I am just north of Toronto, have only grown these in 3 seasons, were pretty much my worst producer in 2005 and 2007 (and 2007 summer had perfect tomato weather), skipped them in 2006 altogether because of poor performance. Plants were smallish (I think someone later referred to CP's as 'semi determinite', but I don't know if that is accurate). Tried them again in 2008, which was a horrible season overall, but CP's did amazingly well. Plants were still rather short, but one 4-foot plant ended up putting out about 20 big beautiful beefsteaks that tasted incredible (that was more than I got in total from all 5 plants I put in for 2005 and 2006), the other 2 I put in this year also had a similar yield though fruits were not as perfect and many did not mature by the end of the season (hail reduced one plant to a stalk, but suckers soon had the plant growing nicely...it only got about 2 feet tall and only harvested about 5 fruits from it, but had about 25 on there of various sizes when the season ended). So who knows, from what I have read I think production is all over the place with CP, does really well for some people and does not work at all for others. Probably complete coincidence but a few others also seemed to have very good luck with CP in 2008 despite the weather, quite odd. I brought it back in 2007 because of people's comments regarding taste, it was in the top 3 in 2007 out of 22 or so varieties (tied for #1 with Brandywine Sudduth and Green Giant) and #1 out of 20 or so varieties in 2008. Regardless of production issues that I have, I will certainly continue to grow it.

Upstate NY here. I grew CP in 2021, and loved it. Produced well, but that was a good year for all of my tomatoes. Not so in 2022. Summer 2022 was superhot and dry here, mid-90's may days in a row with no rain (a town of Kingston, NY, 2 hr away from us declared a state of emergency, prohibiting lawn watering, and only allowing outdoors flower watering after 9pm when nobody would bother watering anyway, very scary stuff). Both BK and CP produced well in hot summer of 2022, upstate NY (well, with me heavy mulching, and daily watering). CP produced larger tomatoes. BK seemed to last longer than CP, almost up to the first frost. Taste was almost identical. Doing blind test, I couldn't tell the difference. CP did slightly better, but I overplanted BK, planting them too close to each other, so no final verdict yet. This year, 2023, I will try again. Problem is I have a small backyard garden and there are so many interesting tomato varieties to explore... (trying tomatoes from the Dwarf Tomato Project this year).

I've still yet to get the Cherokee Purple that others have managed to get. Last year, I got a few fairly bland tasting tomatoes from the two I planted. This year I tried Cherokee Chocolate and it was killed by grey mold before it even ripened one tomato - Other plants are pumping out great tasting tomatoes and are over 6 ft. tall. I'll try growing them again next year, but I'm beginning to feel that for whatever reason, black / purple tomatoes just don't flavor up or grow well in my area. I have consistently good success rates with the large pink beefsteaks (sudduths, marianna's peace, etc.), red plum-types, red and pink hearts, and last year I did well with yellow and green-when-ripes, but for whatever reason the black / purples just tend to stagnate. So far I've grown, black cherry (near flavorless), Black from Tula (on the bland side - wasn't impressed), Cherokee Purple (better than Black Cherry and BFT, but still very mild), Indian Stripe (same as CP), and this year Cherokee Chocolate (died before fruiting). The only thing I can guess is that they like it on the dry side - most of our springs and summers are wet and or very humid for the past few years.

"So my CP went semi determinate on me." Liz, I'm not sure what you mean by "semi-determinate." Does that mean it grew like an indeterminate for a while, but ended up with blossom sets at the terminus end of the main stem and lateral shoots? Or does that mean it's an indeterminate but with a short stature like 5 feet tall or something? I've had Cherokee Purple do some weird stuff with regard to growth habit, too. What did yours do exactly? I mean to qualify as a "semi-determinate." "I got 2 tomatoes and none grew until those started to ripen." Sounds like you had some problems with blossom set. Like not continuous blossom set, rather you got 2 fruit sets and then no further blossom sets until those first 2 started to ripen. Sounds like a weather related issue (a streak of hot weather) or a lack of sufficient fertilizer. You should always fertilize your tomatoes with some balanced formula plant food (10-10-10 or 9-12-12, whatever) just after first fruit set, in my opinion. "Now I have around 15 on the vine - many babies. Wondering how it does in cooler weather and if I have a shot to get these tomatoes to maturity by the frost which is usually around November ..." No tomato variety can survive a killing frost, therefore no tomato variety is "hardy" in Zone 6. Whether small green tomatoes will grow to maturity and then color up on the vine is dependent on length of daylight hours and amount of the foliage's exposure to undiffused sunlight ... as in nice, clear days without cloud cover. Since daylight hours diminish steadily in the fall, particularly after September 22, and since September and October can be wet, cloudy months in the Midwest, what can I say? Where are you located, by the way? Where I live, we should have a killing frost say by November 10 or so. If the weather is normal for our fall, most all the tomatoes currently on my vines, whether little marbles or full size greenies, should ripen at least to breaker stage. To hasten development and ripening of what you have set on the vines, top your vines now at a point where the last little green tomatoes are hanging. Top off the remaining flowers and shoots without flowers or little tomatoes. Next year plant Indian Stripe instead of Cherokee Purple because Indian Stripe will set and ripen tomatoes earlier and more continuously through foul weather than Cherokee Purple. That's been my experience since 2006 through drought and flood, cool weather and hot. Year after year, Indian Stripe outperforms Cherokee Purple and yields the same quality in terms of color, flavor and fruit quality.