It's getting a bit warmer... day by day, I can see little signs of spring... yesterday, Larry saw goldfinches flitting around the yard! Last night we had thunderstorms, and lightening and rain always makes things grow faster! Within the next few weeks, it should be warm enough to ship plant materials through the mail. Finally! I'd say by the latter part of April... but please let me know when you ship so I can keep watch for it! I can't wait to see what goodies you send! I just adore your "care packages", and can't thank you enough for sharing!! :-) Now, what can I send you that will make you smile?!

Jay, It is a truly amazing list and I hope the weather gives you a break and allows for some good fruit set. All my spring tomatoes have been in the ground for some time---some planted in April and some planted in May, and of course, the few I plant in containers in February for earliest tomatoes. Those extra-earlies were yanked out of the containers in late May and replaced with varieties I like better and needed to plant someplace since the ground was still so wet in the spot where they otherwise could have been planted. The earlies weren't anything special--I think they were Better Bush, Bush Goliath, Early Girl and Grape---and they did their job--giving us ripe tomatoes in April and May while we waited for the in-ground plantings to start producing. These are the spring plants I ended up with. The plants listed survived late freezes, 18" or 19" of rainfall in 5 weeks, high winds in the 30s-40s and gusting into the 50s, etc. After the kind of spring weather we had, I just feel lucky to have tomato plants that did survive. This year, I have cut back drastically on both the number of plants and number of varieties, having struggled with drought so desperately last year. I choose to take 4 rows out of tomato/pepper production and plant them with broccoli and potatoes because I felt like whatever rain might fall would fall during prime time for cool-season veggies. So far, that has seemed like a good decision. Although we'll have a lot fewer tomatoes/peppers overall, we'll have tons of broccoli (in the middle of the harvest right now) and lots of potatoes too. After years of trying dozens of new (to me) heirlooms every year, I've actually reversed and have been trying many more new (to me) hybrids the last 3 years. And I have been trying to "pare down" the heirloom list to only the best performers, planting more of the proven varieties that produce good yields for us and less of the heirlooms that may or may not. I'll never stop trying different heirloom varieties, but I am trying to go more and more with great producers (both heirloom and hybrid) and less with the testing of new varieties. So, here's my pared-back, scaled-down list of tomatoes that have been planted and which have survived so far in 2009: IN CONTAINERS: 1. Red Defender 2. Scarlet Red 3. Scarlet Red 4. Livingston's Gold Ball 5. Mountain Princess 6. Momotaro 7. Chocolate Stripes 8. Indian Stripes 9. Red Defencer 10. Red Defender 11. Tropic 12. Moreton 13. Homestead 24 14. Sophie's Choice 15. Tropic 16. Moreton 17. Viva Italia 18. Sioux 19. New Big Dwarf 20. Box Car Willie 21. Glacier 22. San Marzano Redorta 23. New Big Dwarf 24. Black Plum 25. Viva Italia 26. Black Krim 27. Aunt Ruby's German Green IN THE GARDEN: 28. Tess's Land Race Currant 29. Sweet Million 30. Snow White 31. Grape 32. Gold Ball 33. Black Cherry 34. Dr. Carolyn 35. Rose Quartz 36. Ildi 37. Better Bush 38. Yellow Cherry 39. Yellow Pear 40. Snow White 41. Ildi 42. Snow White 43. Rose Quartz 44. Black Cherry 45. Black Cherry 46. Jet Star 47. Ramapo 48. Indian Stripe 49. Indian Stripe 50. Brandy Boy 51. Brandy Boy 52. Black Cherry 53. Primetime 54. Royal Hillbilly 55. Nebraska Wedding 56. New Big Dwarf 57. Primetime 58. Moreton 59. Moreton 60. Supersonic 61. Supersonic 62. Jet Star 63. Ramapo 64. Arkansas Traveler 65. Arkansas Travelet 66. Box Car Willie 67. Black Cherry 68. Porterhouse 69. Orange Flesh Purple Smudge 70. Sioux 71. Brandywine 72. Brandywine 73. Sophie's Choice 74. Early Girl 75. Early Girl The following Dwarf plants were planted as a "border" down one side of a raised bed that had a double-row of Packman broccoli plants: 76. Red Robin 77. Red Robin 78. Red Robin 79. Orange Pixie 80. Orange Pixie 81. Orange Pixie 82. Yellow Canary 83. Yellow Canary There were about a dozen other varieties that did not survive the late freezes, flooding rains, and high winds that occurred after they were in the ground. Among them was True Black Brandywine, which was one of my healthiest plants and earliest producers last year. Last week I started seeds for the fall tomatoes. Although I don't yet know how many of each variety will end up being planted in the ground or in a container, here's the varieties I started: LIVINGSTON'S TOMATO VARIETIES: 1. Dwarf Stone 2. Favorite 3. Gold Ball 4. Golden Queen 5. Globe 6. Honor Bright (Lutescent) 7. Ideal 8. Magnus 9. Main Crop Pink 10. Paragon 11. Stone LONG-KEEPING TYPES: 12. Long Season Peach 13. Longkeeper 14. Keepsake 15. Sunray (technically not considered a longkeeper, but seems to be one) PASTE TYPES: 16. Rio Grande 17. San Marzano Redorta 18. Opalka HEAT SETTING TYPES: 19. Solar Set R 20. Solar Fire CHERRIES: 21. Cuban Yellow Grape 22. Sun Cherry 23. Sun Gold 24. Golden Sweet 25. Fargo OTHERS: 26. Dixie Golden Giant 27. True Black Brandywine 28. Bloody Butcher 29. Mountain Glory VFFF/TSWV 30. Mountain Fresh Plus For peppers, I'm only growing a few of the varieties that are the heaviest producers for us. I dropped about 20 varieties this year that I usually grow, but here's what we do have: 1. Tepin 2. Tepin 3. Tepin 4. Tepin 5. Jaloro Yellow Jalapeno 6. Mucho Nacho Jalapeno 7. Mucho Nacho Jalapeno 8. Mucho Nacho Jalapeno 9. Grande' Jalapeno 10. Ixtapa Jalapeno 11. Ixtapa Jalapeno 12. Ixtapa Jalapeno 13. Ixtapa Jalapeno 14. Habanero 15. Habanero 16. Habanero 17. Habanero 18. Red Beauty Sweet Bell 19. Red Beauty Sweet Bell 20. Red Beauty Sweet Bell 21. Red Beauty Sweet Bell 22. Purple Beauty Sweet Bell 23. Chocolate Beauty Sweet Bell 24. Chocolate Beauty Sweet Bell 25. Chocolate Beauty Sweet Bell 26. Chocolate Beauty Sweet Bell 27. Chocolate Beauty Sweet Bell 28. Chocolate Beauty Sweet Bell 29. Roumanian Rainbow Sweet Bell 30. Roumanian Rainbow Sweet Bell 31. Roumanian Rainbow Sweet Bell 32. Roumanian Rainbow Sweet Bell 33. Mini Belle Mix 34. Mini Belle Mix 35. Mini Belle Mix 36. Orange Sun Sweet Bell 37. Orange Sun Sweet Bell The only peppers I've planted for fall are ornamental ones, since the spring peppers will produce in the summer and in the fall. The ornamental ones I planted were Purple Flash and Royal Black, I think. All my plants get exactly the same thing at planting time....Espoma Tomato-Tone and a little bone meal. They do get periodic feedings of liquid seaweed or fish emulsion, and the ones in containers get fed a lot more often than the ones in the ground. In this year's garden, the earliest tomatoes to produce ripe fruit (not counting the extra-earlies in containers) have been Jet Star and Better Bush, Yellow Cherry and Black Cherry. The best-looking plants with healthy foliage and lots of blossoms/fruit, though, are the Harris Hybrids---Supersonic, Primetime and Moreton and the Rutgers/NJAES variety Ramapo. Close runners-up for great growth and fruit set include Indian Stripe, Royal Hillbilly, Mountain Princess and Brandy Boy. Although beaten almost to death by the wind as they were hardening off and/or newly planted, Scarlet Red and Red Defender have rebounded and look great. Most of my plants have set fruit now, so it is just the wait for more ripe ones. Everything went in later than usual this year, so the big harvest has not yet begun. Normally by now I am running the dehydrator daily with a few hundred cherry, grape, currant and small pear-shaped types being dried for winter. I was just thinking yesterday how odd it is that I'm not running the dehydrator yet. Still, I planted tons of bite-sized tomato varieties so I'm sure I'll eventually be dehydrating fruit daily. At the present time, none of the cherry tomatoes have made it into the house yet, because I pick them and eat them while working in the garden. Dawn

Thanks Donna I didn't think of sweet Lilian. So far I haven't been successful crossing her in either direction. But.. I haven't tried her with Bogota. I have frozen pollen from last season I could try and see what happens. Last time I did a Bogota X self .....just because it's one of my favorites and I wanted a back up just in case something happen to it. I also did X red pearl and X no ID red and white, which might be stargazer or mambo, one of those Minerva looking types. So that gives me a lot of reds. This time I want to try different colors. What do you think about crossing with a yellow? Louana

I think she is quite pretty and who knows, maybe next year she'll develop some stripes :-)))