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Florida Gardening

Early tomato race won by -

15 years ago

Hi all, the first of the fall tomatoes just started to ripen. The winner of the race for the earliest tomato looks to be the Sweet Quartz cherry and just behind it was the Golden Gem. Had some for lunch on Sunday and they sure were good!

A couple of the early girls just might make it in time for Thanksgiving. The plants look great this year and I sure hope the cold snap coming on Wednesday morning does not damage the plants.

{{gwi:970626}}

Fit to be tied ;-)

{{gwi:970628}}

Leaf lettuce and radish doing great.

Golden Gem cherry.

Got to run, DC

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Comments (8)

naplesgardener
15 years ago
Great looking garden and tomatoes, dc . Wish my lettuce was that far along :-)

I'm growing some of the seeds you gave me a year ago (again) with great results. Thanks again.
tomncath
15 years ago
Nice DC,

I hope you fare well over the next few days, keep us posted.

Tom
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tclynx
15 years ago
My spring cherry and grape tomatoes survived the heat of summer and kept producing and are still producing. I might even manage to keep a few of them going a full year if I can protect them from cold this winter.

As to any of my other tomatoes, Not gonna be ripe for a while yet.
cindeea
15 years ago
WTG Charlie!! Your lettuce looks yummy. I am growing a bunch of lettuce seed to eat as baby greens. The cooler temps are keeping the greens happy! That Golden Gem looks like it's gonna be tasty. Is it similar to Sungold? I covered my tomato condo with black plastic tonight. More from the wind than the cool nights we're getting. I tried 2 Early Girl plants early on and they went ugly on me really quickly. I hatcheted them to avoid my other plants getting the crud from them. Right now my Husky Cherry Reds, Black Pear, Better Bush and Yellow Pear are all vying for first ripened fruit. I am betting on Yellow Pear as they were the first to actually set fruit. Hope the chill doesn't hurt your beautiful plants, DC-stay warm.
treefrog_fl
15 years ago
Very nice looking plants DC! And ripe!
Tomatoes for Thanksgiving are always wonderful.
Looks like a good season coming for you.
Mine are still small and green.
whgille
15 years ago
Very neat and decorative garden.
And you get to eat the fruits of your labor!

Congratulations.
delta_charlie
Original Author
15 years ago
Hi Cindeea and the group,

"That Golden Gem looks like it's gonna be tasty. Is it similar to Sungold? I covered my tomato condo with black plastic tonight."

When ripe it looks a lot like the Sungold but is not anywhere near as sweet. It has a rich not sweet favor that is great on salads.

Regarding the cold, I think they made it through this morning chill ok. I had 40F with a little wind (thats good).

Thursday looks to be the real worry as the wind will die and the chance of frost goes way up. Think I will cover them after work today.

Got to run, DC
tomncath
15 years ago
Hey,

Too late for tonight but why not get a pedestal fan, run a cord out there and keep the breeze going when this happens...theoretically, it would work...seems they tried this in orange groves a few decades ago, but I don't recall seeing any of those large fans for quite a while
:-(

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