TomatoesWe try to grow new varieties of tomatoes every year, while still making room for our old favorites. You can choose varieties by length of season, size of fruit or best use. You may want heirlooms or open-pollinated types so that you can save seeds for next year. Any tomato you can find will grow well in your Pocono garden. Some may require a little assistance to generate the best result possible, but you can do it.
Mortgage Lifter Mortgage Lifter tomatoes are an heirloom variety, developed in the 1940s by radiator repairman M.C. Byles. He used it to pay-off his house in just four years. He sold plants for $1 each. Back in the 1940s, when average US weekly wages were just $44, a dollar was 2.25% of the your gross wages. Can you imaging paying that now? He promoted it as being able to feed a family of six, therefore well worth the exorbitant price. During the Great Depression, Mr. Byles, aka Radiator Charlie, experienced a slump in the radiator repair business. He began cross-breeding his best tomato plants, until he developed a stable derivation which he felt tasted better and had larger fruit than its predecessors. It is not considered a hybrid, because it grows true from seed. Mortgage Lifter is a beefsteak type, indeterminate plant that produces pink-skinned fruits that are large and meaty, averaging 2 to 3 lbs each in approximately 75 days. We love them for fresh eating. They are less acidic than most tomatoes we have grown. They are great sliced on a burger or sandwich. Sweet Seedless Tomato The Sweet Seedless is new a new hybrid from Burpee this year. We had to try them! Burpee's catalog said "Beyond the lack of seeds to digest, this tomato is first rate for taste. In fact, precisely because there are no seeds to store the sugars for later use, all the sweetness is immediately available for you to enjoy in every rich slice. This is a totally new tomato on every level – the perfect balance of flavor and sweetness, meat and gel, solid firmness and juiciness. And to top it off, the indeterminate plants have a full package of disease resistance to ensure plenty of healthy yields. Medium size, 8-10 oz fruits. 68 Days." We started our seeds in April and so far the plants seem slow to develop. When they start producing I'll let you know how they taste.
Delicious Tomato Delicious Tomatoes are similar in size to Mortgage Lifter. Indeterminate plants produce huge, meaty, solid scarlet fruits averaging 1 lb, some even weigh 2 lbs. Smooth and virtually crack-free, they are excellent slicers with delicious flavor. Good for tomato sandwiches. Ready to pick about 80 days in my zone 5 Pocono garden. Park’s Whopper Cr Improved Tomato Indeterminate plants have great disease resistance and a long season. The first fruits are ready to harvest approximately 65 days from setting out transplants. These big, juicy, crack-resistant tomatoes, 4 inches or more across, ripen uniformly regardless of overcast or rainy weather and are ready sooner than the old Whopper variety. Plants keep producing, in good quantities, right up until frost. Whooper Cr Improved is resistant to Verticillium Wilt, Root Knot Nematodes, Tobacco Mosaic Virus and 2 strains of Fusarium Wilt. Chocolate Cherry Tomato Indeterminate plants produce high yields of 1" diameter Chocolate Cherry Tomatoes in about 70 days. They grow in clusters of 8 and are very flavorful. Grow them in a container on your deck for fresh snacking. We have had problems with other cherries that crack and fall off the plant as they ripen. These are crack resistant and hold very well on the plant. They can be picked several days before completely mature and allowed to ripen off the vine without sacrificing quality. They look striking on vegetable platters and in salads.
This kit includes everything you need for a bumper crop. The heart of the system is a patented self-watering planter with a 4-gallon reservoir that lets you enjoy self-watering convenience, while your plants receive a steady flow of water and nutrients all season long. A strong, rust-resistant steel support cage clips on to prevent plants from toppling. Do you have excess produce? If your family can not eat all that your garden produces why not donate some of it to a local food pantry? Need more info? Check here:
Hungry Neighbors
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