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Tomato Questions and Answers Hello to all of my vegetable gardening friends across North Florida. Before I get to today’s post, I want to tell you about a unique art show currently underway in Rosemary Beach located in South Walton County, FL. Spearheaded by my talented sister-in-law Teresa Cline, Transformations Art show features artworks created from reclaimed materials. The show benefits Alaqua Animal Refuge. You can get more information here.
Gallery Location: 38 Main Street, Rosemary Beach Florida - - -
-- A reader from Port St. Joe writes: Tomato plants that look great one day and are worn out the next. I think most vegetable gardeners in North Florida share that experience fairly regularly. I know I do. I had a couple of my Amelia tomato plants die suddenly just last week. It’s not so bad when it happens in July, near the end of their useful life in the garden. I will pull up any of my remaining tomato plants in my garden near the end of the month and put out new ones in August. Amelia plants from Bonnie Plant Farm can be found at Lowes and Home Depot, among other places. I saw some at Lowes in Fort Walton Beach just last week. Amelia tomato seeds can be ordered from Willhite Seed Company. Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) products are great for tomato worms but it won’t stop those pesky stink bugs – which come in several different shapes, sizes and colors in North Florida. All of them damage the fruit by piercing it and leaving tiny puncture wounds that result in white dots or specks. I have had good success with carbaryl (Sevin), though I use it sparingly. I can’t say whether garlic spray works as a systemic. And as much as I’d love to say garlic and other such natural products are a good choice for most North Florida vegetable gardeners, I just can’t. From everything I’ve seen and heard, they simply don’t work well here in most instances, especially this time of the year when our gardens are really under attack. I don’t know about you but I hate losing a crop to pests that could have been stopped with something as basic as carbaryl! I quickly turn to it when my organic products fail to work. The yield from my Amelia tomato plants has been as impressive as the big, beautiful tomatoes we have been harvesting. Many are 13 ounces. The tomatoes are meaty – great for slicing and for cooking. They are very tasty when cooked. My lovely wife, Kathleen, has been roasting lots of them with onions and garlic from the garden. Some of the roasted tomatoes are going into the freezer as is; some have been used to make tomato sauce. Oh, so good! Eaten raw, I find Amelia tomatoes slightly above average in taste but not nearly as flavorful at the Better Boy tomatoes I have grown in the past. |
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