About Me
My Photo
Annie in Austin
Welcome! As "Annie in Austin" I blog about gardening in Austin, TX with occasional looks back at our former gardens in Illinois. My husband Philo & I also make videos - some use garden images as background for my original songs, some capture Austin events & sometimes we share videos of birds in our garden. Come talk about gardens, movies, music, genealogy and Austin at the Transplantable Rose and listen to my original songs on YouTube. For an overview read Three Gardens, Twenty Years. Unless noted, these words and photos are my copyrighted work.
View my complete profile

Friday, June 08, 2012

Tomato Garden Follies


At the end of year 6 of the Transplantable Rose blog, what better way to start year 7 than with tomatoes? We like peppers and tomatoes. We like growing them and we like eating them. I even wrote lyrics about the end of Tomato season for a music video called Farewell, Tomato.


After Philo made our small vegetable plot in 2004 we tried different ways to support & protect the plants.  

For a few years we just staked them


Our next phase lasted a few years - a large, strong, painted wooden framework that could support plants, bird netting & shade cloth. We hoped the net could slow down attacks by squirrels & birds.

It’s been fun trying new varieties every year, cramming in 9 or 10 tomato plants and 7 or 8 peppers, watering them by hand while knocking leaf-footed stink bugs into soapy water every day, with the reward of some salad tomatoes and frying peppers.


A post on GardenWeb suggested tying net gift bags over the tomatoes to protect them from the stinkbugs. I was too cheap to buy more than 2 – a good thing since the squirrels chewed off the whole tomato stem & ran away with the bags.


On Tom Spencer’s radio program we heard him mention one gardener who painted wooden balls red & hung them in the garden while the tomatoes were green. The idea was that any critter attacking the fake tomatoes would be convinced that hard, bad tomatoes grew in that garden. We tried it and saw no effect, but at least they’re decorative! 



Recent years broke the weather rules and what worked before no longer held up.  Last summer after every pepper plant in the vegetable garden died, I found a few new plants at a local nursery, put them into containers and those survived. The bird netting kept the birds from taking the tomatoes, but it allowed them to poke their beaks through the spaces to puncture the tomatoes.


 
The tomato frame filled the entire center of our little plot, making it difficult to get in to weed, prune & tie the plants and even harder to reach the stinkbugs. The stakes & frames gave the birds a good place to perch while they attacked the fruit. But we gardeners had no place to perch - the seat made from a slice of tree trunk had rotted.  


So we tweaked the vegetable plot, moving the compost enclosure and changing the layout. A central path looks better and gives us better access. There are fewer plants this year. Five pepper plants grow in containers and we’re getting a small, steady supply. We bought only 5 tomato plants and we’re getting a few of those each day, too.

The tomato vines are sort of draped over wire cages to hold the fruit off the ground but they’re not staked. In place of the garden netting I bought a few yards of inexpensive nylon net to sort of pouf over the top, using recycled bricks to keep it from blowing away. With a tighter weave and no convenient sticks for birdie feet to grasp, they have to work harder to punch holes in the tomatoes. 


They can still do it… our Blue Jays boldly cling to the kitchen windows and tap on the panes! The squirrels will chew through anything and possums and raccoons lurk at night. We know we can’t beat any of them but we're trying to stay in the game. 


If a stinkbug lands on the outside of the net it can’t fit through the small mesh. If the little monster is already inside clinging to the net I use the net to enfold & squish it.


A central path now leads to the concrete bench, relocated from the Secret Garden to the Vegetable Patch. Last June we turned two old compost bins upside down, painted them, added handles and called them tomato guards. This June they cover two tubs bought at some long ago garage sale, painted white. The tub on one side of the path has a pepper plant and a ‘San Marzano’ tomato grows on the opposite side. There’s something going on here but it doesn’t fit the usual categories… it’s not Potager and it’s not Austintatious and it’s not Garden Junk. Maybe it’s Transplanted Frugal Midwesterner?  


Two of the tomatoes were supposed to be our favorite ‘Black Krim’. At planting time I noticed a ‘Better Boy’ tag down the side of the pot. And that one ‘Black Krim’ has now turned to None. Look at these tomatoes! They all came from the same mislabled plant – not ‘Black Krim’ but it might take a tomato-genealogist to figure out what they are.


On the other hand, when that heirloom-lumpy tomato at far right finally ripened, it weighed in at over 13 ounces. Folly it may be, but what a delicious folly it was. 


18 comments:

  1. What you go through for a decent home-grown tomato. I admire you and Philo for it. You are not only still in the game, but it looks like you are ahead right now. My tomato plants are just getting going for the season.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I hope you have a banner year, Carol - with a long season!

      Delete
  2. Annie, you and Philo are two determined tomato gardeners! I think I might have given up the battle against such formidable foes, though a home-grown fresh tomato can't be topped. I had to chuckle at the squirrels running away with the gift bags--do you suppose they were planning a wedding?:)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Maybe they filled them with filched pecans to give as favors!

      Delete
  3. Thanks for sharing the progressive battle to keep tomatoes. I'm in year one of it; I tried the gift bag idea with the green mesh bags that limes come in... and the squirrels just broke off the stem and took the whole cluster. At least the gift bags are decorative! Congrats on the nice production from the mystery tomato...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Good luck, Amy! A couple of years ago I used the larger mesh bags to try to save melons - then put a metal milk crate over it... they still got in.

      Delete
  4. The upsidedown compost bins are genius!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you! It was so kind of WabiSabi garden to give them to me!

      Delete
  5. DH and I are almost as stubborn as you and Philo in terms of tomatoes. Happy we're in good company! We've only enjoyed one ripe unknown volunteer heirloom so far, but we have a Black Krim, an Aunt Ruby's German, three Cherokee Purples, and three San Marzanos ripening on the kitchen table. And a dozen more green ones still on the vine (for now.)

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Good for you, Iris! You have a Black Krim plant, eh? I know where you live so if one is missing it might not be a squirrel that took it!

      Delete
  6. Squirrels are clever little rascals. I sure hope you get to reap the rewards of your hard work. Bugs and beasts are working against you for sure.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We feel under siege, Lisa! MSS of Zanthan Gardens has a frame & wire structure around her tomatoes & I found tomato jails in this post. Philo is seriously considering building one!

      Delete
  7. I like the Transplanted Frugal Midwesterner aesthetic! (But I think that it has a dash of Cool Austinite Eccentric thrown in. :-) Glad that your mislabeled plant was deliicous, at least. Are you going to save seeds from that one?

    ReplyDelete
  8. Might be more "my parents are weird" than cool, but thanks! I've had zero luck starting tomato seeds here, Blackswamp Girl. Small house with no enclosed porch, no basement or attics, and windows with overhangs to keep out sun. That's why I always buy plants. Happy summer!

    ReplyDelete
  9. This is a great posting It’s exactly what I was looking for. I like your article.

    ReplyDelete
  10. I am glad that you are getting some tomatoes and peppers...I agree they are worth fighting for but you really do have a big fight on your hands! I love those compost bin covers...every year I think I have the best idea for saving winter greens from the sparrows and every year I end up sharing. I'm always looking for new ideas.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Holey smokes, Annie, you are a bonafide homegrown tomato lover. My tomatoes are on my backyard deck in a pot, guarded during the day by my mini-schnauzer Jojo . So far we've had two wonderful ripe tomatoes and I'm waiting for the green ones to get bigger before frying them up. No bugs or critters yet and there's a big forest at the end of the property.

    ReplyDelete
  12. The lengths gardeners will go to to protect their tomatoes! I have the deer netting over many of my plants and it doesn't stop the leaf footed bugs which I have to say are strangely absent this year. Inexpensive net is a great idea. Must look out for some. Our tomatoes were so early that they are nearly over for this year.

    ReplyDelete

A comment from you is like chocolate - maybe I could live without it, but life is more fun with it. I'll try to answer. If someone else's comment piques your interest, please feel free to talk among yourselves.