That I will do. What a spectacular tomato year it was/is here, despite drought. That is, if a person irrigated their vegetable garden. Dry conditions meant very little blight and disease. Even those who watered with sprinklers reported very little disease. For those who didn't water, they lost out. I've never had a year where tomato plants are just as green as can be after harvest. I believe these plants would have kept om producing had we not had day after day of 100(+) degrees. 70 - 100 pounds each day for 3 weeks streight off only 22 plants, I'm not complaining one bit! However, I must resist the urge to sneak into people's gardens at night where I see red tomatoes just going to waste. :-)

I've heard good things about Sungold. I have one called Coyote that has very small yellow tomatoes on it. They're good but if I eat the other tomatoes first and then those, they almost taste rotten. I think they're just sweeter. One of my cherry tomato plants has tomatoes bigger than a golf ball but they're not ripe yet so I can't tell what color they're going to be. I think I may have gotten some crosses since they were just seeds-for-postage from the winter sowing forum. One plant that I thought was Isis Candy has yellowish gold tomatoes on it and they were supposed to be red I think. Glenda - Are your Black Cherries green around the seeds inside?

It came as a bonus pack in a national round robin trade several years before I grew it, and it was only labeled "Baby Beefsteak". At the time there was no info available; I grew it out and lo and behold, it looked just like a baby beefsteak. Whomever labeled that pack of seeds once upon a time called it as they saw it. Very practical. It's a wonderful tomato, I've described it well on the package, it looks just like a baby beefsteak but is more juicy and tangy. I liked them so much I've grown them a few times and have shared their seeds with the name they came with. I'm very serious about tomato variety names. I don't change the docmentation that comes with a home-saved OP; I think that's hugely unethical. This year I'm doing another growout of a variety that came to me a few years back only labeled "Purple Heirloom". This is a yum YUM tomato. I'm also doing one again that I named "Big Pink Volunteer" which volunteered from a bag of compost I bought at HD. It makes awesomely good big pink maters, hence the name. The history will be on the label. Should the season go well I'll have seeds of Purple Heirloom, Big Pink Volunteer, the ten USDA/GRIN tomatoes I'm growing and several others available on the site by late Autumn. It's a fabulous set of tomatoes in the garden this year. I'm definitely going to have to buy at least one more set of pidgeon holes ;-) Hope this helps, T

In Montana, most of my tomatoes (started by me) become fully ripened in August. However, tomatoes I started this year on 3-25 (and transplanted to 1-gallon pots at some point) ripened in July (early July through the first 3/4 of the month). NOTE: Those started on 3-25 (and transplanted into 5-GALLON pots) ripened earlier--in late June. Transplanting for both sets was the first week of June. (BTW, I have never seen any stress caused by transplanting, no matter the size of my plant/pot. My tomato plants really take off after they go in the ground.) Those started later, on 4-10, have NOT RIPENED as of August 1. ALL of my tomato plants are loaded with tomatoes, ripe or not. This data doesn't give us the same info as comparing the planting of 6" plants vs. 12" ones would, but it shows that starting early CAN produce earlier tomatoes, especially, IMO, if bigger pots are used, as needed. I did, btw, plant some tomatoes in 4" pots (that were very tall and should have been transplanted into 1-gallon pots) at the same time that I planted the ones in 1-gallon pots in the ground. Those made a good effort in catching up, in size at least, but they were just flowering when others had lots of fruit on the vines. Were any of my plants root bound, particularly the ones in 4" pots? Not that I recall. In fact, I need to learn how to produce more root and less growing top because my tomatoes get too tall before transplanting outside (I have them on a southern-facing, plastic-covered back porch WITH a roof, so they don't get full sun, by any means, which is the main reason they get so tall). I like starting plants earlier than recommended, especially since I moved to this colder climate. I believe, if the roots are given plenty of room, this method can produce healthy plants that produce earlier, just like with flowers that you want to bloom earlier. But beware--it's a lot of work to bring all those plants in big pots inside every time the temp looks like it's going to dip below 45 degrees F at night!