Mon, May 11 2009

The great tomato-growing season has begun

We started the vegetable crop this weekend with tomato plants: one San Francisco Fog, two Early Girl and one Sweet One-Hundred. We are close to the coast, and the tendency toward cool nights and morning marine layer plays havoc with almost all tomato growing attempts in this neighborhood. Commercial growers raise brussels sprouts, broccoli, lettuce and strawberries in rows you that go on for acres, but if you want a great canteloupe or tomato, this is not the optimum place to be. Still, some of us love a fresh tomato from the garden so much that we keep trying. We place ours in heat-attracting black planters and add a watering system that gives plenty of water without soaking the leaves and making them prone to mildew and wilt. We've tried all sorts of tricks for the inevitably cool nights, with varying results. We're a lot more dependent on the climate cycles than we'd like to be. Raising the plants on a platform or raised bed helps get that morning sun, when there is morning sun, to the plants a bit earlier, so we've added that tactic the last year or two. Hopefully, we'll get at least a few tasty treats for sandwiches or salad. It isn't a cost-effective way to get tomatoes, but the returns in taste always seem worth it when the fruit does well. Next year we may coaxing one of the plants into an espalier, since they have a natural tendency to vine anyway. If we fail with our experiments we can still visit the local produce stands, whose tomatoes probably come from hotter climates with less fog.

posted at: 08:46 | category: /Food | link to this entry