Yes, it's tomato time again. Longtime fans and stalkers will know that I can't resist planting tomatoes, and that it's usually a great big failure. The first time was in 2001, back in Saint David, Arizona, and the sucking was truly epic. Then I tried in 2006, here in Tucson, and an auspicious start just didn't pan out. I think our neighbors enjoyed some tomatoes while we were on an extended trip that summer (India, Chicago, Montreal), but by the time we got home the plants were useless.
Last year, of course, was the exception. I put in four plants: Big Beef, Early Girl, Ciudad Victoria, and "Texas Wild Tomato" (these last two are from the Native Seeds/SEARCH store nearby). The two native varieties grew like gangbusters, setting fruit all summer (not so surprising, since they're both cherry tomatoes). Early Girl did OK, though it didn't set fruit during the hottest months, and it was eventually overwhelmed by the two enormous natives. Big Beef provided the yummiest tomato of the year, but it shut down production during the high temps and never really recovered. The plants, all indeterminate, kept growing and growing, and I feared we wouldn't get a freeze. But we ended up dipping below 32° around New Year, so I got to start fresh.
( More garden blah-blah, plus photos! )
Last year, of course, was the exception. I put in four plants: Big Beef, Early Girl, Ciudad Victoria, and "Texas Wild Tomato" (these last two are from the Native Seeds/SEARCH store nearby). The two native varieties grew like gangbusters, setting fruit all summer (not so surprising, since they're both cherry tomatoes). Early Girl did OK, though it didn't set fruit during the hottest months, and it was eventually overwhelmed by the two enormous natives. Big Beef provided the yummiest tomato of the year, but it shut down production during the high temps and never really recovered. The plants, all indeterminate, kept growing and growing, and I feared we wouldn't get a freeze. But we ended up dipping below 32° around New Year, so I got to start fresh.
( More garden blah-blah, plus photos! )
My tomato plants have grown. A lot. We haven't had a freeze yet this year in Tucson, and some years it doesn't freeze here at all. A freeze would normally kill the tomato plants and let me start fresh again in the spring.
I am afraid.
Before:
After:
I am afraid.
Before:
After:
- Mood:
alarmed
Today, May 8, Ted and I ate the first wee little tomatoes off one of our plants. I didn't even know there were red tomatoes on it until I tended the plant this afternoon. The tomatoes were tiny little fellows, hardly more than a centimeter in diameter, with a nice flavor.
I'm not certain what variety they are, but I think it's the vaguely-named Texas Wild Tomato, from the wonderful Native Seed/SEARCH store in Tucson. Hooray for quirky local varieties!
I'm not certain what variety they are, but I think it's the vaguely-named Texas Wild Tomato, from the wonderful Native Seed/SEARCH store in Tucson. Hooray for quirky local varieties!
Blessed with unbridled optimism and a short memory, I planted some tomatoes today. Longtime fans will recall that I've never had much luck growing tomatoes in Arizona (or anywhere else). But I'm trying again -- I planted "Big Beef", "Early Girl", "Ciudad Victoria" and another local variety whose name escapes me. I have no real expectation of ever eating one of these tomatoes, given my dismal track record. Indeed, I think I'm planting only out of morbid curiosity.
For my next trick I'll plant a serrano pepper plant, sunflowers and okra. Updates to come.
For my next trick I'll plant a serrano pepper plant, sunflowers and okra. Updates to come.
Mean Mr. Sun is very hard on tomatoes ‘round these parts, so I asked the nice Ted to help me put up a shade cloth, and he went ahead and built this nice canopy:
Don’t the plants look pleased in their little fort?
Then, this afternoon, there was a huge and wonderful rainstorm, and I couldn’t resist venturing out into the yard to see whether my plants were getting any of this glorious water. What I learned was that the canopy works great, because the water puddles on top of it and then drips down gently in big blops, so the tomatoes get a gentle soaking rather than a pummelling.
( Click here for a cool shot of the runoff pouring from our roof! )
Don’t the plants look pleased in their little fort?
Then, this afternoon, there was a huge and wonderful rainstorm, and I couldn’t resist venturing out into the yard to see whether my plants were getting any of this glorious water. What I learned was that the canopy works great, because the water puddles on top of it and then drips down gently in big blops, so the tomatoes get a gentle soaking rather than a pummelling.
( Click here for a cool shot of the runoff pouring from our roof! )
Most of the tomato plants thrived while I was away. Some of the fruits are nearly ripe now -- I think they'll be ready to eat within a few days.
The bad news, alas, is that it's so hot now that the plants aren't really setting fruit anymore. It may be time to throw some kind of shading material over them, though I don't know if that will solve matters.
( Click for the photo )
The bad news, alas, is that it's so hot now that the plants aren't really setting fruit anymore. It may be time to throw some kind of shading material over them, though I don't know if that will solve matters.
( Click for the photo )
- Mood:
hungry
My "Early Girl" tomato plant has been growing like crazy and is now heavy with unripe fruit. But the little bitty stake that I planted it with is no longer up to the task of holding it up. In fact, said stake turned into a problem -- the stem started to bend right where it's tied to the stake, and I'm a little concerned that serious damage has occurred there.
Crisis at hand, I rushed to Home Depot to get a cage or stake for the plants. Fortunately they had the nice kind of folding cage you can wrap around a plant that's too big for the normal cone-shaped cage. The bad news is that during the delicate operation of ensconcing the plant with the cage, two young green tomatoes fell off the vine. Nooooo! I couldn't just leave them there to attract bugs and then dessiccate, so I gave them a proper burial in an unused part of the garden. (There's no chance that they'll sprout unaided, given the serious lack of rainfall around here.)
So, now all four of my plants are safely tucked in cages -- I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the big plant survives the stem damage.
Crisis at hand, I rushed to Home Depot to get a cage or stake for the plants. Fortunately they had the nice kind of folding cage you can wrap around a plant that's too big for the normal cone-shaped cage. The bad news is that during the delicate operation of ensconcing the plant with the cage, two young green tomatoes fell off the vine. Nooooo! I couldn't just leave them there to attract bugs and then dessiccate, so I gave them a proper burial in an unused part of the garden. (There's no chance that they'll sprout unaided, given the serious lack of rainfall around here.)
So, now all four of my plants are safely tucked in cages -- I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the big plant survives the stem damage.
- Mood:
worried
No dead plants yet, though Yellow Pear is still in a slow downward spiral. But the net total of living plants went up today when the landscapers came and planted three citrus trees: tangerine, grapefruit, and lemon. So now it appears our planting is complete, except they seem to have given us the wrong variety of lemon tree. No problem -- I left a message, and they'll come swap it out (this already happened with our apricot tree). In spite of the various mishaps, we'd definitely recommend these landscapers, particularly given how inexpensive they were.
Anyway, here are some pictures if you're interested...
( Look! It's our yard! )
Anyway, here are some pictures if you're interested...
( Look! It's our yard! )
Here are the main points:
The tomatoes are still alive, to varying degrees. Yellow Pear is not so happy, with curling leaves and such. Celebrity is doing a bit better, but it's not really picture-perfect. Early Girl, however, seems quite happy -- lots of new little leaf clusters emerged today -- and Santa F1 has one or two new flowers. Tomorrow our landscaper is dropping by to help straighten out the drip-irrigation confusion, so maybe he can give me advice about the sad plants.
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markadm turned me onto a nifty tool called a TiddlyWiki. It's a single-file Wiki you can host on your own computer and use to make a hyperlinked, easy-to-update personal notebook. I'm using a supercool souped-up version called GTDTiddlyWiki, which is designed specifically to be an organizer. Ramakesava's description is much better than mine.
The weather in Tucson is just perfect right now, so Ted moved his trusty La-Z-Boy recliner onto our screened porch and took his computer out there.
I entered Chevrolet's contest to create a TV commercial for their newest SUV. I was inspired by loads of snarky environmentalist entries. Mine wasn't as strident as those -- instead I addressed GM and suggested they may be able to restore their battered bottom line by selling cars that aren't gas guzzlers. Sadly, I can't share it with you, because they didn't mail me back my link as promised. They'll probably yank the campaign any day now, thanks to all the backlash and mockery, so it's no great loss.
I've gotten kind of hooked on Sudoku puzzles. I don't want to talk about it.
That's all for now!
markadm turned me onto a nifty tool called a TiddlyWiki. It's a single-file Wiki you can host on your own computer and use to make a hyperlinked, easy-to-update personal notebook. I'm using a supercool souped-up version called GTDTiddlyWiki, which is designed specifically to be an organizer. Ramakesava's description is much better than mine.That's all for now!
They're not dead yet, but they've entered the could-go-either-way phase where they're a little sad in the wake of being transplanted. They'll either perk up in a day or two, or they'll shrivel and croak. Which wouldn't be the worst thing in the world, actually, since there would be some advantages to starting from scratch. Here's the tale...
On Wednesday I took on the drip irrigation system, which has been more exciting than I expected. After some futile attempts to coax water out of it, Ted and I discovered that the main valve from the hose-bib was closed. This means it's been running in automatic mode, possibly for months, with no water emerging from the little drippers. Obviously this was no problem for my yet-unplanted tomatoes, but it does explain why none of the other plants in our yard have grown very much, and also why our water bill did not change after we installed the system.
I find it a little hard to believe that our yard hasn't been watered at all since December, when it was first landscaped, since all the plants are at least alive (and somewhat perky thanks to some decent rains in the last month). And it's possible that the valve was open until recently, and that some local hooligans came and shut it. But there's another piece of evidence supporting the no-water theory: I discovered that the irrigation timer was programmed wrong, and that the only areas scheduled to receive water were the two raised beds, which were empty until Tuesday.
Together, I think we have some fairly damning evidence that the rest of the yard has never been watered. And so I am rather impressed by the hardiness of our "drought tolerant" plants!
Anyway, the reason it would be OK if the tomatoes died is that it would be nice to bury the drip lines and the main water router (the Octa-Bubbler!), which I can't really do now that it's surrounded by little plants. Instead the Octa-Bubbler is sticking up about six inches, and the little blue tubes are all streaming out from it into the ground, which looks a little more cyber-tronic than your typical tomato garden... it's kind of like Neo in that Matrix goo-box with hoses coming out from his spine.
Photos to come, I hope. (Tomato garden, not goo-covered Neo.)
On Wednesday I took on the drip irrigation system, which has been more exciting than I expected. After some futile attempts to coax water out of it, Ted and I discovered that the main valve from the hose-bib was closed. This means it's been running in automatic mode, possibly for months, with no water emerging from the little drippers. Obviously this was no problem for my yet-unplanted tomatoes, but it does explain why none of the other plants in our yard have grown very much, and also why our water bill did not change after we installed the system.
I find it a little hard to believe that our yard hasn't been watered at all since December, when it was first landscaped, since all the plants are at least alive (and somewhat perky thanks to some decent rains in the last month). And it's possible that the valve was open until recently, and that some local hooligans came and shut it. But there's another piece of evidence supporting the no-water theory: I discovered that the irrigation timer was programmed wrong, and that the only areas scheduled to receive water were the two raised beds, which were empty until Tuesday.
Together, I think we have some fairly damning evidence that the rest of the yard has never been watered. And so I am rather impressed by the hardiness of our "drought tolerant" plants!
Anyway, the reason it would be OK if the tomatoes died is that it would be nice to bury the drip lines and the main water router (the Octa-Bubbler!), which I can't really do now that it's surrounded by little plants. Instead the Octa-Bubbler is sticking up about six inches, and the little blue tubes are all streaming out from it into the ground, which looks a little more cyber-tronic than your typical tomato garden... it's kind of like Neo in that Matrix goo-box with hoses coming out from his spine.
Photos to come, I hope. (Tomato garden, not goo-covered Neo.)
This week in futility, I planted some tomatoes. Some of you may recall just how badly it went the last time I tried to grow tomatoes. I was living in Saint David, and I was so excited to have space to grow a nice little garden. I read Vegetable Gardening for Dummies and pored over seed catalogs and sent for special tomato food and tested the soil alkalinity and totally obsessed over the project.
But everything went wrong. First, my little plants were felled by cutworm, which severs the stalk. Then I planted more and the frost came, killing the little plantlings. Finally I got some plants to stay in the ground, but I had so aggressively fertilized and loamified the hostile Arizona clay that every weed in Cochise County decided to get in on the action. I might have stayed on top of the weed situation if I'd been in town, but I was gone for three weeks, and by the time I returned the garden was overtaken by Andrea-sized weeds. We mowed them all down a year later when we moved away, but I suspect I've left an incorrigible weed patch for future generations.
This time I took the opposite approach. We have some raised beds in our newly-landscaped yard, so I went to a plant nursery with no knowledge at all about the soil the landscapers put in. I bought four tomato plants, one jalapeño plant, and a couple of bags of general potting soil (the raised beds were kind of underfilled). I brought them home, mixed in the soil, and planted the plants. I'll hook up our drip irrigation system to water them regularly. And then I'll hope for the best.
Feel free to comment on how many days it will be before my plants are dead :-)
But everything went wrong. First, my little plants were felled by cutworm, which severs the stalk. Then I planted more and the frost came, killing the little plantlings. Finally I got some plants to stay in the ground, but I had so aggressively fertilized and loamified the hostile Arizona clay that every weed in Cochise County decided to get in on the action. I might have stayed on top of the weed situation if I'd been in town, but I was gone for three weeks, and by the time I returned the garden was overtaken by Andrea-sized weeds. We mowed them all down a year later when we moved away, but I suspect I've left an incorrigible weed patch for future generations.
This time I took the opposite approach. We have some raised beds in our newly-landscaped yard, so I went to a plant nursery with no knowledge at all about the soil the landscapers put in. I bought four tomato plants, one jalapeño plant, and a couple of bags of general potting soil (the raised beds were kind of underfilled). I brought them home, mixed in the soil, and planted the plants. I'll hook up our drip irrigation system to water them regularly. And then I'll hope for the best.
Feel free to comment on how many days it will be before my plants are dead :-)
