Summarizing the 2020 tomato growing year

Summarizing the 2020 tomato growing year

Calcium nitrate to prevent end rot

I did a calcium nitrate application test to see if Ca application would prevent end rot (ER).  It did, although I nearly killed the test plants by over-applying.  I had two test plants and one control.  The strain was Flamme, which is very prone to ER.

Soil: Miracle-gro potting mix.  Test plants had ½ cup of calcium nitrate mixed in the soil. Control had zero.

½ cup ~ 120 g ; x 0.19% calcium (according to label)  = 22.8 g calcium = 0.57 moles.   (Calcium is 24.4% of pure calcium nitrate by molecular weight, but the material is probably not pure calcium nitrate. )

Transplanted the plants into these, 5 gal buckets 5/10/20.

On 6/7/20 I supplemented with even more calcium nitrate.  This time I dissolved 120 g (½ cup) of the calcium nitrate in 500 ml water and applied it directly.

To the control, I added ¼ cup of 29-0-4 fertilizer to supply a similar amount of nitrate as the test.  Note this was a slow-release pellet form; not meant to dissolve quickly!  I dissolved it in 500 ml water as best I could, and added to control.

Well by evening, the two test plants were wilting. Of course, I should have realized that hitting them with a solution of 0.57mol/0.5 L, or more than 1 molar salt, would hurt!   This arrested growth of the test plants.  They did not recover their wilted appearance until ~6/28/20, 3 weeks later.

However – they did catch up, and by season’s end it was clear that the test plants had almost zero end rot.

Final results:

Test plants:  35 fruit.  34: no ER.   ER rate 3%.

Control plant: 53 fruit.   No ER: 27.  ER: 26.   ER rate 49%.

Interestingly, the control plant had much less ER after about Aug 15.

June-July 20:  Control had about 50% ER.  Test plants had no fruit yet.

July 20-Aug 15:  Control had about 50% ER.  Test plants had zero.

Aug 15- end of season:  Control and test plants had almost zero ER.

  

Conclusion:  It works, but don’t use such a concentrated calcium nitrate solution. Try much lower, like 50 mM, perhaps every two weeks.

Indigo crosses

I grew a few plants each of 55a1.2 F4 and 46a2.3 F5, and 1 of 28d3.3F4.

I saved seeds from 55a1.2F4 plant 2.  I will now call this 55a1.2F5.   

I previously thought 55a1.2F4 was not gf/gf, but it actually is gf/gf.

Since these are NOT y/y, it is hard to see the gf/gf from outside.  Sliced open it was obvious. (“identical to Carbon.”)

46a2.3 F5 are gf/gf;y/y and indigo.  These seeds were from 2 years ago and so I had already grown the F5 last year.  These were decent as before.  Were prone to sunscalding but I got started late in 2020 and that was partly why – in late July the heat and sun get really bad. Perhaps y/y is more prone to sunscalding?

28d3.3F4 did not have much at all purple.  A nice cherry, but prone to cracking with overwatering.  I sort of prefer Black Cherry which was very sweet this year.

Heirlooms

I derived Tangerine Dream from a store-bought orange globe “

heirloom”.  Seems to breed true and was a decent yellow-orange beefsteaky tomato.  Would grow again.

Flamme calcium tests

Flamme is prone to end rot.  I have three plants in buckets.  Two have each been supplemented with 1/2 cup pure calcium nitrate;  one with none as control.

Transplanting to 5-gal buckets

On May 7, 9, etc.  I starting moving the plants from cowpots into the buckets.  The plants are well rooted - roots are beginning to go right thru the cowpots.

I put a brick in each bucket to stabilize it.  Planting medium is simply Miracle Gro potting mix.

Crepe Myrtle branches:  I saved a bunch of pruned, fresh, straight branches, though after storing about a month in the garage they are all warping a bit and are not quite straight anymore.  Next time, to prevent warping after harvesting them, immediately anchor them on both ends to a T-post till use  (if possible, need to test this.).

2x  46a2.3 F5, 
2x  55a1.2 F4, 
1x:  28d3.3 F4.

2x CA
1x BC
1x HC  maybe 1 more?
1x FB
1x TD

Still need to transplant FL.  Will grow 4 I think; spike 2 with lots of calcium to test if helps stave off end rot.
Still need to transplant Roma.

Disinfecting last year's 5 gal. container buckets

On 5/4/20 I disinfected last year's 5 gal. container buckets as follows:

1. Rinsed off all dirt and debris as best I could with hose.

2. Made Disinfectant:  a 10:1 mix of water and 5% hypochlorite bleach; 5 gal of water + 2 quarts bleach, in a large white tub.  (Actually the bleach was "outdoor cleaner" from home depot, but it's basically 5% hypochlorite with prob a small amount of a detergent!)

3. I could place a bucket one at a time on their side in the disinfectant tub and roll it to cover all surfaces. Then placed the bucket upright in another tub while I rinsed the next one.  Let them stand a few minutes to disinfect.  

4. Finally, rinsed them by rotating them well in a separate tub of water.  Let drip dry in stacks.   

Tomato sowing - April 2020

Tomato sowing, 4/18/20.

For various reasons, I decided not to do a big grow-out this year from any 2019 F2 seeds.  Looking forward to doing that next year if all goes well.

This year I plan to have about 18 container tomatoes in the backyard.

They will be:

•46a2.3 F5, 55a1.2 F4, and 28d3.3 F4.

Each germinated well.

• Previous heirlooms: CA, FL (2016), BC, HC: also all germinated fine. HC had only 3 seeds left! but they all germinated.

Finally, I am growing two heirlooms I saved from Kroger!

• FB/Funky Bell :  a red, small-to-medium, bell-pepper-shaped tomato.  I guess the fruit weight was about 30 grams.

• TD/Tangerine dream:  a medium slicer, very nice globe/beefsteak with orange-y color.

I sowed into standard seed starter mix, heat mat.  Germination went fine.  Also sowed basil, cilantro, and banana pepper plants.

Sowing was 4/18/20.   Transplanted to cowpots, standard miracle-gro potting soil, around 4/24/20.   Hardening off, then fully outside around 5/1/20.

From August 2019

An assortment.

1. White Beauty

2. Mortgage Lifter

3. Carbon?

4. Black Cherry

5. Flamme

6. 28D3.3  F5

7. Uluru Ochre

8. 46A2.3 F5 ?

ZPT x GDZ F1s

I got a couple of ZPT x GDZ F1 fruit, which were interesting as they combined traits of either parent.  The fruits were not as weirdly fasciated as GDZ; however, the larger of the two fruits was pretty funky shaped.  Still it did not have any lobes that were totally separate, like GDZ and RT usually have. In other words the fruit was one unified body.   The smaller fruit was very similar in apperance to Costoluto Genovese, in having the ribbed appearance of ZPT and CG but flat like CG.  In addition, the seed blobs inside the locules were not very juicy and there was an air cavity separating the seeds from the outer rim of the locule, which is just like the ZPT parent.  This trait is seen in "stuffer" variety tomatoes, which are not very popular.  I have seen this trait in one other heirloom I have grown several years ago, Gogoshari Stiped.   It seems to be a dominant trait.

After consideration I think it's still possible that these plants could be from ZPT self-fertilization, i.e. the cross did not work as planned.  Wish I had more than 2 fruits on which to base the phenotype.  But my gut feeling is that they are not quite shaped like the ZPT parent - the first one seems to have the asymmetry of GDZ and the second fruit was too "flat".