Dan, I have a Territorial catalogue but haven't had a chance to look at it. By the way, regarding the heating thread I'd like to talk about phase change more. Did you catch my last post? On a related note, has anyone tried the Earth Box in a greenhouse? A little pricey, but good in theory, I think. Thanks, Mark

wow your tomatoes loook great!! Your so lucky to have a yard to work with. I have a front porch and move all the pots everyday. (well I used to before it got hot) Now I am waiting for it to cool down so I can try again. Good luck with your plants.

If you invest in a food mill for processing your tomatoes for sauce then you don't have to worry about cores or seeds or peels. The mill removes them all quickly and easily. Without one then just use the boiling water-ice water dip to peel them then slice off the top of the fruit. You'd still have to tolerate all the seeds (you can strain some of them out with a wire strainer) but at least you wouldn't have to put up with the plastic bits of peel. We don't care for the seeds left in at all. Makes the sauce bitter to our palates. And yes, any variety, if used unpeeled, ends up with the rolled up bits of chewy plastic peel in it. But if you process lots of tomatoes and make lots of sauce then a food mill makes a world of difference in the processing. Dave

Scott, I still have tomatoes producing heavily, and a few slow-pokes (planted late because of weather) that haven't produced a ripe one yet. And, there's no way I am going to list every single variety because I plant too many, but I'll give a brief synopsis of the ones that have produced well. Better Bush--earliest tomatoes...picked ripe ones in late April from plants set out in containers in mid-February. The flavor was very good considering these ripened in cool weather. The one in the ground in the garden produced one of the earliest ripe fruit in the garden too. Early Girl--early, lots of fruit, average flavor Jet Star--earlier than Early Girl, heavy bearers, better than average flavor Supersonic--very heavy yields of very large tomatoes, great flavor Prime Time--very heavy yields of large tomatoes, great flavor Ramapo--heavy yields of medium to large tomatoes, great flavor Moreton--heavy yields of medium to large tomatoes, very good flavor Momotaro--heavy yields of large pink tomatoes, excellent flavor Livingston Gold Ball--Heavy yields of golf-ball sized golden-yellow fruit with great taste. I like these so much they seldom make it indoors because I eat them while working in the garden. Indian Stripe--moderate yields (not as good this year as last year) of tomatoes similar to Cherokee Purple in flavor (excellent flavor) and appearance Chocolate Stripes--moderately heavy yield of red and green stiped tomatoes with average flavor Brandywine--low yields--so far 2 tomatoes from one plant and 5 from the other, but the flavor is great, and they are blooming now so hoping for more fruit set during the cool spell (which hasn't arrive here yet--it was 84 degrees here at 7:30 a.m. and felt like 89) Nebraska Wedding--Moderate yields of orange beefsteaks with outstanding texture and flavor Royal Hillbilly-moderate yield of fruit with amazing flavor--did not produce huge numbers like last year Tess' Land Race Currant--One of these is all you need. The plant currently is 8' tall and about 4' wide and I've had trouble keeping it upright. It currently is staked with 3 8' tall metal fence posts and 3 shorter wooden stakes. This produces tiny, red, round, tasty 1/2" wide tomatoes in great profusion....I'd say I've easily picked a thousand of these so far and it will produce until frost is heavy. A lot of flavor in a tiny tomato. We use these in salads and also I dehydrate tons of them. Sweet Million--heavy producer of red cherries with very good flavor Rose Quart--heavy producer of pink oval cherry types (not really as oval as most grape tomatoes) with very good flavor SunGold--as always, a heavy producer of golden-orange cherries with great flavor. Less cracking than most years. Black Cherry--superb as always and ties with SunGold in terms of great flavor and great productivity Ildi--a very prolific yellow grape tomato with amazing flavor. I've tried other yellow grapes and none of them can touch it in flavor. Some of the others are late to ripen.... Red Defender and Scarlet Red both have very heavy loads of large tomatoes. I am just about to start picking them. I think I picked a couple of Scarlet Red last week, but sent them to work at the fire station with DS, so can't comment on the flavor yet. These plants (and Moreton) have just about more fruit than foliage, and their foliage is heavy. I've never had plants in 7 to 10 gallon containers produce as many tomatoes per plant as these are producing. I can't wait to see how they do in the ground next year. Arkansas Traveler is producing medium-sized pink tomatoes with great flavor as always. Box Car Willie is just now ripening fruit. San Marzano Redorta is slow to ripen this year. Viva Italia has been a heavier producer and earlier and with fine flavor Black Plum was wonderful but both plants---one in a container and one in the ground--died of bacterial wilt. Mountain Princess produced heavy loads of pink, tasty fruit early on but was the first to die....of bacterial wilt. It was in a container too, and in fresh soil. (sigh) Some plants that won't be back: Dr. Carolyn (ivory cherry), Snow White (ivory to yellow large cherry) and Yellow Pear (kids love them). All three struggled with disease and died about the time they're producing heavily. That's all I can think of off the top of my head. I didn't grow a lot of my real favorites this year because I was worried about drought and wanted some heavy-producing hybrids. Next year (Jay, do you think I'll stick to this plan?) I am determined to grow only the best-of-the-best of the plants I've tried, and maybe allow myself to try 5 or 10 new varieties. I think I'll do a 50-50 split between heirlooms (better flavor, but usually lower productivity in our climate) and hybrids (flavor can be iffy, but heavy production). Dawn