I would love to hear the answer as well. My tomatoes that were stolen by Squirrels ended up with tonnes of blosso, drop. I got pissed off and cut the plants down to 25% height, got rid of the foilage, did dolomite line and bone meal treatment as preemptive to BER, my plants due to unusual warm winter not only thrived but is producing fruits. four of my heirlooms (italian, 1884, Beefsteak, and Brandywine) have tomatoes now and is flowering in anticipation of spring. I have not decied to pull them out yet as I wanted the plant to die so plant beomes part of organic matter.

I do plan to plant a lot of new varities of heirloom this season so I will have to pull the plug one day or antoher, but if old plants thrive well and fruit well, I may skip them and take care of them instead.

In 2010, I kept a Cherokee Purple alive over winter for the first time ever. It didn't look super robust but it didn't look sickly either, and since it was in an unused spot I decided to let it be.
Well, to my surprise, it "woke up" by spring of 2011 and I got quite a few delicious tomatoes from the plant. Still looked kinda spindly, but I was happy. This year I am keeping 4 plants alive, but 3 are cherries and they usually survive anyways. I'm getting enough for salads, and I might keep one till summer. But since cherries pump out so much fruit I might just replant new ones just so I can be sure of getting the usual overload. I would've kept my other toms alive but most succumbed to disease or just plain died.

I'd say try it if you don't need the spot for anything else.

"I'd say try it if you don't need the spot for anything else."

Well put, peebee1. I missed my usual fall planting due to traveling so the spots are available for spring. But I may need these space this summer.... If they won't perform as well as new stocks, then I may replant.

The only thing is... those hairloom like the ones behlgardem mentioned takes so long to fruit. I'm almost tempted to keep them and see if the overwintered toms will fruit sooner than new plants. Wonder if anyone has done that?

i'm here in the phoenix area and due to great winter i have a yellow cherry and a red grape that are pumping out about 5 pounds or fresh sweet tomatoes per week. we have about 3 more weeks of cool weather then it's planting season so i'm gonna start fertalizing then and see what happens i've allready got several more starts ready to go so the more the merrier i always say

Several years back I overwintered some supersteaks indoors by taking cuttings in the fall. They produced well but the battle with white-flies and fungus gnats throughout the winter made it very unworthy of the effort. Keep in mind that tomatoes are perennials grown as annuals at latitudes any great distance from the equator. If conditions permit they can produce three years or more.
Good luck,
~Ken~

If they're anything like peppers, expect larger harvests of higher quality fruit the second year around.

Makes sense when you think about it. First year the bulk of the plant's energy is going into growing roots and stems and leaves. The fruit is basically an afterthought. Second year around the plant is mature and established and can put 100% of it's resources into it's fruit.

So yeah, you should have more, bigger, and better tomatoes this year than you did last.

I should move to phoenix. Unlike hellbound, my toms, though all alive, are not really producing much fruits nowadays given our night time temperatures sometimes drop below zero. Thus the delima.

Wow three years, Ken! And more harvest, Edymnion! Come to think of it, I did have some peppers from over 5 years ago and they're producing just fine every year. I am even more encouraged to save a few plants this year. I've never had so many toms looking so well in January. If I want to try, this year is better than any to keep the tomato plants for two years. Let me see which ones I'll pick and hopefully I will be around this summer to babysit them and update everyone.