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Originally posted by SunnyDee
Hey all,
Just wondering how everyone's gardens performed this year. I have had a small garden for the last ten years and living in the California high desert, I've always had great luck with tomatoes and squashes, in particular. To be honest, I am not a great or knowledgeable gardener, but it never seemed to matter these last years since my garden would just explode with tomatoes and zucs, many of which came back(heirloom tomotoes) from previous years.
Well this year is very different. I did my usual, I tilled in amendments prior to planting a mixture of small plants and direct seeds. They grew. But they did not explode, and now I have lots of greenery with basically no squashes and my tomato plants are low on fruit, with the strangest part of all, nothing has changed color, every tomato is just green and hard! The tomatoes have been on the plants now, I'd say, 6-8 weeks. This has NEVER happened. What changed?
I can tell you that the weather was extremely warm over the last 8 weeks, sweltering. The garden has adequate sunlight, although a tree does block some sun in the early morning, and I did trim it back when I realized it, so now the garden has normal amount of sun.
So my husband and I started to think that maybe this year was the year that the soil is just too depleted. Yet, we have some runaway tomoto plants, (seedlings that sprouted in other areas of the yard) that also have only green tomatoes on them.
I usually am making colorful pico de gallo by early to mid august and here we are in Sept. without a colored tomato or a zucchini to grill.
Anyone else with odd behaving gardens? As a regular here, I secretly wonder if Fukushima is affecting my garden, but there is still plenty of vegetables in the stores, so this must be wrong.
Anyone?
Originally posted by remymartin
Put a couple of banana skins near the plants that will help them
ripen off
Originally posted by winnar
Originally posted by SunnyDee
Hey all,
Just wondering how everyone's gardens performed this year. I have had a small garden for the last ten years and living in the California high desert, I've always had great luck with tomatoes and squashes, in particular. To be honest, I am not a great or knowledgeable gardener, but it never seemed to matter these last years since my garden would just explode with tomatoes and zucs, many of which came back(heirloom tomotoes) from previous years.
Well this year is very different. I did my usual, I tilled in amendments prior to planting a mixture of small plants and direct seeds. They grew. But they did not explode, and now I have lots of greenery with basically no squashes and my tomato plants are low on fruit, with the strangest part of all, nothing has changed color, every tomato is just green and hard! The tomatoes have been on the plants now, I'd say, 6-8 weeks. This has NEVER happened. What changed?
I can tell you that the weather was extremely warm over the last 8 weeks, sweltering. The garden has adequate sunlight, although a tree does block some sun in the early morning, and I did trim it back when I realized it, so now the garden has normal amount of sun.
So my husband and I started to think that maybe this year was the year that the soil is just too depleted. Yet, we have some runaway tomoto plants, (seedlings that sprouted in other areas of the yard) that also have only green tomatoes on them.
I usually am making colorful pico de gallo by early to mid august and here we are in Sept. without a colored tomato or a zucchini to grill.
Anyone else with odd behaving gardens? As a regular here, I secretly wonder if Fukushima is affecting my garden, but there is still plenty of vegetables in the stores, so this must be wrong.
Anyone?
Did you start it any later than the previous years? As far as it being sweltering I know that tomatoes will stop setting fruit in high temps. Ripening I have no idea. Parts of what you write sounds like too much nitrogen and parts dont. No pictures? I know my tomatoes I usually have to wait what seems like a long time before they will start ripening. Then as it cools down new tomatoes ripen even faster than the first ones of the season.
Ripening and color development in tomatoes is governed primarily by two factors: temperature and the presence of a naturally occurring hormone called "ethylene." The optimum temperature range for ripening mature green tomatoes is 68–77 deg. F. The further temperatures stray from the optimum, the slower the ripening process will be. And, when temperatures are outside the optimum range for extended periods, conditions may become so stressful that the ripening process virtually halts. At the same time, tomatoes do not produce lycopene and carotene, the pigments responsible for ripe tomato color, when temperatures are above 85 deg. F. So, extended periods of extreme heat cause tomatoes to stop ripening. The resulting fruits often appear yellowish green to yellowish orange.
Originally posted by mistressofspices
Tomatoes shut down production when temperatures are above 95 degrees F and below 50 degrees F. Maybe the same for ripening. Ditto what was said about nitrogen in the soil. Too much nitrogen will give big healthy green plants with little fruit.