I have been growing and grafting fruit trees since I was in my early teens and workin after school and in the summers at Green Brothers Nurseries.Know many of the folks around the south such as Lee Calhoun and Jim Lawson who are experts in the field. Have met with the USDA Fruit and Nut tree folks down in Byron, traveled to Long Ashton in England to see the research center there, and regularly obtained scion wood from Cornell. Even this year grafted many a fine pears onto flowering pear seedlings that were plentiful around the yard. Used to be a NAFEX member. Would love to start some figs, but with my various health issues, cannot really justify a new ten year venture. Most of my work is now tending to my large mixed fruit orchard and developing the life in the soil of my garden as I slowly convert to raised beds. What started the tomato exploration was my interest in growing two each of the best 100 to see what will thrive, produce, and deliver plenty of quality tomatoes. After growing them, I will have good idea of what does best in GA. Towards this end, I have included Creole, Goose Creek and Tropic.Before beginning I took recommendations for seed from around the U.S. and the world back in January from the "experts" in the field. These I began in my Florida room and have been tending and repotting ever since. With my own theory of developing life in the soil, evene my seedlings were started with the best organic seed starting soil to which I added soil micro-organism to enhance root production and disease resistance early own. This assures that a very broad range of organisms go into the soil along with the plants. Meanwhile, I have been consistently adding large amounts of humus, home produced manure compost, and far more to the soil. Now, I would just love to have these 100 varieties get out into the region to educate and provide new taste experiences..as well as a broadly available base of Georgia seed stocks as most who visit are fascinated with saving their own. Each visit takes an hour or two as we just talk tomatoes to match their interests and uses. We should be developing a base of info as to who has what seed. I now have a rather huge collection, but will be growing far fewer next year. Thats why I only planted two of each variety...to add their new seed to my selection, though I will only grow 20 next year. My seed comes from growers across the U.S. and Canada, Russia, Mexico, Europe and the Slavic nations. With many later arrivals, I still have many flats yet to be potted of varieties that will be perfect for later planting as well as the original 100 varieties. Most HAVE to have Green Zebra, SunGold, and the Cherokee strains as those are what they seem to have seen and experienced the most, but there are over 5000 varieties and I was seeking those recomeended by the experts as the best in FLAVOR and had to stop somewhere. Few have any concept of how much work is involved inacquring the rare seeds, much less the starting of seed, mutilple transplants, and moving them in and out for proper hardening, display, daily watering and protection from sun and storms...and I still have at least five hundred new seedlings to pot. Expensive, quality potting soil with large cups to provide adequate root mass adds up quickly.

When I was a young boy my father and grandfather taught me how to compost and organically garden. I am 40 years old. I am an accredited organic land care professional.

Reporter87- Since you just registered and this appears to be your first post, how do we know that this is a legitimate request, and not some type of sales effort? If this is legit, convince us. If you can't, this will get referred to the web master. Sorry, but these forums attract many spammers and violators of the Terms of Service.

What are you paying?