TOPIC: What you got growing ?

Great pics TN. Veggies look great. Those squash plants are doing well. Ginseng plants are nice and healthy. Chard looks great to. What part of TN are you from Hunter? Fixing to be making a trip to Cocke County with the family. Want to check the county out.

Very nice TN, I need to get out and take some pics, but we are waaaaay behind you. Here's what my tatter hills look like!

If you have not tried them, plant some Cherokee Purple tomatoes, I like their flavor better than any. We grow about 10-20 varieties each year but they are the best.

Gareth... I am in southern middle TN... that is about as detailed as I care to give out online.

Maya - that tater has eyes, and legs

Kysang - I have grown cherokee purple in the past, and they are excellent on flavor... a kin to the famous Brandywine tomato... which I think has the best taste of all.

The problem with both brandywine and cherokee purple (in my garden, or my area) is that they are low producers, and don't do well at fighting off early or late blight.

Burpee crossed the Brandywine with their Better Boy tomato a few years back, and I have had some success with them. They are more disease resistant, more productive, and the tomatoes are nice, large, red, roundish tomatoes that do not split and cat face as much as brandywine does. I have two of those out there in my garden now and am looking forward to eating those. One slice usually covers the bread and then some.

But still even though the taste is good, nearly as good as brandywine, they do not produce anything near what the Big Beef does.

The Big Beef have good taste, not as good as brandywine, or cherokee purple, but they do taste good enough, and they make sure that I get my quota of canned tomatoes put up for the year.

Below is a pic of some of my big beef tomatoes from last year, showing how they produce. One Big Beef tomato plant (in my garden) will produce as many tomatoes as 3-4 Brandywine, or Cherokee Purple (easily).

I am also growing some Rutgers this year, and hear they have really good taste and are heavy producers. We'll see, so far they are looking good and they are doing better or as good as the Big Beef on leaf blight so far.

My two brandy boy tomatoes are already getting those bullseye spots on the leaves, more so than the other varieties. I just keep pruining the infected leaves and leaf sets off as it shows up.




TNHunter

TN: I really like Rutgers. Been growing them for several years and they are super producers, and very sweet. Another great thing is that they are straight run (non hybrid) and if you have them away from others, you can replant seeds from the tomatoes. Very good in a worse case scenereo. The hybrids almost always make cherry tomatoes if I reuse the seeds.

Nice lookin' garden and seng. Thanks for sharing the pictures.

You make my stomach growl. Great looking stuff. Good to see someone growing their own food. No artificial colors or flavors. No food dyes, just good ole country food. Yum.

Along with the standard tomatoes, cukes, zukes and peppers I've got several things growing on a small scale. Nothing like most of you but I'm getting there.
These are some strawberries I grew, they are about finished.

Along with the standard tomatoes, cukes, zukes and peppers I've got several things growing on a small scale. Nothing like most of you but I'm getting there.
These are some strawberries I grew, they are about finished.

Shiitake mushrooms I started last year.

Chestnut trees I started from seed this winter. These are all planted already.