Quote:
Originally Posted by zipcode
There are not many varieties I would call cold hardy. I expect them to grow well in colder soil in the spring, etc. Only 2 tomatoes from what I tried qualify: Black Plum (even at seedling stage they don't get purple when transplanted in cold soil like everything else) and Legend (legend is not terribly early or good tasting though). Considering Siletz is bred by the same breeder as Legend, there's a very good chance that one actually will be. Stupice might be reasonably more tolerant than others but not much, and it is indeed the kind of early for larger than cherry. You can give also Gold Nugget a go, it is a small cherry, but you'll be surprised how many of them you will eat before other things are ripe.
In my experiences with Matina vs Stupice: they are clearly different, Matina has no green shoulders on the fruit at unripe stage (making the unripe fruit look markedly different), also the fruit is more regular in shape and in neat fishbone order. Stupice has irregular shapes (even some small megablooms) and flowers grow quite disorderly and sometimes many in a cluster.
Also matina has long internodes, which makes it a plant that easily gets tall, which makes the comment about small plant odd to me (the leaves are certainly not as big as the potato leaf beafsteaks, so it takes less space but it is not short).
My guess is there are various 'matinas' circulating around (and I'm not sure I know which is the right one, obviously I'm inclined to think mine is).
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Im fine with a cherry or other small tomato for fruit size. Fitting the plant inside a small 4 ft tunnel, with sides much shorter than 4.
I see putting plant into a black pot would be helpful to raise the temp of the soil.
Flavor--while a great tasting tomato is my hearts desire, I do realize that something must give when another characteristic is more necessary, cold tolerant. Currently this tunnel cannot be heated; hoping for a larger greenhouse next year with a small greenhouse with in to hold a couple tomato plants...but that is NEXT year.