Planted Four More Tomato Plants; Isis Candy Maturing

On Saturday I dug a few more holes and my wife planted four more tomatoes -- Buffalo Heart Giant, Big Yellow Zebra, Kellogg's Breakfast and Indigo Apple in the raised bed.

I think we're down to three tomato plants left to plant. I dug two more holes in another raised bed.

On an odd note, an Isis Candy tomato is already maturing!

My wife watered the tomato plants in the front yard. Happy Mother's Day to a great wife and mother!!! 

Volunteer Tomato Plant Is A Foot Tall

Today's harvest includes 14 Black Cherry, 10 Babywine, 8 Red Currant, 7 Jaune Coeur de Pigeon, 6 Snow White, 6 Red Grape, 4 back yard Husky Cherry Red, 3 front yard Garden Peach, 3 Oaxacan Jewel(2), 3 Super Snow White, 3 front yard Green Grape, 3 back yard Green Grape, 3 Plum Tigris, 3 Italian Ice, 3 back yard Paul Robeson, 3 Pierce's Pride, 2 Green Zebra(1), 2 back yard Garden Peach(2), 2 Japanese Black Trifele, 2 Black From Tula, 2 Sweet 100, 2 SunSugar, 2 Black Krim (one 6 ounces), Oaxacan Jewel(1) (6 ounces), Mong, White Currant, Jaune Flamme, White Zebra (6 ounces), Yellow Perfection, a back yard Mexico (13 ounces) and Big Yellow Zebra (14 ounces) for a total of 104 tomatoes.

Wow, just four days ago we harvested over double the amount we harvested today.

I was distracted for a couple of reasons – we had a relative in Los Angeles on business get ill and have to be admitted to the hospital. All looks like it will end well.

And this morning a tree trimmer from the city came by while I was harvesting in the front yard. They trimmed a few branches from our pine tree in the back yard.

Our volunteer is about a foot tall and actually has a couple of blooms on it. Marz Round Green is about 2.5 feet tall with a few blooms as well. However, it has gotten hot again and I expect these blooms to go sterile.

Went To My 30 Year Reunion

Today's harvest includes 20 Babywine, 19 Black Cherry, 19 Red Currant, 15 Snow White, 9 Italian Ice, 8 Plum Tigris, 8 Jaune Coeur de Pigeon, 6 back yard Garden Peach(2), 5 Sweet 100, 4 back yard Green Grape, 4 Black From Tula (6 ounces, 9 ounces, 6 ounces), 4 Oaxacan Jewel(2), 4 front yard Speckled Roman (one 6 ounces), 4 front yard Husky Cherry Red, 4 back yard Husky Cherry Red, 3 Patio, 3 Japanese Black Trifele (7.5 ounces, 6 ounces), 3 SunSugar, 3 Black Krim, 3 Silvery Fir Tree, 2 Super Snow White, 2 Vintage Wine, 2 front yard Garden Peach, 2 Oaxacan Jewel(1) (8 ounces, 9 ounces), 2 Red Grape, 2 White Currant, 2 Green Zebra(1) (new!), 2 Tiger Paw, 2 Pierce's Pride (6.5 ounces, 6 ounces), Yellow Perfection, Green Zebra(2), White Zebra, Mexico (18 ounces), Big Yellow Zebra (23 ounces), Amazon Chocolate (6 ounces), Jaune Flamme and Dr. Wyche's Yellow (10 ounces) for a total of 174 tomatoes.

Today represented a dramatic drop from the day before. However, I got up late and it was getting hot outside so I didn't work too hard harvesting. Let's see how tomorrow's numbers are before determining if we have a pattern.

The reason I was late harvesting today was that last night I was at my 30^th high school reunion. The reunion was a bit of a blah reunion, but mostly due to the organizers. For $90 per person they can serve iced tea with the meal. They only served water. My wife came along, asked for coffee and it never came. There were a couple of other things that indicated the handlers hired to run the event were phoning it in.

After the meal, the standard deejay cranked up the music and drove a fair amount of people outside the doors.

Still I'm glad I went and more glad my wife came along. I enjoyed being with my wife more than anything.

I met some old friends and at the end there was a group that went to the Catholic elementary school, which included me.

But...growing up in Orange County wasn't fun. It was, well, dreadful. Orange County probably isn't too bad today. But when I moved there Huntington Beach had approximately 8000 people. I was beyond bored. Having what I now recognize as an abusive father growing up and currently have an abusive brother makes the OC an unfriendly, strange, ugly and unhappy place to be.

The town exploded. It went from about 9000 people in the town to over 100,000 people in one year. No joke. It was white flight and defense industry money. For our freshman year we had around 5000 students.

As I have mentioned at other reunions, people who didn't talk to you during high school won't talk to you at the reunion. It's just the way it is.

Still I had a nice time even though I didn't go out of my way to be sociable to everyone. If people came up to me (which happened) I was thrilled. I really did have a good time. A person that lived across the street from me while in high school (and didn't much care for me then) was face to face with me, less than two feet apart. Heh, she didn't say anything and I wasn't about to break the ice.

My wife made it a lot of fun.

Speaking of which, I haven't been mentioning all the hard work she's been doing processing all the tomatoes. We have over 30 jars of canned tomatoes. On Friday she spent over four hours working on a reduced tomato sauce that was excellent. She's both a trooper and a keeper.

I finished the front yard watering on Friday afternoon.

At dinner tonight we tried three Zebra tomatoes, Green Zebra, Big Yellow Zebra and White Zebra. My wife liked White Zebra the best while I liked Green Zebra the best. In both cases, though, it was the first tomato we tried.

My wife couldn't stand the Big Yellow Zebra a few days ago. While it was our least favorite of the three tomatoes, that's not a shot at Big Yellow Zebra.

White Zebra – smooth, mellow and refreshing.

Big Yellow Zebra – same, though watery.

Green Zebra – same, though more refreshing.

I preferred the refreshing Green Zebra while my wife preferred the smoothness of White Zebra. But all the tomatoes didn't have the tomato acid kick. They were all quite good.

Black Cherry has passed up Yellow Perfection in the total number of tomatoes harvested (320 to 319). So for now Black Cherry holds the all time record for the most tomatoes harvested from a back yard tomato plant.

Earlier today, we got a freezer delivered to us. We didn't have to pay for it! Josephine, a neighbor two blocks down whom my wife has known for years, had an extra freezer. Her son delivered it. It's the perfect size for our garage. Repeat, perfect. So we will have more room to hold our tomatoes!

Harvested Green Zebra Today!

Today's harvest includes 31 Snow White, 26 Black Cherry, 21 Red Currant, 17 Jaune Coeur de Pigeon, 16 Babywine, 11 back yard Garden Peach(2), 8 Oaxacan Jewel(2), 7 Plum Tigris, 7 White Currant, 7 back yard Green Grape, 6 White Zebra, 5 SunSugar, 5 front yard Husky Cherry Red, 5 back yard Husky Cherry Red, 4 Black Krim (6 ounces, 9 ounces), 3 Mong, 3 Early Annie, 3 Tiger Paw, 3 Black From Tula (8.5 ounces, 11 ounces, 8.5 ounces), 3 Patio, 3 front yard Green Grape, 2 Silvery Fir Tree, 2 Oaxacan Jewel(1) (one 6 ounces), 2 front yard Speckled Roman (one 7 ounces), 2 Dr. Wyche's Yellow (10.5 ounces, 11.5 ounces), 2 front yard Garden Peach, 2 Super Snow White, 2 Sweet 100, 2 Japanese Black Trifele, 2 Red Grape, 2 Green Zebra(2) (new!), a back yard Paul Robeson, Yellow Perfection, German Orange Strawberry, Amazon Chocolate (6.5 ounces), Pierce's Pride (6.5 ounces), Berkeley Tie Dye, Big Yellow Zebra (27.5 ounces!), Italian Ice, Vintage Wine and Jaune Flamme for a total of 224 tomatoes among 41 tomato plants.

I believe this is the highest total number of tomato plants harvested this year.

My wife watered the back yard tomatoes and some of the front yard tomatoes. I don't know if she's completely caught up with watering but if not, she's close.

The harvested Big Yellow Zebra is a monster. I forgot to mention it yesterday – I knew it was coming.

Babywine, back yard Garden Peach(2), Plum Tigris and White Zebra had new harvest highs for the year. Black Cherry tied its' harvest high for the year.

White Zebra is a tough harvest. The ripe White Zebra is very similar to the unripe White Zebra.

After I post this I'll get images of the 30 ounce Mexico and the 27.5 ounce Big Yellow Zebra.

The two harvested Green Zebras look both large and perfect.

A Day Of Seconds

Isn't every day a day of seconds?

Today's harvest includes 33 Red Currant, 33 Snow White, 24 Yellow Perfection, 18 Black Cherry, 12 White Currant, 10 Jaune Coeur de Pigeon, 6 back yard Green Grape, 6 Japanese Black Trifele (7.5 ounces, 11.5 ounces, 6 ounces), 6 front yard Garden Peach, 6 front yard Husky Cherry Red, 5 Babywine, 5 Tiger Paw, 5 Turkish Striped Monastery, 4 Sweet Olive, 4 Pierce's Pride (13 ounces, 7 ounces, 8 ounces, 7 ounces), 4 back yard Garden Peach(1), 4 back yard Garden Peach(2), 4 Mong, 4 front yard Speckled Roman (6 ounces, 6 ounces), 3 Berkeley Tie Dye (12.5 ounces, 6.5 ounces, 6 ounces), 3 Dr. Wyche's Yellow (12 ounces, 12 ounces, 9 ounces), 2 back yard Husky Cherry Red, 2 Black From Tula (8 ounces, 10 ounces), 2 Red Grape, 2 Aunt Ruby's German Green, 2 Vintage Wine, 2 Silvery Fir Tree, 2 Oaxacan Jewel(1) (6 ounces, 7 ounces), 2 Oaxacan Jewel(2), SunSugar, Amazon Chocolate (8 ounces), a back yard Paul Robeson, Plum Tigris, Cuor de Bue, Super Snow White and a front yard Mexico for a total of 222 tomatoes.

Today was our second largest total harvest number for 2009 (222 tomatoes), the second largest total for the front yard (114 tomatoes) and the second largest for the back yard (108 tomatoes).

Last night the Manchester Terrier got to a ripe Turkish Striped Monastery. However, this is the second time he's grabbed a tomato only after a late dinner. He was fed dinner after 10 PM and may have simply been hungry. It's possible that this dog actually has gotten the idea to leave them alone.

Also last night we tried Big Yellow Zebra. I thought it was overripe (we tried the first one) but my wife didn't like it at all. She even mentioned how much she didn't like it at tonight's dinner. At the time I told her to keep an open mind because this tomato was overripe. She understood.

Today I was the tomato Santa Claus. I brought bags of tomatoes for my mechanic, my brother and his wife and my mother. Everybody was happy to get them.

Also I visited my mother and father in law, took their two dogs and brought back their Green Zebras to sample. Their best harvest day was yesterday as well, harvesting 33 tomatoes. The mother in law does the harvesting and she lined them up for her husband to see.

We took more pictures of the 27.5 ounce Mexico plant. I'll post them later when I have more time.

Best Harvest of 2009 So Far!

Today's bountiful harvest includes 43 Snow White, 34 Red Currant, 26 Black Cherry, 12 Yellow Perfection, 10 Jaune Coeur de Pigeon, 9 White Currant, 7 Tiger Paw, 7 front yard Garden Peach, 6 Babywine, 6 Red Grape, 4 Vintage Wine (7.5 ounces, 6 ounces, 7.5 ounces), 4 Oaxacan Jewel(1) (12 ounces, 14 ounces, 10.5 ounces, 15 ounces), 4 Berkeley Tie Dye (15 ounces, 18.5 ounces, 13 ounces, 14 ounces), 3 Paul Robeson (one 6 ounces), 3 Japanese Black Trifele (8.5 ounces, 6 ounces), 3 Husky Gold, 3 Italian Ice, 3 Oaxacan Jewel(2), 2 Silvery Fir Tree, 2 Black Krim, 2 back yard Husky Cherry Red, 2 German Orange Strawberry, 2 Sweet 100, 2 back yard Garden Peach(1), 2 back yard Green Grape, 2 Orange Blossom (one 6.5 ounces), 2 back yard Garden Peach(2), Plum Tigris, Turkish Striped Monastery, Cuor de Bue (8 ounces), Amazon Chocolate (7 ounces), Sweet Olive, Beaverlodge Plum, a front yard Speckled Roman, Mong (6 ounces), Jaune Flamme and Big Yellow Zebra (new!) for a total of 215 tomatoes from 37 tomato plants!

We have a large back yard Mexico tomato that's maturing and doesn't appear to have any rot. While looking at that I glanced over at Big Yellow Zebra and hey, it has a ripe tomato on it! That was unexpected.

I “harvested” Patio Princess as well but it had terrible end rot. I got rid of two others on the plant with bad end rot.

I'll harvest a Dr. Wyche's Yellow tomorrow.

My wife completed the front yard watering on Tuesday and watered the back yard tomatoes yesterday.

Today is our largest harvest day of the year so far (215 tomatoes) with the largest front yard harvest of the year (118 tomatoes) and from the most plants (37). We're two tomatoes short of harvesting 1500 tomatoes in the back yard for this month.

What a harvest. It would have been Vintage Wine's day, 4 nice tomatoes except the first Oaxacan Jewel plant had 4 beautiful, large tomatoes. It would have been Oaxacan Jewel's day if it weren't for Berkeley Tie Dye and it's 4 huge tomatoes. The 18.5 ounce Berkeley Tie Dye harvested today is the largest of the year.

About three weeks ago I was wondering when Black Cherry and Snow White would come in. Now you know why I was wondering! On a frustrating note, there are mature Snow White tomatoes that I simply cannot reach from any angle.

Today I tried a new technique for harvesting Snow Whites, reaching over the fence and looking down. I found about a dozen that I couldn't find the other way, crawling underneath and looking up.

The steady numbers for both Red Currant and Yellow Perfection are remarkable. Usually a harvest will have a bell curve to it. These two plants have been “steady Eddies”.

At lunch my wife and I tried three tomatoes we hadn't tried this year: Black Krim, Babywine and Berkeley Tie Dye. Black Krim was good, smoother than we remember from previous years. Babywine was quite good and tasty. I think it's good for salads and my wife thinks it's good for sauce. Either way it's good.

Then came Berkeley Tie Dye. Wow, what a complex tomato. It starts off a bit acidic, then mellows out, then gets acidic at the end, more than in the beginning. I like it and so did my wife but I can tell this one is an acquired taste. I would imagine this tomato would be wonderful on a hamburger. The taste of this tomato is as complex as the skin color.

Today was the best harvest of the year so far.

Harvested 2 Tomatoes; 4 More Plants With Tomatoes

I came home for lunch and after lunch, I checked out the tomato plants.

Jeff Davis isn't looking as it did last week. It's starting to turn grayish and some of the leaves are actually turning brown. We think that this plant is more sensitive to a lack of sun and also may be watered too much.

My wife picked 2 Sweet Olives. We also noted that some Patio and Beaverlodge Plum tomatoes are beginning to ripen.

Four plants have new tomatoes: White Zebra, the second Green Zebra, Big Yellow Zebra and Super Snow White all have tomatoes.

Busy Weekend

Ever have one of those too busy weekends?

On Friday my wife watered the front and back yards which include the tomato plants. But unfortunately, we also discovered that the front yard Japanese Black Trifele was starting to wilt. The front yard Jaune Flamme was showing damage as well, but no wilt. Darn, we need to replace another one...

That makes it five more plants damaged by vandalism. Several spots have been hit twice. The only tomato to survive unscathed so far in the front yard is Mexico.

Japenese Black Trifele, Green Zebra and Black Zebra were the three plants in the “corner office” that were closest to the sidewalk. Husky Cherry Red and Eva Purple Ball were nearest to the driveway. I'm sure that's not a coincidence.

My wife hit upon the idea of moving some rose bushes to the area in the “corner office” next to the sidewalk. But first, our shovels are worn out, we'll need new shovels to move the rose bushes.

Also, the stray cat outside needed treatment. He had a lopsided face during the week, but that went away on Friday. Still, something was wrong. Apparently this cat has had this before – an abscess inside his mouth that apparently burst open – but we weren't sure. So my wife trapped the cat and brought it in. No time for shovels.

We had planned on putting together the wheelbarrow back together with a new inner tube for the tire on Saturday morning, but I didn't sleep a wink on Friday night. I had gone to Denny's to get something to eat and checked out a property at 3:30 AM.

My wife went to the veterinarian to pick up the cat, while I handled the gardener. The gardener thinned out the lemon tree in the back, giving us more room to plant. The wife came back with the cat around 12:45 PM. We hurriedly dealt with the cat, did a little yard work and drove off to the LA Garden show, but detouring to pick up the mail and to check out the property I had seen earlier in the morning. An agent was showing the house so we politely invited ourselves in, checked it out and decided it was a no-go.

At the Garden Show we met our friends, Liz and Ricardo and picked up three more tomato plants. Afterwards, we spent about two hours at a nearby Home Depot, picking up a new shovel or two among a lot of other things. Then we stuffed ourselves at a local BBQ restaurant.

We both came home exhausted. I fell asleep but was awakened by the Cinco de Mayo celebrations and again couldn't fall back asleep.

Sunday morning it was apparent that the Japanese Black Trifele wasn't going to make it. But there was no time to deal with that. We got up, loaded up the wheelbarrow pieces and some tools and went to the new house owned by our “seed lady”. There we assembled the wheelbarrow (which was hers to begin with), got the inner tube in, pumped it up and reattached the wheel axle to the body of the wheelbarrow.

We got back home and I planted Big Yellow Zebra near the north wall of the back yard, in an area that now gets sun due to the thinned lemon tree. I used the new shovel and it's a good one. There's still a pile of lemon branches that need to be discarded but we're waiting for the trash pickup on Tuesday morning to empty the green recyclable trash can.

I adjusted the back yard tomato document and the on line spreadsheet to reflect this additional tomato.

Around this time our Saturday friends came by to visit to help us put up a new patio cover.

We have these metal braces in the cement, four in the back yard and one in the front yard, that can hold a 4x4 piece of wood. The idea was to take advantage of three of these braces in the back yard to put up a framework of a patio cover to help protect the house in the scorching summers. We went to the local Lowe's and spent another couple of hours, picking up lumber and bolts and washers and sandpaper...you get the idea.

The rest of the afternoon was spent assembling the pieces, drilling holes and whatnot. It took a while but it all came together and looks quite impressive.

Then we went to Brent's Deli for dinner.

We came home, said our goodbyes, fed the dogs and dealt with the cat. Again, off to bed exhausted and again I couldn't fall asleep. I got up, read part of the Sunday Los Angeles Times and fell asleep on the couch.

So the rose bushes didn't get moved because of our jam packed weekend.

We know we're planting very late now, but we're not going to give in to any vandalism.