Tomato Growing Thread 2021

They've been really slow, first was a one off, the others are a week or two from ripening. Luckily I'm only growing 10 beefsteaks this year and 5 of them are for heavy tomato class and I wanted those to be fully grown but only just starting ripen as they lose weight when ripening.

 

Sweet Olive just keeps on giving. I'm definitely going to grow this next year, we have been picking since July which is unusual for an outdoor tom up here.

 

My biggest tomato, not as heavy as it could've been because it's shaped like a donut with a hole though the middle.

 

Shirlies have got up 17 tomatoes per truss. The ripe ones I'm picking at the moment are around 4 oz's.



Another big tomato that's still getting bigger

 

Nice, job done

 

I will only grow Shirley & Alicante next season, both have cropped well with a nice taste. I won't bother with Super Marmalade, cropped very small.

 

Will you remove the blighted soil now @JWK

 

And what will you do with the old soil???

 

I did that once with the borders in a 6 x 3m polytunnel. Swapping the top 150mm involved about 40 x 85L barrow loads (including bulking).

It entailed initially digging out quite a few barrow loads of tunnel soil and depositing in a temporary heap, then moving some replacement soil into the empty tunnel bed, then digging out and barrowing replacement soil into the tunnel, and so on, until finally shifting the temporary heap into where the last soil was moved out the tunnel.

That took so long, about the same as putting up another tunnel, so rather than swap soil again, next time I put up another tunnel, then another one the next year, then practiced rotation. But that was when 6 x 3m tunnels could be bought out of season for around £100 (or less My £87, 6 x 3m polytunnel from ebay )

 

If you swap the greenhouse soil every time you get a plant with blight in there, it'll be a mass of work and devastation outside continually digging borrow pits for replacement topsoil.

Have you considered a polytunnel? (that wont let rain in through roof vents).