u/chainsawwwmassacre

They're finally coming in!

It's not just you. It's slow as hell. I'm over 100 days since transplant. This is what it looks like when it finally blushes.

There's a song I love with a lyric that goes "she's pretty, but she's all I can see". That's this tomato.

I triggered a LOT of ripening by restricting water a little. I went from 20 minutes every other day to 15 minutes every other day to 20 minutes every third day. I have a really short season, so we have to be sadists here.

Prune the base a bit and slow down the water. Alice wants to dry out. For such a diva, it better taste good.

It's my first time entering the county fair, and I've been looking forward to it all year. Exhibition drop off day is tomorrow, and I need help choosing my champions! I can only enter three varieties in the heirloom class.

I'm listing each variety as a separate comment below. Upvote your favorite, and I'll drop off the top three at the fairgrounds tomorrow. It's been a hell of a season, fellow tomato lovers!

Of the 16 different heirloom varieties I grew this year, this is my most anticipated! I've been waiting TWO years to try one. Last year a friend gave me a seedling, but we had a family emergency at the height of summer resulted in the loss of my my entire vegetable garden before anything had a chance to fruit. I was pretty devastated.

In my experience and growing zone, it's pretty common that the first ripe fruit isn't as delicious as the ones that come later, likely because of the cooler temperatures and soil at the start of the season. If this is half as good as the tomatoes still ripening on the vine, I'm in for a treat.

This is a DELICIOUS tomato! It was sweet, juicy, and had a very subtle tropical flavor. Very meaty, with almost no seeds. I found exactly one, and immediately threw it in a cup with a little water to ferment. It's also a little ugly; I've noticed that my pineapple tomatoes tend to pull away from the stem as they ripen, like reverse catfacing. No matter! Ugly tomatoes are just hidden treasure.

Hopefully I get a couple more seeds because this will be a regular in my garden from now on.

My thimble runneth over

It's finally happening. Here's some of the magic in my backyard.

Today's haul. I love tomatoes!

I feel like I owe her a dollar for watching.

When the indeterminant cherries start pushing out a couple ripe fruits every day, but before they catch their stride and absolute chaos unfolds. It's close, because the beefsteaks are finally blushing.

The sun was beautiful last night which meant mandatory glamour shots! This is by far my most beautiful season yet. Like... I can't believe I grew these. You can't buy happiness, but over here, it grows on a vine!

I finally got my first ripe Black Krim, and I paid it the respect it deserves by slapping it on mayonnaise-slathered potato bread and snarfing the whole sandwich in four bites so I wouldn't have to share. The sandwich was decidely worth all the work that went into eating it, and I can't wait to eat 100 more.

First year growing black strawberry and I hope they taste as good as they look

An entire lifetime later, we're finally hitting breaker stage on sunrise bumblebee, roman candle, and principe borghese, and the black krim is starting to lighten up. I planted out on May 10th. I'm going to wait an extra week next year because I think the cold snap slowed them down.

It's a Sunrise Bumblebee in Eastern WA. Packet said 70 days, but it took an extra week. I think I planted them out too early and it slowed them down. At any rate, it's go time!

Is it just me, or is that Green Zebra (first slide) starting to show a flush of yellow? 🤩

I'm Eastern Wa, grew everything from seed this year, and haven't had a ripe one yet, but I can feel it. We're getting close.

Also pictured is the fabulous explosion of Principe Borghese growth and my monster Mushroom Baskets. I'm in love!

I'm in northeastern Washington on the Idaho border, and I've grown over thirty tomatoes of this year from seed. I can't get over how beautiful and productive they are! In order of the photos:

Black Strawberry— these are unbelievable. They're early, freaking gorgeous, and have twenty or more blossoms on each stem. I've never seen anything like it.

Alice's Dream— Polish beefsteaks that (eventually) look like a sun setting in the night sky. It was a little later to set fruit than the others, but the vines are purple from the anthocyanin.

Sunrise Bumblebee— Sungold hybrid with the cutest stripes! I'm impatient for them to hurry up and ripen.

Mushroom Basket— A crazy prolific Russian heirloom beefsteak. The pleats are wild. I'm in love.

Principe Borghese— My most anticipated variety! Italian longkeeper with a very low moisture content. You can pull the whole plant at the end of the season and they'll mature into "sundried" tomatoes on the vine.

My other varieties are Pineapple, Roman Torch, Prairie Fire, San Marzano, Purple Prudence, Green Zebra, Beaver Lodge (an early local type, exceptional cold tolerance) Micro Tom, Black Krim, Pink Brandywine, and Supersweet 100, a choice I regret because Chadwick cherries are better.

Big Rainbow and Ananas Noire are top on next year's list. What other cool varieties should I try?

These are the prettiest damn tomatoes. I'm growing 16 varieties this year, but these are the earliest stunners. The leaves are so robust and green, the depth of color Is like nothing I've ever seen, and the vines are soooo strongly scented. Super cool tomato!