I managed to get some background time around the 6 minute mark in this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=3O76simiJRM#at=460
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Ten In The Ground
My wife planted ten tomato seedlings in the back yard yesterday.We're so busy with things that I don't even know their names. I hope to fill in these details later. When I got home last night I opened up a 50 pound bag of gypsum and spread the gypsum over part of our unplanted growing area in the back yard. I shoveled it in as fast as I could, then raked the ground and watered it in to the soil.
TomatoMania was both fun and exhausting as usual. Do a Google search on TomatoMania 2011 and see what's returned.
One of the TomatoMania customers I helped had some mild notoriety about 15 years ago. I recognized him immediately. In the course of asking general questions, I asked him where he resided. I do this to all customers, as the tomato choices will vary if one resides in Venice versus, say Woodland Hills. He told me that he was off of Mulholland and another cross street (I won't say and it doesn't matter) so that verified that I knew the identity of this person. I said "I know who you are." but spoken to convey "I recognize you" and no more. We walked around and I picked out about 20 tomatoes of all shapes, colors and sizes and left him to pick several more. I believe he picked up a few strawberry plants as well but I could be wrong about that. At the counter he held out his hand and said "I'm Bob". Later on I put his seedlings in the back of his car.
He came back to his car and actually tipped me. What a nice thing to do! I immediately put it in my left back pocket...catching my shirt, putting both the end of my shirt and whatever money he tipped into my pocket. The moment I moved, the end of the shirt came out along with the tip. I never saw it again! That's okay, I'm smiling as I write this. He didn't need to do that...not that I wouldn't mind if he came back next year!
Over the last two weeks we pulled out most of the rest of the grass in our new planting area. I pulled up a lot of asphalt with a lot of it in large chunks.
My wife has also planted new tomato seeds recently.
I just got a message from my wife. The ten in the back yard are Snow White, Brandywine (Red or Yellow, we're not sure), Green Zebra, Quedlinburger Fruehe Liebe, Black and Brown Boar, Negro Azteca, Berkeley Tie Dye, Oaxacan Jewel, Coyote and Black Krim.
Friday, March 25, 2011
TomatoMania Weekend!
The main TomatoMania has started and will continue through this weekend at Tapia Brothers Farm in Encino. See you there!
Monday, March 7, 2011
Preparing for Planting
Saturday morning my wife and I went to see Scott Daigre's annual tomato class at CSUN. It was fun and engaging as usual. If you didn't go this year, try to catch this in future years.
I finished turning over the grass for our new growing area. We're by no means done, however, as the dead grass needs to be pulled before we can amend the soil.
We moved one of the raised beds to another part of the backyard lawn, providing additional planting area. We may move the original raised bed as well but that will require more effort.
My wife "challenged" me to find asphalt in a random area of our backyard near our east fence. Our tomatoes do not do well in this area of the yard. The plants tend to get about 3 to 4 feet tall and then struggle. I picked a spot, checked to see if this is an acceptable spot to try and started digging. The shovel went in and we heard the scratching sound we normally associate with asphalt. After about 15 minutes of digging I had pulled up a fair amount of asphalt including at least two slightly larger than a large, thick hamburger patty.
Yep, we have an asphalt problem. My wife has been pulling it out for at least 10 years and we're still pulling out large chunks about 8 - 12 inches below the surface.
For now we're going to plant again in this area. I may dig up this area in the fall after the tomato plants are pulled. We'll see. It is very hard work.
The results of last year's back yard soil test indicated our soil is lacking nitrogen. We'll continue amending the back yard soil to supply nitrogen to the growing areas.
Our tomato plants grown from seed are not doing well at all. For the most part they were doing fine but they became very sensitive to light/water/heat/cold.
During Super Bowl weekend I turned the dirt in the "koi pond". Another round of buckwheat was planted and it is starting to sprout. The buckwheat is simply a plant that puts nitrogen back in the soil.
Tomatomania is less than three weeks away! My wife plans to work all three days of the event and I plan to work the last two days of the event. For further details, check out http://www.tomatomania.com.
I finished turning over the grass for our new growing area. We're by no means done, however, as the dead grass needs to be pulled before we can amend the soil.
We moved one of the raised beds to another part of the backyard lawn, providing additional planting area. We may move the original raised bed as well but that will require more effort.
My wife "challenged" me to find asphalt in a random area of our backyard near our east fence. Our tomatoes do not do well in this area of the yard. The plants tend to get about 3 to 4 feet tall and then struggle. I picked a spot, checked to see if this is an acceptable spot to try and started digging. The shovel went in and we heard the scratching sound we normally associate with asphalt. After about 15 minutes of digging I had pulled up a fair amount of asphalt including at least two slightly larger than a large, thick hamburger patty.
Yep, we have an asphalt problem. My wife has been pulling it out for at least 10 years and we're still pulling out large chunks about 8 - 12 inches below the surface.
For now we're going to plant again in this area. I may dig up this area in the fall after the tomato plants are pulled. We'll see. It is very hard work.
The results of last year's back yard soil test indicated our soil is lacking nitrogen. We'll continue amending the back yard soil to supply nitrogen to the growing areas.
Our tomato plants grown from seed are not doing well at all. For the most part they were doing fine but they became very sensitive to light/water/heat/cold.
During Super Bowl weekend I turned the dirt in the "koi pond". Another round of buckwheat was planted and it is starting to sprout. The buckwheat is simply a plant that puts nitrogen back in the soil.
Tomatomania is less than three weeks away! My wife plans to work all three days of the event and I plan to work the last two days of the event. For further details, check out http://www.tomatomania.com.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Monday, January 17, 2011
2011 Tomato Seedlings
Images from our 2011 tomato seedlings. The first was taken on 12/30/2010, the day most of the seedlings were planted. The planting was completed on 12/31/2010, shown in the second image.
The last image was taken on January 15, 2011, showing mostly happy seedlings!
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
8092 Harvested Tomatoes in 2010
We ended up with harvesting 8092 tomatoes during the 2010 season. These numbers indicate it wasn't a good year and these numbers also indicate it wasn't a bad year. This year's crop did have good taste.
Snow White was pulled yesterday. The freezes over the last three weeks have hurt the plant. It was time to go. This plant was a volunteer and did a wonderful job. There's are many tomatoes lying around and it will be nearly impossible to collect and dispose of all of them.
Only SunSugar remains.
My wife has already started on the 2011 tomato seedlings. They've been planted over the last week. I'll try to get images up on this blog this weekend.
Snow White was pulled yesterday. The freezes over the last three weeks have hurt the plant. It was time to go. This plant was a volunteer and did a wonderful job. There's are many tomatoes lying around and it will be nearly impossible to collect and dispose of all of them.
Only SunSugar remains.
My wife has already started on the 2011 tomato seedlings. They've been planted over the last week. I'll try to get images up on this blog this weekend.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Lots and Lots of Rain...
December 24 harvest: 16 Snow White, 2 SunSugar.
Yesterday's harvest: 39 Snow White, 4 SunSugar.
The harvest has been spotty due to a lot of rain over the last week and a half. That and it's too cold when I get up in the morning. Yesterday's Snow White harvest was handled by my wife during the afternoon.
My wife is making preparations for next years crop. She has purchased a plastic enclosure to house the tomato seedlings. I think she'll start the seedlings in a day or so.
There were near torrential rains between the harvest on the 17th and the 24th. Many of the ripe tomatoes were discarded due to severe splitting. Some of the splitting was so severe the tomato nearly turned inside out! I've never seen such behavior before.
The Snow White is showing signs of minor frost damage and is finally looking old.
Saturday, December 11, 2010
Harvested Over 1000 Front Yard Snow White Tomatoes!
Today's harvest: 17 Snow White (front yard).
We've now harvested over 1000 front yard Snow White tomatoes! So long as the weather stays temperate (It's actually a got bit warm today, low 80's) this plant will continue to be productive.
I didn't harvest during the week as I was out the door to my consulting job at 6:00 AM. I'll have a normal schedule starting this Tuesday.
There are no back yard tomato plants. All the rest of the plants in the back yard were pulled on Thursday or today.
The only tomato plants left are Snow White (front yard) and SunSugar.
Saturday, December 4, 2010
Harvested Over 8000 Tomatoes This Year!
November 30 harvest: 4 Snow White (front yard) and 2 Carmello for a total of 6 tomatoes.
December 4 harvest: 9 Snow White (front yard), 2 Sweet 100 and SunSugar for a total of 12 tomatoes.
We've now harvested over 8000 tomatoes for the year (8014)! We've also harvested over 4500 tomatoes in the front yard (4513) and over 3500 tomatoes in the back yard (3501).
We harvested 214 tomatoes for the month of November, 181 in the front yard and 33 in the back yard.
The past two to three weeks have been cold in the morning. Twice the temperature has gotten below freezing and many times approached freezing temperatures. This is unusual for November. The spotty harvests are due to the freezing weather in the morning. Usually the coldest times of the day are between 6:00 and 7:00 AM around here and I harvest just after 7:00 AM.
If the gardeners had come today I would have left the Snow White in the front yard and have almost every other tomato plant pulled. My wife did pull Husky Cherry Red today as the plant was black due to the freezing temperatures.
We continue to slowly wind it down...
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