Some of us like to learn how to do things in more efficient, controllable, repeatable ways. It wasn't some kind of ordeal for me to learn how to do things properly--it was great fun. If you're the kind of person who gets joy out of growing mystery unstablized tomatoes from your compost scraps and don't mind taking the risks that come with not fermenting seed, then all power to you--whatever gives you joy. But don't make it out as though experienced people on here who try to teach others best practices and point out realities such as the fact that you might get a dud from the offspring of a hybrid commercial tomato or that some varieties don't do well in some places or that tomatoes need time and care to produce *optimally* are sucking the joy out of anything for anyone. They're just trying to give people a way to maximize their harvests, avoid diseases, and avoid unwanted genetic surprises in their tomatoes. People are free to learn from their advice or not--nobody is sending in stormtroopers to arrest them for using compost to start plants. I don't always follow everyone's advice here, but I do appreciate that they take the time to give it.

First, a caveat: This season was really a difficult one weather-wise. Cool and wet right up through mid-June, then hitting 100F by early July. Every plant across the board was dropping blossoms in July, though the non-cherry types were noticeably harder hit. Also had a lot more BER on the big tomatoes than I've ever had, probably because I couldn't keep enough water in the soil during the worst of the heat. So not a great season for comparing cultivars. That said... Red Siberian is a ZAP for good. This was the third year in a row for it and it has never been anything other than puny, weak, and barely producing, let alone as an early. Maybe there's a sweet spot climate-wise for it, but it isn't here. From the Tomato Cherry Rainbow Blend seed pack by Botanical Interests: Super Snow White is a grow again. This is the second year of growing, and either as container or in-ground, this one grows huge, produces quickly and heavily a lot of sweet cherry-sized fruit, and stayed healthy way longer than any other cherry. Brown Cherry has large fruit for a cherry, with decent production if not as early as a smaller cherry. But the taste is worth the wait. Green Grape was a bit of an uncertainty early on - as seedlings the plants always looked like they were drooping and nearly wilting. Even after plantout the plant tended to droop. But it produced amazing green/yellow fruit that is sweet and acidy and looks good in a salad. Worked better as a container than in-ground; the fruit seemed to sit for weeks until it started turning from green to yellow-green, but once it started it was consistent harvesting. Sweetie Red I will not grow again as it wasn't all that early and the fruit was so small that it almost wasn't worth picking. Bicolor Cherry literally just sat there for two months, didn't even flower until I was picking the first Black Krims, and it was August before I could harvest any of the few fruit it produced. Flavor was bland, and there was a lot of scarring on the skins. ZAP. Black Krim & Cherokee Purple: The BK plants flowered and produced earlier, but had a short flush and then nothing for two months. The CP plant took forever to flower, but produced larger fruit for a much longer time. I'll probably only grow CP next year as the plant got very large and needed more room than I planned for. Principe Borghese was a first-time grow for me. I will grow it again because it was one of the best producers this year. Worked best in a container, but make sure you have a good support system for it because this one was definitely not determinate like some companies advertise. A good producer of clusters of ping-pong ball size fruit that have that traditional tomato flavor, texture suitable for either fresh use or sauce or drying. This was another plant that has very thin, droopy foliage and makes you want to water it more than you should. Later than a cherry, but earlier than the bigger toms. Be careful handling the seedlings as the plants are more prone to breaking and splitting than other cultivars. Costoluto di Parma: This was another first for me. Very pretty pleated fruit, was actually the first container plant to set fruit, but the in-ground plants did better at producing . The seedlings had really large leaves and grew prodigiously faster than any other variety, but the plants were the worst in terms of blossom drop, though they are still producing this late in the season. Production only average, but I'll give it another shot next year because the taste is really good for fresh slicing and with a more normal season I can see getting more fruit. So there you have more of a review than a list.

Consider doing some serious research. Asking people for opinions only gets you opinions which are almost 100% passed back and forth so many times people actually start to think they're facts. You're doing pretty good. You already understand no nitrite means no bacteria. You used the term "total ammonia" too which is good. You're already smarter than the average bear. Let's bump it up one more notch. Lets start with the easy stuff. You don't mention the temperature of the water but I have to assume it's pretty cold. Nitrifying bacteria slow down as the temp drops. At 39F they stop. At 46-50F they only work at 25%. So trying to get a bio filter going is a bit silly in most climates in winter. Moving the fish back to the pond has the same issue, no working bio filter. Moving them back to the pond must work cause that must be a safe place cause millions of ponds overwinter fish without loss. Must because of bio filter...right? Nope. A little harder now is the term "ammonia". When pond people talk about ammonia they almost always think of it a chemical. That's a problem. Ammonia in the pond is 2 chemicals, NH3 and NH4+. They're kind of the same, the difference is just ions. But ions are the thing doing the harm to fish so kind of important to us. What's an ion? Forget about it...not important to us. We only care about how to keep fish safe. There are lots of terms for NH3 such as "free ammonia", "Ammonium hydroxide" and probably what most people just call "ammonia". Let's make it simple and call it "deadly ammonia". This is really what scares us. Lots of terms for NH4+ too "ionized ammonia", "ammonium". Lets call this "safer ammonia" because for fish that's what it is, safe. Most tests are for "Total Ammonia" which of course is the total amount of deadly and safer ammonia. So a total ammonia test by themselves tells you almost nothing when ammonia is detected. There are test kits for telling the difference between deadly and safer ammonia but most people use total ammonia tests. This causes lots of fish deaths as people do all kinds of crazy stuff to lower ammonia...which may have been safe to begin with about now fish are stressed by the "fixes". The weird thing is deadly and safer ammonia go together. You always have both. And they change from one to the other in the blink of the eye as temperature and pH changes. As temp drops "deadly ammonia" converts to "safer ammonia". As pH drops same thing "deadly ammonia" converts to "safer ammonia". As temp and pH go up safer turns into deadly. You've been raising pH, or trying to keep it up, and have been cheered into doing so, to get a bio filter going which probably can't start due to low temps. Keeping the pH up is also busy converting safer ammonia to deadly ammonia. For example there will be about 90 times less deadly ammonia when pH is lower from 8.5 to 6.5 at 68F. By letting water temp fall and letting pH go down the fish can be safe even when total ammonia tests are crazy high. My suggestion is to find a ammonia - ammonium chart on the web you like and use that along with your pH test and water temp to determine first if you have a problem. It's likely you don't have a problem...but are doing things that could cause problems. If you have a problem then water change is the best option imo. Adding an ammonia binder means test results will be meaningless and you'll be flying blind. If needed water changes are often you could consider a 24/7 drip water change. Even with treated city water these can work. I also suggest letting water temp fall to around 40F. Converts most deadly ammonia into safer ammonia and almost stops Aeromonas bacteria from growing. I would not let water stay below say 37-39F for days. Lots of people with froze over ponds think the water temp is near 32F but that's another myth. Fish under ice in a backyard pond are likely enjoying a 39F temp. With an above ground tank the water temp can drop below 39F, even below 32F so you have to keep the temp up a little. Low temp also lowers fish metabolism which reduces ammonia production. Natural selection kind of worked this all out for us...as long as we don't "fix" it. I suggest letting pH fall to wherever it wants to be. You could force pH lower if you really wanted to, knew what you were doing, AND actually had a deadly ammonia issue AND water changes were a problem for some reason. Be really careful of people saying pH should be this or that range. They almost never know what they're talking about and are just repeating what they heard from other repeaters. In reality it's almost impossible for normal water sources to have deadly pH levels. Trying to push pH into some made up range with little understanding is more dangerous. Some other small points...size of the tank doesn't really matter. Sure, bigger the tank the slower ammonia becomes of problem...but it's likely to still be a problem. All the rules of thumb on ratio of water to number/size of fish is a bit silly. Just made up number out of thin air. Fish are kept safe with testing and understanding. Most city water now days don't use chlorine but instead uses chloramine. They sound the same so most people think they're the same and give the same advice they did 20 years ago for chlorine. Chloramine is made by adding ammonia. When we add chemicals to remove "chlorine" that ammonia is released which is why those pond products add an ammonia binder. And why total ammonia tests become useless even with temp & pH charts. Adding binders means you have no idea what's going on ammonia wise in the water unless you have specific tests for the binder.

I have moved 12" and 24" tall Sabals with a fair degree of success. It was explained to me that all sabals will kill off damaged roots all the way to the base of the plant and this is why so many transplants fail. If the plant isn't big enough to hold enough water on its own, it will dry out and die. So to get a transplant to take, you need to keep the soil around the 'bulb' moist, but not wet. The bulb can take a few days of dry weather, but it is better to water at least every other day until you see growth, but only water the soil. Naturally, there isn't much you can do about rain, but the drier you can keep the above-ground bit, the more likely it won't rot before it has had a chance to establish new roots.