How big is your garden and how many tomato plants?

[Larro Darro]

Once they get growing, gourds like fertilizer. As the season progresses, don't let fruit form that will never mature. When the stems turn brown they are done although I had some green(ish) stems dry just fine.

I side dressed them with 1 1/2 handfuls of triple 13 per plant. That is 50% more than I use on melons. Later on I will give them a little blue juice {Miracle Grow} all along.

How long does it take them from bloom to mature gourds? We had a few on the two volunteer plants last year that didn't ripen. But our first frost could come as late as October or November. {October 28th is the average first frost for Tallahassee} Or do they run out of steam before that?

Larro

 

[sixdogs]

I side dressed them with 1 1/2 handfuls of triple 13 per plant. That is 50% more than I use on melons. Later on I will give them a little blue juice {Miracle Grow} all along.

How long does it take them from bloom to mature gourds? We had a few on the two volunteer plants last year that didn't ripen. But our first frost could come as late as October or November. {October 28th is the average first frost for Tallahassee} Or do they run out of steam before that?

Larro

Bloom to almost mature gourds was the blink of an eye but it was painfully slow for the stem to turn brown to indicate final maturity. Yours should be all done in September. Some people leave them out all winter and in the Spring they are dry and light as a feather. I did that with a couple I thought weren't ripe. Some leave them on the back porch under the awning where they will dry fine. I put some in the barn because I thought that freezing would bother them and because I didn't think they were ripe. They molded and stained terrible but dried fine. Every gourd dried perfectly and the stains will scrub off when dry.

Forget volunteers of anything since the odds of getting the variety you want are near zero. You'll wind up with half gourds and half pickles or whatever. After around early August or so, snip off any new fruit that won't mature anyway.

Be prepared for an enormous amount of vines. My two seeds put out 40 feet of vines last year. Did I mention the vine were enormous?

Now, while these things are growing start figuring out what you're going to do with them the following year when they re dry and scrubbed clean. They take up a lot of space. I have about 15 looking for a home.

:dog:

Oh, if you think you can put them in a pile to rot down or toss them in a field, forget about it. The shell is so tough I bet they will last for a couple of years, even if you crush them. They're the gift that keeps on giving. So why did I put in six plants this year, including some Big Dipper gourds? You should get a pack of seeds at Walmart.

 

[Looking4new]

I gotta replant my tomatoes. We lost 50 plants with the frost last night. The good thing is that I have another 50 I can plant anytime and an extra 50 that can be started from seed.

 

[lakngulf]

I gotta replant my tomatoes. We lost 50 plants with the frost last night. The good thing is that I have another 50 I can plant anytime and an extra 50 that can be started from seed.

Yikes! I am glad you have some replacements ready to go. I have lost only one so far (to wilt I guess, since it was in a pot that grew tomatoes last year). Today, 16-18 smaller tomatoes go in the ground. They will be side by side to the ones planted early May. Will be interesting to see the difference, if there is any.

And now to start some seed for late, late tomatoes. I think I will start a flat on June 1, June 16 and June 30

 

[pacerron]

Frost coming tonight and tomorrow night. Last night--at midnight--we went out and put Styrofoam cups over the very small tomato and pepper plants. We get the largest size cups from a big box store and place over plant with a rock on top. It works great. The best cups are the extra large foam cups from Sam's Club soda fountain but we can't find those cups for sale.

These poor tomato and peppers plants have been buffeted by severe winds, had five inches of rainfall and now cold temperatures. They sure will he hardy plants when they get going.

That is why we wait till after May 20 to plant tomato and pepper plants. The ground is still so cold they wouldn't grow much anyway and when the ground warms up stuff planted later catches up and overtakes the earlybird planter stuff anyway.
Luckily our Super Fantastic VFN plants were small from the greenhouse this year so they are doing well still in flats.
We put them out in the sun, the few days we have had lately, and back in the barn at night.
Been eating fresh green onions for a week but the peas are barely coming up after 2 weeks and were presoaked before planting. Ground is too cold.
All the potted plants/flowers and hanging baskets have been moved again to the covered front porch and are growing well.
Six inches of rain in 3 days last week. Normal for the whole month of May is 4".
Sure hope the rain slows down before hay cutting time:2cents:

 

[Gem99ultra]

Some of you guys sure know how to make a guy feel humble. I'm on Chemo this year and don't have the energy for a big garden. We have just 14 tomato plants and 8 sweet banana pepper plants. Our tomato plants are a mix of early girls, BHN 602 --Texas A&M hybrid for hot weather, and some Super Fantastic.

I'm with you Jinman - we've planted about the same amount. Just the two of us... That's enough for eating and canning.
Last year we had about 50 plants and couldn't give away enough tomatoes. As these get ready for picking, we'll put in another dozen for late season.
A row of beans, some okra, bunch of herbs, and a few cucumbers. That's enough work

 

[sixdogs]

pacerron--here's a secret with tomatoes that allows you to plant early. We used to live in northern New England with a very short growing season.

Get your tomato plants from 4 to 10" tall and rip off all the leaves except the top few. Then bury the whole plant in the ground so just those few leaves stick above the ground. Then hump a "berm" of soil around the plant to hold heat and buffer winds. Every bit of that plant will get roots and when fall comes it will be hard to pull out of the ground.

For cold climates you can instead dig a trench, pull the leaves off as instructed and lay the plant in the trench. Turn up just the tip, bury the rest and remember not to hoe there. Some people put down plastic and others use rocks over where the trench was to hold the heat at night. both of these methods give an earlier tomato.

Separately, we don't fertilize until the fruit sets and is the size of a quarter. Otherwise we get too much plant and not enough tomato.

 

[pacerron]

pacerron--here's a secret with tomatoes that allows you to plant early. We used to live in northern New England with a very short growing season.

Get your tomato plants from 4 to 10" tall and rip off all the leaves except the top few. Then bury the whole plant in the ground so just those few leaves stick above the ground. Then hump a "berm" of soil around the plant to hold heat and buffer winds. Every bit of that plant will get roots and when fall comes it will be hard to pull out of the ground.
Separately, we don't fertilize until the fruit sets and is the size of a quarter. Otherwise we get too much plant and not enough tomato.

Sixdogs
From your method above, when ( what date ) are you usually rewarded with your first tub of ripe tomatoes?
The season has shifted quite a bit over the years around this latitude. When I was a kid we planted tomatoes in April
but the first fall frost was 15 September.
Now we can get frost here till the end of May but the first fall frost doesn't usually happen till 20 October.

We do the same as you about fertilizer, wait till the fruit sets. We usually sucker the plants as they develop but still have lots of tomatoes
and lots of vine. Although I didn't know our tie up method was called the "Florida Weave" until last year we have used that with used baling twine for many years.
Rows are 4-5 feet apart but plants in rows are 18-24 inches apart. Add rows of string as they grow and usually have 5 rows of string about a foot apart in height. Great for weeding with a small roto-tiller most of the season and keeping the fruit off the ground.

 

[sixdogs]

Hard to say exactly when the tomatoes arrive but the described method allowed us to have our tomatoes in the ground earlier so we could lengthen the growing season. Where the last frost was often the beginning of June, we had our plants in the ground in mid May.

These days in a better climate we put plants in the first week of May and bury them up to the top few leaves. Despite out horrific weather, I expect the first tomato maybe by July 4th. Plants are already established and have grown a surprising amount when common sense suggests they would be lucky to be live. I think I see the start of a few blossoms.

As with all things tomatoes, there's an element of hocus pocus and luck involved and you never know what will exactly work until it works.

 

[pacerron]

Hard to say exactly when the tomatoes arrive but the described method allowed us to have our tomatoes in the ground earlier so we could lengthen the growing season. Where the last frost was often the beginning of June, we had our plants in the ground in mid May.

These days in a better climate we put plants in the first week of May and bury them up to the top few leaves. Despite out horrific weather, I expect the first tomato maybe by July 4th. Plants are already established and have grown a surprising amount when common sense suggests they would be lucky to be live. I think I see the start of a few blossoms.

As with all things tomatoes, there's an element of hocus pocus and luck involved and you never know what will exactly work until it works.

July 4th will put you about 10 days ahead of our, and the Crows, usual first picking by setting them out after 20 May.
The Ohio River tomatoes will be selling around here about the 1st of July so we eat them for a couple weeks and avoid the early planting frost harassment.

Be careful tonight.. It will be mid to high 30's according to the weatherman and is always colder out in the country.

I thought you wanted to move to Texas?