While distractions dragged my attention elsewhere the past couple of weeks, the tomatoes were busy converting the fertile earth of a new garden into many inches of explosive growth.
In eight weeks three of my five varieties rocketed from about 8 inches above the ground to 7 or 8 feet tall, spilling out of their 5-foot cages. I shoved 8-foot poles into the cages of the taller plants so I could secure their tallest stems, which are laden with so much fruit that they bend to the ground under the weight.
This is a big departure from last year, when the nematodes and wilt disease in the back garden combined for a meager tomato harvest and prompted the creation of Garden #2. (Here are before photos.)
I mixed a couple handfuls of this magic organic substance at planting on March 30, and spread another generous handful on the ground above the roots of each plant in late April, and that was it. Ample water, good drainage and virgin soil did the rest. Oh yeah, along with a regular program of removing stems and leaves up to about two feet above the ground, so that rainwater doesn’t splash dirt, and disease microbes, onto the leaves.
We tasted the first ripe tomato on May 21 – 52 days from planting. It was a German Johnson heirloom grown from second-generation seeds I saved from last year’s earliest and most-productive plant, which put out its first ripe fruit in 59 days. However, I’d be kidding myself if I said the earlier yield this year is because of superior seed. We had a really late spring, and I moved my seedlings into bigger pots instead of putting them in the ground when I wanted to. So when they finally did go in the ground, they had really healthy roots. 
This year I planted second-generation German Johnsons, second-generation Belgium Giants and three new varieties. One of them was just for fun and not part of the Great Experiment to create a great-tasting, open-pollinated tomato that can handle the harsh South Texas climate and not succumb to the bugs and verticillium wilt present in the soils here. The other two are old heirlooms that were new to me: A round, red type called Acme, developed by De Giorgi Brother’s Seed Company of Council Bluffs, Iowa in the early 1900s, and something called Wood’s Famous Brimmer, also developed early in the last century, by Wood & Sons Seed Co. of Richmond, Va. (Is it too geeky to know stuff like this about your maters? My wife thinks so.)
Both of these new old varieties set their fruit in clusters; some of them have as many as nine tomatoes in a cluster. I have a theory that, back in the late 1800s and early 1900s, gardeners and seed companies worked to develop tomatoes that tasted great and were as productive as possible.
In later decades, with the rise of the chain grocery store, the emphasis was on firm, uniform-shaped tomatoes that were easy to ship. All you have to do today is slice up a grocery store tomato, slice up one you grew in your garden and taste ‘em. You’ll see they bear almost no resemblance to each other. It saddens me to think that entire generations of kids have never tasted a tomato that someone didn’t buy from the store.
after
After a weekend trip, C. and I found that four of our tomato varieties had ripened to perfection on the windowsill, so we made a batch of Caprese. Beforehand, we sliced some of them up and held a blind taste test. Both of us picked Wood’s Famous Brimmer, which really does taste great but obviously needs a shorter name.
Soon a real crush of tomatoes will come ripe and the birds and bugs will take notice. I’m broken out the bird netting, which already caught the season’s first stupid snake. As a bonus, it was a fat, 18-inch copperhead with a bad attitude.
It gave me an idea, though. The kids got these toy rubberish snakes that grow up to like 5 feet long if you put them in a bucket of water for a few days. I borrowed them, and now every time I go out in the garden, I re-position my new rubber snakes so that the birds won’t become familiar (and unfrightened) by their presence. I can’t say for sure, but so far no bird damage to the garden.
I might have to go on eBay poke around for some more.
