Good Morning, GGG, Yes, I have run across a post where you instructed someone on how to prune tomatoes with scissors and alcohol both in hand. I decided I was going to do that this coming summer once the plants slow down and look like they need diseased parts removed. I already have the organic neem you recommended too. I will also be sure to add worm tea and then mulch really well. I didn't do any of this stuff last year in addition to growing Brandywines (they didn't do so well at all here and many people warned me to try something else-my fault), so we didn't have a lot of tomatoes last year. Thank you for the info. I will be sure to employ it... I don't suppose I have a tomato category or preference in terms of taste-not yet at least. I just want something very natural and heirloom, preferably created by nature not people that is disease resistant while producing a lot of food. In reference to 'not created by people', I know that even many of the heirlooms are human creations. Tom Wagner developed Green Zebra if I understand its history correctly. A lot of the other heirlooms seem to be this way too (Mule Team, Radiator Charlie's, etc). Hence I don't know if I should even be picky about that... Oh, and thank you for the info on Yellow Pear. I'm going to try to grow at least 2 plants. I like the way they look, and I tasted some at the Morningside Market one time. I thought they were pretty good-certainly nothing wrong with them. I'm now thinking about black cherry too, since you made the 'rely on the cherries' comment. Everyone seems to say they provide a lot of food. Maybe I'll see if I can get my hands on some Black Cherry seeds or something like that. And feel free to recommend a cherry if you have time. I don't know a lot about the cherry tomatoes... Thanks So Much, GGG, Stella p.s. If you need/want any of the special, not so easy to get at the store seeds that I have from Southern Exposure (Japanese Black Trifele Tomato, Corno di Toro Pepper, White Wonder Cucumber, Seminole pumpkin), let me know. I live in Decatur and can bring them to you. If not, that's okay too;-)

Ilene, I've been wondering where you'd been! I agree with you. I do think there is a big climate difference between extreme southern Oklahoma and northern Oklahoma, especially northeastern Oklahoma. For starters, we are are the 'sunny side of the Arbuckles', though you can't tell much difference this year! I think we get a little hotter, perhaps, in late July and early August of some years. Our first year here we had a string of 110 to 115 degree days in early August that lasted about a week, and I was ready to pack up and move back to Texas, where it 'only' gets to about 105, maybe 106 on very hot days. Most of the time y'all have higher humidity and higher rainfall. Y'all also have generally better soils and colder winters. We have earlier springs most years, and we have occasional days in January through March where the temps spike up into the 80s and even the 90s, which will make us think it is spring even though it is not. I don't know if your winter temps are as erratic as ours, or if they are more consistently winter-like? I think our frost-free growing season is a few days longer than yours, but not much. We do get away with pushing the envelope as far as planting early, because our late cold spells tend to be briefer and not as cold as your late cold spells. If you are familiar with the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex and its weather, ours is very, very similar to theirs--only slightly hotter in the summer and slightly colder in the winter. As far as whether you are a Yankee or not? I don't think so! I have to admit though, that when I was growing up in Texas, it was generally accepted that everyone who was NOT from Texas was, in fact, a damn Yankee! Now just find a single person in Texas who was even born in Texas! The Yankees have all moved south and become Texanized. Ilene, I was pinching back the lemon and lime basil earlier today because they are trying to flower and I am trying to stop them. I could pinch back basil all day--it smells so good. I have a big pot of tomatoes on the stove boiling down so I can make spaghetti sauce for dinner. In a few minutes I am going to run out to the garden and pick some Italian large leaf basil and some parsley to use. Yum. I am just like you--tired of the rain but afraid to say so out loud for fear I will jinx us and the rain will totally stop. It has happened to us before--we have gone from a VERY wet spring to a July and August where virtually no rain fell, and it is amazing how quickly the moisture in the ground dissipates! I hope they are careful with their water releases so your area doesn't have to deal with more flooding. Your little old lady friends sound so precious and sweet--I always liked the Baldwin sisters. When I was growing up we had a lot of older ladies like them and they got me addicted to gardening. I remember them working out in their yards and gardens wearing cotton housedresses in lovely floral prints, and very sensible shoes, and big straw hats, and very proper gardening gloves of course. I may be more comfortable in my jeans, T-shirts, baseball cap and hiking boots as I work in the garden.....but I don't look like a 'southern lady gardener' the way they used to! We've been fighting the grass too as it attempts to take over the world, especially in the beds where all the 'prety' stuff grows. It seems like all we do is mow and weedeat lately, in between rain showers, of course. I hate to say it, cause I'll jinx us, but not a drop of rain has fallen at our place today. There--I went ahead and said it--now it will probably start pouring down rain at any moment. :) I need to go gather some herbs. Talk to you all laer. Dawn

Those poor mules and the teamsters driving them had to go 165 miles over some of the most inhospitable country in California to get the borate from Harmony Mines to the Mojave railroad station.

The 2015 season was a different one for me this year. This is the 6th year I've grown tomatoes in my little backyard here in Tulsa. The first 4 years, I only grew in containers. For the 2014 season, I built two 4' X 10' raised beds, and also had a couple of containers. But I switched from 18 gal. plastic containers to 20 gal. Smart Pots. My strategy from my first year was to mostly grow one plant of 12-15 different varieties to try as many different ones as I could. 2015 was different for me in a couple of ways. First, I started growing from seed. And second, I decided to grow tomatoes that I already knew I liked, and to grow 2 plants each. I started seeds for Brandy Boy, Big Beef, Black Cherry, Yellow 1884 Pinkheart, Jaune Flamme, Break O'Day, and what I thought was Sun Sugar, and Super Sweet 100. Those last 2 ended up not being true to seed. I was bummed about this, as Sun Sugar is my favorite. Whatever seed I got that was supposed to be Sun Sugar was a small red cherry instead. It was decent, but not Sun Sugar. Whatever was supposed to be Super Sweet 100 seed, was instead a golf ball size red that was mealy and bland all season. I started my seeds on Feb. 14, and they did fantastic. I moved them out to my "temporary" greenhouse (8' x 8') around March 10. By the time I planted on April 8, most of my plants were 18-24" tall and thriving. I planted a little early for Tulsa. It helps being a Meteorologist and knowing what the likely weather will be for the next couple of weeks. ;-) My plants were thriving until the rains came......and came.....and came some more. We didn't have it as bad as Dawn did down south, but we still had way too much. I started getting the first ripening fruit on a few of them the week before Memorial Day. Jaune Flamme, Break O'Day and Yellow 1884 were the first to ripen. The other varieties started ripening the next week. All of the fruit that ripened before June 6th or so were very watery. We had that dry spell during the first couple of weeks of June, and that helped a lot. I also tried a little experiment with my cherries this year. I said I had 2 plants of all of my varieties, so I decided to do one of each cherry in the raised bed and one in a Smart Pot to see if there was a difference in taste. I can report that there was not a significant difference in taste for Black Cherry, not-Sun Sugar, and not-Super Sweet 100. They all tasted the same whether from the Smart pot or the bed. The only difference in the cherries was the Black Cherry in the Smart Pot succumbed to Gray Mold about 3 weeks quicker than the one in the raised bed. Like I'm sure most of you experienced, the disease pressure was much higher this year than normal, due to the heavy rain. I normally get Gray Mold on any of the Blacks I've tried. And I usually eventually get Early Blight to some degree on all the others. It was quite a bit faster this year. And to top it all off, around July 4th, my neighbor behind me decided to use Round Up all over his backyard to kill his bermuda and do some landscaping. My tomato plants did not like this one bit. They all died within a week. I was pretty mad at first, but luckily, they were mostly played out by then. So the loses weren't too bad. I didn't have too many fruit left. It would have been a different story if it was June 4, instead. I guess that's the risk you take when you garden in the middle of town. BRANDY BOY - This one was my only new variety. These did well overall, but I probably will not grow again. I know this sounds crazy, but I'm just not a huge fan of the Brandywine taste. Call me crazy, I know. I grew a Brandywine back in 2012 in a container and they all tasted watery and bland to me. And it got Early Blight quicker than others that year. On a whim, I decided to try Brandy Boy this year in the bed. Both plants produced about 20 good-sized beefsteaks. I still just wasn't crazy about the taste. If you like Brandywine, these may be worth a try. Definitely had better disease resistance than Brandywine, at least in my case. BIG BEEF - These did great for me, and I plan to always grow this one. The taste isn't "knock your socks off", but it's very good for a hybrid. And they produce like crazy. This was my second year growing it. Every year, each plant has pumped out at least 35 fruit. Most were in the 8-16 oz. range. And for what it's worth, these 2 plants were the last to die from the Round Up accident. BREAK O'DAY - This variety is probably my favorite pink. There's something about the "zing" in the flavor that my wife and I both really like. I've grown this one all 6 years and will continue. It's a little bit smaller plant (4'), but it pumps out the tomatoes. I've always had at least 30 from every plant. In 2012, I got over 60 from one plant before it finally gave out. BLACK CHERRY - Another staple that I've grown every year. I love this cherry tomato. Not much to say about this one. It's a very popular tomato, and it always lives up to its reputation for me. The only negative about these is they are susceptible to Gray Mold, typical for Black Tomatoes. I had hundreds of fruit from each plant before they died. Both plants were huge, as usual. YELLOW 1884 PINKHEART - This is a creation from The Tomatoman here in Tulsa, and I think it is only available through The Tomatoman's Daughter. It's another tomato that I grow every year. It typically produces 8-16 oz. yellow beefsteaks with pink in the middle when fully ripe. This is my favorite beefsteak. It's flavor is hard to describe, maybe creamy-sweet, almost buttery. I know it sounds weird, but it is oh so good. Every person I've given one to has commented on how good it tastes. The first few this year were watery, but after that, they were fantastic. I got about 25 from each plant. I had 2 huge fruit this year, too, which was new. One was 21.9 oz. and another was 20.7. Lisa (the Tomatoman's Daughter) said she'd never heard of ones that big. JAUNE FLAMME - This one is an orange, golf ball size tomato that is very juicy, sweet and tangy. I've grown this one every year. When I grew them in containers, they had quite a bit of blossom end rot. I haven't had that problem in the raised beds. These are early and very productive. I lost count on these this year, but I think each plant produced at least 75. I'm not going to go into the not-Sun Sugar and not-Super Sweet 100. I took a chance and ordered the not-Sun Sugar seed from Amazon. That was a mistake that I will not make again. The not-Super Sweet 100 seed actually came from Burpee. They emailed me about a month ago saying there was a mistake in their production of Super Sweet 100 seeds this year, and offered to send me new seeds early next year. I'll give those another try, but will likely not order from them again. I've got a Black Cherry, 4th of July OP, Jaune Flamme, Green Zebra, Break O'Day, Yellow 1884 PH, and Johnny Joe's going in the garden for Fall. I planted out on July 10. I've already had a couple ripen, and have several fruit growing on all of them. I had worms really bad on these in late July. I sprayed a couple of rounds of Bt, and haven't seen any since. Hopefully I'll get some good production before our first freeze. So overall, it was a decent year. It wasn't my best year for sure, but I guess it could have been worse. The rain was too much and lead to more disease than normal. And the Round Up incident lead to a premature end to my season. But I grew from seed for the first time this year, and successfully, I might add. So I'm going to say this season was a success. I look forward to seeing other reports, too. Lee