Reached 4000 Tomatoes Today!

And our harvest today includes 5 Piccolos, 4 Kellogg's Breakfast tomatoes, 3 Cherokee Chocolates, 3 Salisaw Cafes, 2 Black Plum Pastes, Stupice, Evan's Italian Plum, Green Grape, Micro Tom, Polish Pastel (6 ounces), Italian Market Wonder, Jaune Flamme, Black Krim, Gregori's Altai, and a gorgeous Painted Ukrainian (16.5 ounces).

Today we reached 4000 tomatoes for the year! This pales compared to last year's numbers but we trudge on nonetheless.

We visited a farm in Fillmore that had an open house. This farm grows tomatoes for the Encino Farmer's Market (and other Farmer's Markets). Wow, what an education! They had a very scientific method to their watering and growing of their tomatoes. I'm not joking when I say that some of the tomato vines were 20 and 30 feet long. Again, no joke. Playing on an old joke, they've forgotten more about tomatoes than I'm ever going to know. We came away with a lot of good ideas for next year's tomatoes!

Our Manchester Terrier knocked off a good sized Kellogg's Breakfast and an Evan's Italian Plum, ruining them both.

Here Come The Kellogg's Breakfast Tomatoes!

And today's haul includes 6 Piccolos, 6 Kellogg's Breakfast tomatoes (7 ounces, 6 ounces, 9.5 ounces), 3 Cherokee Chocolates, 3 Black Plum Pastes, 2 Arkansas Travelers, 2 Polish Pastels, Salisaw Cafe, Stupice, Sioux, Aker's Plum, Evan's Italian Plum, Gregori's Altai, Snow White and Painted Ukrainian (8 ounces).

I finished watering the front yard and completely watered the back yard last night.

We found a new spot where the Manchester Terrier dropped his picked tomato. On his bed in the bedroom. It looked like an Aker's Plum.

I did a little tomato taping this morning.

My wife tried Painted Ukrainian. She found it good, but saltier than other tomatoes.

Also, I did find a few unripe tomatoes on the Kimberly tomato plant.

My wife is currently making tomato sauce, some from today's tomatoes. Yum!!!

Behind On Watering...

And today's harvest has 5 Stupices, 4 Piccolos, 3 Salisaw Cafes, 3 Kellogg's Breakfast, 3 Cherokee Chocolates, 3 Evan's Italian Plums, 3 Arkansas Travelers, 2 Jaune Flammes, 2 Olga's Round Yellow Chickens, 2 Husky Cherry Reds, 2 more beautiful Painted Ukrainians (7 ounces, 8 ounces), 2 Black Plum Pastes, Blue Fruit, Gregori's Altai, Black Krim (front yard, 6 ounces), Pierce's Pride (6 ounces) and Polish Pastel.

I didn't get to any more watering. We're behind, simple as that.

I forgot to mention that we finally tried Big Rainbow. We didn't like it.

The Kimberly plant is a bit odd...the plant is as green as ever, very little or no browning of leaves but there are simply no tomatoes on it that I see, let alone ripe ones.

The Manchester Terrier picked off another tiny Evan's Italian Plum.

How'd It Get So Brown?

Sunday's harvest included 15 Stupices, 12 Salisaw Cafes, 3 Lime Green Salads (back yard), 2 Cherokee Chocolates, 2 Polish Pastels (one 6 ounces), 2 Black Krims (front yard, 6 ounces and 6 ounces), 2 Thessalonikis, 2 Gregori's Altai, 2 Black Krims (back yard, one 7.5 ounces), 2 Evan's Italian Plums (one 7 ounces), 2 Aker's Plums, 2 Black Plum Pastes, Carbon, Big Rainbow, Green Grape, Blue Fruit, Husky Cherry Red, Lime Green Salad (from the “koi pond”), Pierce's Pride (12.5 ounces), Italian Market Wonder, Olga's Round Yellow Chicken and Arkansas Traveler.

On Saturday night we met with the officiant from our wedding and his wife, who was one of the bridesmaids, for dinner last night. We got caught up with what's going on in their lives at a Korean BBQ restaurant. It's always great to meet up with them!

The combination of all the tomatoes in the morning and the Korean food in the evening made for a sleepless night for me.

The Manchester Terrier is getting into the backyard Zhezhas now.

Our front yard plants have been getting more and more brown, but today it all of a sudden looked as if most of the plants should be pulled. I mentioned this to my wife, who had the same thought -- “How'd it get so brown so fast?”

Staked, Taped and Watered

And today's haul includes 11 Salisaw Cafes, 10 Stupice, 4 Kimberlys, 3 Black Krim (back yard, 7 ounces, 6 ounces), 2 Zhezhas (back yard), 2 Pierce's Prides (10 ounces, 8.5 ounces), 2 Evan's Italian Plum (6 ounces), 2 Blue Fruit (6 ounces), 2 Piccolos, Jaune Flamme, Zhezha (front yard), Gregori's Altai, Green Grape, Paul Robeson, Black From Tula, Snow White, White Bush, Red Currant, Chocolate Stripes, Black Krim (front yard, 10 ounces), Sioux, Black Plum Paste and Polish Pastel.

Last night I tomato taped as much as I could until the tape ran out. Also, I staked several plants with some of the remaining stakes.

Our Manchester Terrier grabbed one of the back yard Zhezhas but we were able to save it in time.

I watered the back yard last night.

The back yard Black Krims and Pierce's Pride look quite nice.

I don't see the blooms on Yellow Brandywine – Platfoot Strain any more.

Harvested Olga's Round Yellow Chicken Egg Today!

Today's haul includes 6 Piccolos, 4 Kimberlys, 4 Stupice, 4 Old Ivory Eggs, 4 Paul Robesons, 4 Green Grapes, 4 Husky Cherry Reds, 3 Salisaw Cafes, 3 Cherokee Chocolates, 2 Black Plum Pastes, 2 Arkansas Travelers, 2 Gregori's Altai, 2 Black Krims (front yard, 6 ounces and 6 ounces), 2 Lime Green Salads (from the “koi pond”), Red Currant, Aunt Ruby's German Green, Italian Market Wonder, Black Cherry, Thessaloniki (7 ounces) and a new one: Olga's Round Yellow Chicken!

My wife had enough dark tomatoes to make a sauce. The look and smell of the tomatoes were tantalizing!

We got around to trying Red Yellow Cap, and we like it.

Last night my wife watered the front yard and I watered the back yard.

Harvested Polish Pastel Today!

And today's haul includes 18 Piccolos, 7 Salisaw Cafes, 6 Green Grapes, 4 Black Plum Pastes, 3 Paul Robesons, 3 Black Cherries, 2 Kimberlys, 2 Lime Green Salads (from the “koi pond”), 2 Red Currants, 2 Husky Cherry Reds, Stupice, a nice looking 7 ounce Blue Fruit, Red Robin, Zhezha (front yard), Jaune Flamme, Italian Market Wonder, Thessaloniki, Black From Tula (6 ounces), Red Yellow Cap (7 ounces), Gregori's Altai, Garden Peach and a new tomato – 2 Polish Pastels!

One of the Polish Pastels was a beautiful looking 10 ounce tomato. It was hidden behind one of the wooden stake supports. Had I noticed it yesterday I would have picked it then.

We finally got around to eating Arkansas Traveler. It's a meaty tomato and we all liked the taste. Also I should mention that we tried Old Ivory Egg a few days ago. We liked it as well - a softer, gentler taste, clearly good for sauces.

I'm having second thoughts about keeping Red Currant around. There are still tiny tomatoes on the plant but they're getting mealy and not lasting very long. I'll keep it around past this weekend but it may be removed a week from Saturday unless I see a change. Nevertheless this has been a wonderful plant and we've been very happy with it.

We just surpassed last month's harvest totals. We'll end up with about 1600 tomatoes harvested for the month of July. Last year, 6154 tomatoes. Quite a difference.

Today we had visitors watch me pick the tomato harvest and “talk tomatoes”. More on that later. Also, today is the last day for our on line wedding pictures to be displayed. We had such a great time at our wedding – what a blast!!! Today is the day (I believe) our friends from Florida have their first day living in SoCal again. And a friend of ours from San Jose and her son are driving down to stay in Westwood for five days. There's a lot happening!

Harvested Chocolate Stripes and Pierce's Pride!

And today's haul includes 13 Piccolos, 11 Salisaw Cafes, 10 Red Currants, 8 Black Plum Pastes, 7 Cherokee Chocolates, 5 Green Grapes, 4 back yard Black Krims (11.5 ounces, 7.5 ounces, 7 ounces, 10 ounces), 3 Gregori's Altai, 2 Stupice, Zhezha, Jaune Flamme, Kimberly, Sioux and two new tomatoes – a 10 ounce Pierce's Pride and a 7.5 ounce Chocolate Stripes!

Yesterday I put a thick stake into Black Krim but the plant still leaned. It needed more support. With the help of my wife we used two pieces of twine tied to the large stake and metal posts into the ground. This should keep it supported.

Other tomato plants were supported and staked such as Aker's Plum.

Today's totals might be a bit high as I harvested at 2 PM. The totals for tomorrow may be a bit low.

Chocolate Stripes looked great...until I turned it around. Darn it, the birds got it! I weighed it and my wife cut away a generous portion. The tomato looks beautiful on the inside. The birds got to one of the mature Black Plum Pastes as well.

I'm really happy with the harvested Black Krims, Pierce's Pride and the remaining Chocolate Stripes. They're great looking dark tomatoes!

A Polish Pastel may be maturing, but it appears to be maturing unevenly.

Now The Backyard Plants Look Better

Todays harvest includes 7 Cherokee Chocolates, 5 Black Plum Pastes, 5 Red Currants, 2 Piccolos, 2 Gregori's Altai, 2 White Bush, Kimberly, Salisaw Cafe, Stupice, Italian Market Wonder, Black Cherry, Green Grape, Jaune Flamme, Paul Robeson, Thessaloniki, Black From Tula, a 12 ounce Red Yellow Cap and Lime Green Salad (from the “koi pond”).

My wife thinks we have enough tomatoes for another batch of sauce. The last batch, which was served Sunday evening, was fabulous.

I mentioned to my wife that in general, the back yard tomato plants look better than the front yard tomato plants right now. She agreed.

Yesterday, my wife watered the front yard and I watered the back yard.

Still No Tomatoes On The Last Two Plants

Today's harvest includes 10 Piccolos, 7 Red Currants, 6 Salisaw Cafes, 4 Cherokee Chocolates, 3 Zhezhas (front yard container), 3 Black Plum Pastes, 3 Stupice, 2 Lime Green Salad tomatoes (from the plant near the street), 2 Green Grapes, 2 Thessalonikis, White Bush, Italian Market Wonder, Prairie Fire, Big Rainbow, Red Yellow Cap (10 ounces), Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifter and Gregori's Altai.

I used some bug spray for a couple of the tomato plants per my wife's suggestion.

I bought some thin green plant stakes from Green Thumb and used them to support Evan's Italian Plum, Polish Pastel, Big Rainbow and White Bush. I did a bit of tomato taping as well.

We have three new tomatoes starting to ripen – Aker's Plum, Black Krim (back yard) and Zhezha (back yard).

Unfortunately, Jeff Davis and Yellow Brandywine – Platfoot Strain still show no signs of any tomatoes on their vines.

Ugh...That Manchester Terrier...

Today's numbers are: 13 Red Currants, 10 Salisaw Cafes, 8 Cherokee Chocolates, 5 Kimberlys, 2 Gregori's Altai, 2 Husky Cherry Reds, 2 Piccolos, Stupice, Sioux, Black Plum Paste, Black Cherry, Red Robin, Zhezha, Thessaloniki, Black From Tula (6 ounces) and Red Yellow Cap (one pound, or 16 ounces).

We picked more back yard tomatoes today than front yard tomatoes, 27 to 24.

Our Manchester Terrier picked off a large tomato last night. It looked like a Black Krim. But as I was picking the back yard tomatoes, I noticed a maturing Carbon was missing. I checked the organic waste bin and yes, there was a maturing dark tomato with three bite marks in it. It was about seven ounces in weight. From memory it was about a foot off the ground.

Later on I noticed the ground around the Carbon tomato plant had been dug up. The paper mulch was scattered everywhere. I had noticed a similar situation around the Lime Green Salad in the back yard and I think he picked one off there as well in the past.

The Harvest Numbers Are Dwindling...

Today's harvest includes 9 Salisaw Cafes, 6 Cherokee Chocolates, 6 Red Currants, 2 Black Plum Pastes, 2 Piccolos, 2 Radiator Charlie's Mortgage Lifters (one six ounces), 2 Paul Robesons (9.5 ounces and 7 ounces), Kimberly, Zhezha (front yard), Big Rainbow (6 ounces), Thessaloniki, Black From Tula, Lime Green Salad (from the “koi pond”), Husky Cherry Red and Gregori's Altai.

Last night I watered the front and back yards.

My wife said that our Manchester Terrier picked off another tomato, probably another unripe Arkansas Traveler.

The harvest numbers have started to fall again. Here are the last five day's numbers: 73-51-57-43-37.

My wife made a tomato sauce from most of the tomatoes harvested over the past few days. She said he used around six pounds of tomatoes. The sauce tastes great! We'll try it tonight over pasta.

Aunt Ruby's German Green -- "Phenomenal"

And this morning's harvest includes 22 Red Currants, 6 Stupice, 5 Piccolos, 3 Cherokee Chocolates, 3 Sioux (including a six ounce and seven ounce tomato), 3 Paul Robesons (including a six ounce and seven ounce tomato), 2 Kimberlys, 2 Salisaw Cafes, 2 Black Plum Pastes, 2 Black Cherries, 2 Green Grapes, an Italian Market Wonder, Golden Jubilee, Arkansas Traveler, Garden Peach and a 6.5 ounce Gregori's Altai.

Today is the highest back yard harvest total for this year: 23 tomatoes.

My wife spent a lot of time in the garden last night. She pulled out the Taxi and Patio tomato plants. She was concerned over my reaction to this but the plants have been non-productive for some time. I could have pulled them a week ago.

Gregori's Altai looks a lot like last year's Gargantua. Could they be the same?

I brought some of our smaller tomatoes to our computer user group, LA Fox. Almost all of them were taken. One person couldn't stop raving about the Aunt Ruby's German Green that I brought to our LA Fox board meeting, calling it “phenomenal”. I'm afraid that someone may have picked off a few of the unripe Aunt Ruby's German Green tomatoes in the past. I remember some of these tomatoes having a good size and now I simply don't see them.

Harvested Three New Tomatoes Today!

Today's harvest includes 39 Red Currants, 5 Cherokee Chocolates, 4 Salisaw Cafes, 2 Piccolos, 2 Green Grapes, 2 Gregori's Altai (one 6.5 ounces), 2 Husky Cherry Reds, 2 Zhezhas (front yard), 2 Black Plum Pastes, 2 Italian Market Wonders, Stupice, Kimberly, Black From Tula, Paul Robeson (8.5 ounces), Jaune Flamme and three new ones: 3 Arkansas Travelers, 2 Snow White Cherries and a Lime Green Salad from the “koi pond”!

We have three Lime Green Salad plants, two in the front yard and one in the back. We've now harvested from the two front yard plants. The one in the back had a tomato that was near the ground and should have been ripe about now, but I think our Manchester Terrier picked it off. Speaking of which, last evening he stood guard over a ripening Cherokee Chocolate that he had just picked.

The Snow White tomatoes don't look like the Snow White tomatoes that we're used to. There appears to be something wrong with the plant. It's grown to about three, maybe three and a half feet and has simply stopped growing. Last year's Snow White plant grew to seven feet tall and was tremendously prodigious.

Harvested Gregori's Altai Tomato!

Sunday's haul included 27 Red Currants, 9 Salisaw Cafes, 5 Piccolos, 4 Black Plum Pastes, 3 Cherokee Chocolates, 2 Husky Cherry Reds, 2 Black From Tulas (including one at 7 ounces), 2 Paul Robesons (one 9 ounces), 2 Jaune Flammes, 2 front yard Zhezhas, 2 Stupices, 2 Black Cherries, a Lime Green Salad, Green Grape and a new one: 2 Gregori's Altai tomatoes (one 8 ounces)!

My wife went cut up some of our tomatoes for a party she attended on Saturday night. All the tomatoes were eaten. That's a good sign – they must taste good!

Also, she asked other people at the party about their tomato plants. Apparently, three other people were growing tomatoes as well, and all three of them reported that they weren't doing as well as last year. In terms of sheer quantity and bulk, that matches our experience this year.

On Saturday night I watered the front yard.

I keep meaning to post that my wife and I tried one of our Lime Green Salad tomatoes. In a word, it tastes refreshing. We also tried Salisaw Cafe and really liked it.

Low Harvest

This morning's harvest includes 15 Red Currants, 4 Husky Cherry Reds, 3 Cherokee Chocolates, 2 Piccolos, 2 undersized Garden Peaches, a Jaune Flamme, Kimberly and Salisaw Cafe.

A couple of Red Yellow Cap tomatoes are ripening as well as Stupice and Gregori's Altai.

The tallest tomato plant right now appears to be...Evan's Italian Plum!

I have to do some more tomato taping.

Even I have to admit, these totals are somewhat disappointing.

Gregori's Altai Has Tomatoes! Really!

I watered the back yard tomato plants this morning.

As I was moving things to my car in preparation to go to work, I took a look at the plants in the “corner office”. Gregori's Altai has two tomatoes on it. And unlike the problem I had here, I brought my wife over to verify it. Next to it, Aunt Ruby's German Green, has at least two good sized tomatoes growing on it.

Gregori's Altai Has No Tomatoes

Gregori's Altai, located in the “corner office” has two tomatoes on it. two round buds that look like tomatoes.

Micro Tom has three tomatoes on it. Garden Peach has more than two and the bottom leaves are yellowing, indicating that it's concentrating on making tomatoes.

I put a cage on Old Ivory Egg and staked it. I made paper mulch and went through the back yard, looking for spots I missed. I used about half the pile and threw the rest away. For now, I'm completely caught up on mulching.

I was going to individually report on the back yard tomatoes since I was back there adding mulch...but, darn it, they all have good color. In terms of the way the plants look, the standouts are White Bush, Yellow Brandywine – Platfoot Strain, Arkansas Traveler and Jeff Davis. Even our problem child has new growth on it and good color again but it's still a very thin and wispy plant.

I gave Cherokee Chocolate some worm castings as it has a lot of blooms on it and the growth has slowed down. I gave some worm castings to Purple Russian yesterday.

The weather in the San Fernando Valley this week has been overcast and cooler than normal. I just want to make note of it for when I look back on this entry 60 days or 90 days from now.

Black Krim, Lime Green Salad planted

Today was a pretty warm day, getting up to the mid-90's or so.

We still have the Old Ivory Egg/Speckled Roman mystery as an open issue.

While my wife was out doing a few chores, I planted Black Krim and Lime Green Salad in the front yard. The Black Krim in the back yard came from Tomatomania while the one in the front yard came from seed. Because of the proximity of the newly planted Black Krim to the birdbath, we'll move the birdbath to a new location in the front yard. I used the cage from Gregori's Altai for Lime Green Salad and gave Gregori's Altai a new cage.

That leaves two more Lime Green Salad tomatoes and a Piccolo tomato. My wife was real excited to get three Lime Green Salad tomatoes and wants to plant them all (We grew this plant in 2006 and has very fond memories of this tomato). If she wants three Lime Green Salad tomatoes planted, that's good enough for me.

When I had finished planting Black Krim and cleaned up the front yard, my wife came home. We discussed where to plant the other three tomatoes. We'll plant another Lime Green Salad in the back yard between Black Cherry and White Bush, using the cage from Black Cherry for the Lime Green Salad and replacing Black Cherry's cage with one of the newly bought ones. Also, Black Cherry needs some new landscaping.

We both looked at the Purple Russian and she agreed that there was new growth on the tomato. I told her I was afraid to pull it because we don't know if the issue is with the tomato or the location. She agreed and thought we planted it (and the nearby Zhezha) in a bad location. Time will tell.

That leaves two left. We'll plant Piccolo next to the water meter near the curb and the last Lime Green Salad near the small tree near the curb. I believe that'll be the last tomatoes planted.