Thanks FarmerShawn for your information!
I would love to hear which of the rootstocks you've tried and, later, how Juliet ends up comparing to them.
Just some thoughts (from someone who truly knows almost nothing about the process, but who loves to brainstorm)
perhaps since you have very little soil borne illness, that extra from the graft isn't giving you any real advantage. Maybe you are actually losing a bit in productivity either by getting the plants out a bit later (because of the recovery time involved) or because grafting might have a slight negative effect on the vascular system of the plant where it joins?
Maybe the rootstock that you need (if you need one at all) should be one that stresses being super vigorous over disease tolerance? Maybe that's where Juliet will come in for you. I hope so! (And if this brainstorming sounds super stupid, let me know so that I won't ever say it again!)
I actually did think about using the White Rabbit rootstock, but wondered whether it would have the vigor that is generally associated with hybrids. I mean, White Rabbit is vigorous, but many cherry tomatoes are. I don't know if it would pass that on to regular sized fruit?
Also, while it ends up being a large sprawling plant, it had more delicate looking stems than my other plants. (And it stayed quite a bit smaller than the other plants for quite a while). I wasn't sure that small stem would support the faster growing stems of the scions or even if I would be able to coordinate the stem sizes of WR and scion for grafting.
So I went with one that seems to be a good fit for my area. I don't grow enough to do a lot of experimenting, but will if this one doesn't work out.
As far as cost, seriously, if I can even get a regular amount of beautiful heirloom tomatoes, that would make the grafting cost and time, of seed and clips, worth it many times over for me!
