This week’s talking point has to be our largest tomato which weighed in at almost 1.1kg or 2½lbs.
It’s another Brandywine beefsteak variety (or maybe buffalo steak in this case) which is known to produce huge fruits although I haven’t come across one as large as this in my trawling of the Internet. General information says it regularly produces fruit of up to a 1lb in weight.
It was grown from seed in our garden greenhouse and planted in a large size grow bag using a ring culture system. Must admit it was only really fed when we remembered to – nothing special just ordinary tomato food. The two large tomatoes were the first to set on the lowest truss and just grew and grew. The plant does have more fruit which have set higher up the plant but no more monsters.
Click here for video of the event!
Tomato plants in the plot greenhouse that had been stripped of fruit have been removed and made way for the onions which were lifted earlier. If left outside they were more likely to rot than dry off.
Running the gauntlet of feeding wasps we harvested most of the gages – Reinne Claude & Mannings. Fruits at the top of the tree were left for the wasps as we didn’t fancy climbing a ladder and heading into the wasps’ party.
As beds are being cleared of their summer occupants, they are being rotavated and replanted with crops that will hopefully provide a continuation into autumn and beyond. One bed has been planted up with a selection of brassicas; broccoli – Late White & Claret, cauliflower – Mayfair and cabbage – Excel & Spring Hero.
Another bed is to be used as a nursery bed in which to grow on cuttings and young plants destined for the garden or flower borders. Wild primroses grown from the seed gathered from plants in the garden were the first to be planted out.
Harvested this week:
Vegetables:
Runner Beans – Enorma & Desiree
Cauliflower – Kaleidoscope
Carrots – Ideal Red
Beetroot – Sunset Mixed & Boltardy
Sweet Corn – Sweet Nugget
French Beans – Delinel & Cosse Violette
Spring Onions – Guardsman
Various herbs
Tomatoes – Roma, Brandywine, Yellow Perfection, Amish Paste, Moneymaker, Shirley, All Blacks, Rainbow Beefsteak & Gardeners’ Delight
Fruit:
Apples – Discovery, Queen Cox & from the garden (not sure what variety they are but we think one is Peasgood Nonsuch)
Blackberries
Raspberries – Autumn Gold & Joan J
Plums – Victoria
Gages – Reinne Claude & Mannings
Strawberries – Flamenco
Alpine Strawberries- Alexandria & Mignotte
Grapes – Himrod
Click here for August photo album of our plot
