[SWhite6124]

Hi. I had a go at growing Tomatoes last year but was not happy with the results. Can anybody recommend a good heavy cropper?

[syks grower]

My selection is Shirley for medium sizes fruit,
 Gardeners Delight for smaller fuit
 Sungold for cherry

These should give you a good crop and taste good

[joyfull]

This may help you.

[compostqueen]

It's not as simple as that 

There are different tomatoes for a range of purposes - salads, drying ones, passata ones, beef ones for sarnis and toasties, plum ones for bottling, and so on 

[mumofstig]

was just going to say the same CQ 

[DD.]

Huh, typical.

10 gardeners, 100 answers.

Sorry, you won't find a definite answer.

If there was one, there wouldn't be such a choice.

[allot2learn]

If only................... 

[shoozie]

Hi. I had a go at growing Tomatoes last year but was not happy with the results. Can anybody recommend a good heavy cropper?

Bad year here for tomatoes , like a lot of other folks.  Most greenhouse toms were wiped out by botrytis - though managed to coax a 100&1000's through .... Silly really, but that's how it bad it was ! Thinking I'll stop tomatoes for now

[Klausy1000]

I like hybrids as they produce better yields and have more disease resistance than open pollinated.  They seem to have bred good flavour back into modern hybrids  in the last decade or two.

Another thing to consider are special requirements for your growing area.  My plants were all succumbing to some kind of blight a few years ago, I tried varieties with different disease resistances but to no avail.  I finally tried a tomatoe with tolerance to Tomatoe Spotted Wilt Virus (TSWV) and no more problems!  Now I only grow tomatoes with resistance to TSWV.

[Trillium]

I agree with DD, there are far too many variables each gardener must consider for their situation and growing conditions.

My mother lives only 30 minutes away from me but is in a higher altitude that puts her in a much shorter (and colder) growing season so she can grow only sub-arctic type tomatoes while I can grow almost any variety I want. But due to diet sensitivities, I can eat only low acid tomatoes. For bottling I use only paste tomato varieties as they're drier and easier to process. My growing pals all prefer very tart tomatoes.

Perhaps it's best if you sat down with a big catalogue of toms and read through each one's pros and cons and start experimenting with varieties that suit and appeal.

[Growster...]

We're reverting to our old methods of bringing on about three types, but growing them in several completely different areas of the garden and the patches.

So we'll have - say - about sixty to seventy plants dotted around on three walls (not the north wall), the greenhouse taking another dozen, and the spares going down somewhere on the patch and the plot.

The reason for this is that we should, by the law of averages, get a crop in every condition - including blight.

Always worked so far!

[compostqueen]

Yes, me too. Spread the risk 

[syks grower]

I agree with DD and the other posters there is no one size fits all answer.

If you are new to greenhouse growing of tomatoes the choice in seed catalogues is vast and they all sound so good.

So i grow my banker varieties of Gardners delight, Sungold and Shirley.
them i try 2 or 3  different varieties each year.
I find 9 plants is all I can squeeze into my 8' X 6' greenhouse with the peppers,chillies,cues and aubergines.

I would just be carefull of taking too much notice of what happened last year it was by no means a normal growing year and most peoples crops have been poor.

[Griffete]

Hi there i was in  the same boat as you last year with so many to chose from  anyway i went with these and everyone on the allotment commented on them.....got lots and lots of the plants and all was a good size   :blink:
http://www.unwins.co.uk/tomato-gourmet-pid3894.html

[shokkyy]

Anybody tried those Red Pear toms from Franchi? They look really interesting, toying with the idea of giving them a try this year. They're a cordon variety but I'm not sure how they'd do outdoors.

My banker varieties are Gartenperle, Alicante and San Marzano. I also do 2 or 3 other varieties each year, usually outdoor bush varieties like Roma or Rio Grande.