Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat

Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: jambop on August 04, 2021, 12:06

Title: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: jambop on August 04, 2021, 12:06
Last year on the 12 of August I picked and bottles approximately 30kg of lovely red juicy sweet San Marzano and Roma tomatoes and there were many left to pick.


 This year on the 4th of August there is not one red tomato on any of the 16 San Marzano or 8 Roma plants I have this year  :(  I have lots of green tomatoes and am hoping for some decant weather to ripen them but at the moment we just cannot get out of a run of cool wet weather
I have a few cherry tomatoes that have ripened and a few beef tomatoes that are just changing colour that is it.
Title: Re: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: Christine on August 05, 2021, 06:40
You are not the only one with green tomatoes. Friends have red ones but not me.
Title: Re: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: Growster... on August 05, 2021, 07:01
Not a good year for toms - we only grew 35 plants this year, and some San Marzano are just not trying with their trusses!

We've had a few Sungold, and a couple of Shirley toms are ripening outside, but it's all very, very slow, and because of the wild variances in watering/rain/heat, a few signs of blossom end rot are creeping in.

I suppose we're lucky in that we still have a load in the freezer from last year, and it looks like we'll need them!
Title: Re: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: jaydig on August 05, 2021, 08:30
Mine are slow to ripen too and the flavour is nowhere near as sweet as last year.  Could it be that earlier, when we had the first "heatwave" the temperature between night and day was so extreme?
Title: Re: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: jambop on August 05, 2021, 09:54
Mine are slow to ripen too and the flavour is nowhere near as sweet as last year.  Could it be that earlier, when we had the first "heatwave" the temperature between night and day was so extreme?

The problem I have had is just plain rotten weather! We had a poor early and late spring followed by the coolest, wettest July for 50 years and August has started exactly the same :( I am still hopeful that with a change to some warmer weather we will get some tomatoes for bottling come early September.
Title: Re: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: Enfield Glen on August 05, 2021, 11:02
The ones in the green house look healthy but are setting very few tomatoes, So far I have had 3 from 9 plants of different varieties.
Title: Re: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: JayG on August 05, 2021, 12:11
Picked the first ripe Red Alert tomatoes last week - as ever they're the first to deliver despite being in a cold frame rather than the GH.

In the GH, looks like Gardener's Delight will be the first to ripen - the others (Amish paste and Sugar Drop) still some way behind.

Overall, pretty much as previous years timing- and crop-wise despite the stop-go weather so far this year.
Title: Re: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: Goosegirl on August 05, 2021, 14:42
I am not alone then. Like Growster, I've loads of green ones but not a single red one anywhere, not even on one I had left over from the green house which I popped in a tub outside.  >:(
Title: Re: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: steven c on August 05, 2021, 15:08
we have golden sunrise ripening ahead of gardeners delight in greenhouse none outside cannot remember
if this was same last year some BER om gardeners delight but none on golden sunrise which are really sweet and plentiful
Title: Re: Tomatoes this year vs last
Post by: Growster... on August 05, 2021, 17:14
Just bought some cherries from a local farmer, and she said exactly the same as we all say here!

She sells toms on a farm stall, and they're grown in a polytunnel, but very, very poor this year!

So if the 'pros' are having problems, it's not surprising we just might do as well!

Hey-ho, some years you win etc. etc...