination, I have flower buds, but none open yet.

Removing the lower leaves seems to have worked and the extra light has encouraged my tomatoes to ripen. I picked Scotland yellow, Chocolate cherry and a Cornu des Andes yesterday. I'm looking forward to trying the Scotland Yellow. It is a good sized salad type and a nice cheerful yellow, not anaemic looking. There are a lot on so I hope I'm not disappointed with the flavour.

I haven,t completed followed your practice Plum but my outdoor tomatoes are planted very close together so I,ve just trimmed back some of the more vigorous leaves to help the ripening process.
What worried me now after this long spell of hot weather is getting a sudden rainy spell which creates a lot of humidity and the cold diction's for blight.

I picked about a pound of small red and yellow tomatoes today from tumbling bushes in patio pots and in one of my borders. One almost doesn,t need a greenhouse this summer! In fact I imagine having one and trying to keep the temperatures down in it must be a considerable preoccupation at the moment.

Our first tomatoes (Gardeners Delight) will be ceremoniously picked tomorrow. I was surprised to see in the RHS The Garden magazine that Gardeners Delight has lost its AGM ticket because

"despite being one of the best known and most widely grown tomato cultivars, the [RHS] forum felt it was not a cherry tomato. Besides this cultivar (perhaps because of its popularity and age) is too variable, with many different strains being sold as the same plant. The [RHS] forum felt it is 'not what it should be or once was'."

Mine seem to have been consistent over the year.

Do you save your own GD seeds Monika?

I don't, and must confess my GDs do seem to vary somewhat in size from year to year but I!ve always put that down to environmental and weather conditions rather than anything else. I normally only grow about 4 or 5 plants of this variety so I think the same seed packet has been in use for a few years now! . The seeds keep germinating though.

And I've taken 3 tomatoes - 1 Black Krim, which I left too long as it wasn't anywhere near the size it should be & 2 Green Zebra! The rest of the black Krim are much bigger, loads more Green Zebra to come, Indigo Rose has loads of trusses & finally the Plums San Marino are fruiting. Even the one in the net tunnel at lottie is heaving with fruit.



Happy Days!

What do the Indigo Rose taste like Westi? It's blacker than all the black ones I've ever grown. The Green zebra looks tasty. I grew Cherokee green a few times and that had a good flavour.

I'm still impressed with the flavour of my own tomatoes compared to shop ones. It's always a treat to look forward to.

Hi PP!

I like them, they are a bit sweet with a slightly sharper aftertaste. They are quite fleshy as well for a smallish tomato. The Green Zebra is a more tart tomato flavour, quite zesty & really livened up last nights salad - well in comparison to the shop bought ones we have been using up to now. If it wasn't for colour & shape you'd be hard pushed to i.d. the taste of some as tomato even. Home grown are indeed tastier regardless of variety!

I had a box of about ten or a dozen different plants given to me, one of them was called black cherry,if you like sweet toms then this is one to try,i have never tasted a tomatoe as sweet, i shall make room for one next year.

Not too keen on the Red Cherry, a bit mushy texture, though that might be my fault going on holiday in the middle of the growing season .

Apart from a bit of green back where the greenhouse got too hot whilst we were away on holiday, everything is doing just fine.