A noun. A verb. A blog.
Despite our best efforts, as gardeners and as just plain folks, we never know for sure what can happen in a season. There I was, walking west on Lake Shore in mid-October and a flutter among the hawthorns caught my eye. Could it be? Yes, it was! The little fella above, left behind by the […]
After the Tomato Heartbreak of 2016 (*more on that in a moment), I vowed there’d be no more than one tomato plant in my garden. Certainly no tomatoes planted in my big garden trough. Despite last year being one of the best years in memory for tomatoes and despite me darting out, waving arms and shouting, […]
Back in July, my Microgarden report mentioned some of the tomato cultivars I was growing this year. Now here it is at almost the end of November, and I’m still eating fresh tomatoes, harvested back in October. How did that happen? I picked them while they were still green. Some, I kept in a tightly closed […]
Basket o’ Tomatoes. See also the best little pruner/deadheader, by Fiskars, at left. Thanks to a fun plant swap hosted by our local Toronto garden genius, Gayla Trail of You Grow Girl, I’ve come away with a lovely pile of new tomatoes to try this year. All are new to me, and I’ll update later […]
Clavate tortoise beetle on a chewed potato leaf. Note that teddybear shape on its back. Noticing some pellet holes in my potato leaves, I wondered if we’d been hit by flea beetles. Then I saw what looked like a small fleck of bird droppings on the leaf. When flicked, it moved. That’s when I first […]
A tomato plant is indeed a beautiful thing. Don’t throw out that coffee cup! Don’t even toss it in the blue bin! They make great seed starting pots. Poke a hole in the bottom, fill with soil, and plant a few tomato seeds, or anything you want to start from seed. At planting time I […]
Too much direct sun, especially along with unusually hot weather, can be a bad thing if you’re a ripening tomato. It’s one factor that can lead to the colour disorder shown above, which goes by names including yellow eye, yellow shoulder and green shoulder. Some tomatoes, particularly some heirlooms, grow naturally with a bit of […]
I feel virtuous about spending at the Toronto Botanical Garden plant sale (which remains on till Sunday). Virtuous because what I bought* was tomato plants, mostly heritage ones at that. Three of them will find a home at my allotment in the community garden. One will probably stay home with mamma, churning out cherry tomatoes. […]
This is one of Sarah’s tomato casualties, which I think we’ve IDed as being felled by beet curly top virus, an insect-borne malady. The leaves have curled upward and become stiff (Sarah says: like rigor mortis for tomatoes), with purple veining on the undersides. The whole plant has become stunted and curled, not older or […]
We have been lucky enough to gain the use of two unclaimed 4×10′ allotment plots in a local community garden. My husband and I haven’t planted veggies on any scale since we foolishly gave up our Leslie Street Allotment plot when we bought our first house 25 years ago. I don’t count an occasional cherry […]
I have tomatoes growing on two plants on my deck. Now. In October. They are actually growing leaves and forming tomatoes and flowers and it is October 21st. Both plants are the cherry variety. One of these plants, ‘Gardener’s Delight‘, I grew from seed, sown in April. The other plant was a rescued tomato plant. […]