2011 Tomatoes in Minnesota

[carpenterlady]

Hello and welcome to T'ville. I like Beam's Yellow Pear. I live up north, near Duluth. I became tomato obsessed because of my quest for a ripe tomato at harvest time. Because of many poor summers up here, I live vicariously through my Twin Cities friends. I start seedlings, they grow them and give me tomatoes. My friend and I have a plant sale in May. I sell my tomato, pepper, and tomatillo seedlings and she sells perennials. From your list, I have started Brandywine, Cowlicks and Pink, Black Krim, Cherokee Purple, Sungold, Black Cherry, and Beam's Yellow Pear. Barring any CATasrophe, I will have them plus many more heirloom, OP, and a few hybrids. Sungolds, and peppers are the hybrids. Finding productive heirloom peppers that grow well here is difficult, so I compromise and grow hybrid peppers. Sungolds speak for themselves. The sale will be in Minnetonka, just off Highway 7. She will advertise it on Craigslist, so keep your eyes open for it. Or pm me. From your list, Black Krim and Sungold is my favorite.

[stoopeechee]

Don't forget STUPICE!

[carpenterlady]

Agreed, Stupice is a good early tomato for Minnesota. Glacier and Latah are early here also. Not the most exciting tomatoes, but they are fresh and early. Better than Early Girl. In 2010, Latah was my earliest ripe at my home in northern Minnesota. Most other years it has been Glacier. Stupice probably has the best taste.

[recruiterg]

Not trying to toot my own horn, but I have a plant sale every year and have many of the varieties you are seeking. I have about 50 varieties this year and I am currently putting this years catalog together. PM me if you want to see it.

[joenorwood77]

Taking into consideration the feedback everyone has given me so far, along with some additional research I have done, here is my new list including 8 good sized tomatoes and 4 smaller sized (cherry and salad/pear) ones. Feel free to continue with comments, especially if there is anything I really should not leave out.

1. Brandywine
2. Super Fantastic
3. Cherokee Purple
4. Black Krim
5. Beefsteak
6. Big Beef
7. Green Zebra
8. Mortgage Lifter

1. Stupice
2. Sungold
3. Super Sweet 100
4. Black Cherry

[rsg2001]

Joe, here are some comments, given your objectives for the garden. As an overview I note that at least 5 of the 8 you picked are later season big tomatoes (Brandywine, Cherokee Purple, Beefsteak, Big Beef and Mortgage Lifter). I'd suggest you replace a couple of them with mid season varieties of the medium-size range so you don't run out of patience waiting for your maters, and also to balance your risks in the event of an early frost.

While I absolutely love Brandywine (Sudduth variety), it's not a very productive plant, meaning, you'll get just a small number of superb-tasting fruit as well as late season harvest. With just 8 plants, I don't know that I'd recommend it for your purposes. Instead, I'd recommend Marizol Purple (which is a dark pink that can give you a good amount of medium to very large size very delicious beefsteak type tomatoes depending on the amount of sun that you have - I grew it for the first time last year and was very impressed. It harvests earlier than Brandywine also.) The other one that I'd recommend is Eva Purple Ball, which is very easy to grow and plentiful on the vine. EPB tomatoes are medium size and, to me, have a slightly winy flavor, one of my favorites year in and year out.

I definitely endorse Cherokee Purple - I was really surprised last year when I grew that for the first time at how plentiful, large and succulent these are. When I first started tomato-growing about 18 years ago, Super Fantastic was an early favorite of mine - it was also easy to grow, though I found that as I started with heirlooms, I preferred heirlooms to it.

In your second group, Stupice is a nice very small tomato, however I have found that the quantity is wanting. I have done much better with Kimberly, which is similar in that it's an early season small variety -- I've liked the taste better and gotten better production, especially given it's a compact plant. If you have time to start seeds from scratch, I'd also recommend Pozhar (a Russian variety - probably you can find it on Seed Savers Exchange website) - very, very plentiful small variety and absolutely delicious. I was lucky enough to get seeds last year from Carolyn Male's seed offer on Tomatoville.

I absolutely endorse Sungold and Black Cherry - my two favorite cherry tomatoes and a staple for me every year. I grow a couple of each. Both of the plants grow extraordinarily tall and are very productive, although Black Cherry for me gets a bit of a wilt after its peak production. Instead of Super Sweet 100, I prefer Sprite, which is a nice red grape tomato with a slightly thickish skin, very sweet, that has remained productive up till the frost.

On the green side, I prefer Lime Green Salad to Green Zebra. Why? Taste and productivity. It's a smaller tomato (more the size of Stupice), and the plants are very compact, but quite tasty and productive. I find Green Zebra to be a bit on the astringent side.

As far as I can tell you haven't selected any yellow tomatoes. One that I like a lot that I've found is pretty dependable and good-tasting is the old standard Lemon Boy.

Good luck! Sounds like you'll have some fun this year.

[tam91]

Brandy Boy is a hybrid pink tomato, tastes good and produces pretty well.

I like Lemon Boy also. It's not the strongest tasting, but quite nice in combo with a nice red and a dark tomato on a plate.

[joenorwood77]

Everyone here is so friendly and helpful. Thank you for your continued comments and insight!

[Douglas14]

Welcome to another MN grower! I live in central MN near Alexandria.

Miravsky Div was a great early tomato for me last year. I'm giving it another go this season. This could prove to be one of the best early varieties, but it doesn't seem to be very well known yet.

For a maincrop red variety, I really like Red Brandywine.

[eyolf]

I don't log on more than every few days, but great to see another MN grower. Near Duluth? Near enough to L. Superior to be affected by the cold water? Years ago a friend's mother in Two Harbors grew heat-lovers in her friend's garden away from the lake!

I have experimented with a number of earlies that do well: You're familiar with Stupice, and Kotlas, Kimberly, Matina, and Burwood Prize are very similar.

I have had pretty good luck with the following Canadian-bred varieties:
*Alpha (not Alpha pink)
*Canada Northstar
*Beaverlodge series (which are improvements of Vic Chanasyk's work including some of the sub-arctics)
*Melfort was bred as a commercial variey, and is the earliest slicer I know, beating Sophie's choice both in earliness and flavor.
*Pollock and Early Alberta are improved John Baer/Bonny Best varieties from Canada. Pollock is better than E.A., but both would be late for you if you're near the lake.
*Whippersnapper...intense yield of tiny cherries with a vague wild raspberry note to their flavor.

Others I enjoy are:
*IMur Prior Beta
*Kootenai is good, as is
*Orange Russian/Azoychka
*Polar series
*Roter Gnom (Swedish)
*Siberia
*Swift
*Tidlig Bush (Norway)

Of all these, Melfort and Pollock are favorites. PM me for seeds if you want.

[GaryStPaul]

The St.Paul Farmer's Market is about midway between Eden Prairie and Osceola. There are usually several vendors selling heirloom (and hybrid) tomatoes there—pretty good selection, I'd say. One of them, Jeff Adelman, has a copy of Carolyn's book on hand to show pics of some of some of the varieties he carries. I myself may have some to give away around Memorial Day weekend, if you're interested.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by Douglas14

Welcome to another MN grower! I live in central MN near Alexandria.

Miravsky Div was a great early tomato for me last year. I'm giving it another go this season. This could prove to be one of the best early varieties, but it doesn't seem to be very well known yet.

For a maincrop red variety, I really like Red Brandywine.

Doug, that's spelled Moravsky Div in case others might be looking for it and I agree that it's a terrific new variety, from Andrey in Belarus, that more folks should be aware of.

I've offered it here in my seed offers for I think the past two years and here's a link to Tania's page for it for other seed sources:

http://t.tatianastomatobase.com:88/wiki/Moravsky_Div

I'd check Sandhill as well, b'c I know that Glenn offered it last year and I would assume this year as well but I can't find my 2011 Sandhill catalog now and I'm too lazy to go to the website.

I used to grow quite a few earlies but decided that I could wait for some midseason ones since most, but not all, of the earlies are not distinguished by good taste, IMO. But Moravsly Div has a rich full bodied taste that I wouldn't expect in an early.

There's another one that I want to try one of these seasons and Jeff Casey offers it at his site, and I forget the full name now but Sion is part of the name.

Many years ago I was sent five crosses that Stanley Zubrowski in Canada did where he crossed Brandywine with Stupice and Glacier and I forget the other three now, trying to get some good taste into some earlies. And Jeff got F2 seeds from me for the Stupice cross and worked with it making selections and doing growouts until he got a stable OP.

I'm growing out several new varieties this season that Andrey sent me so will be looking for perhaps another great early from some of those.

But Moravsky Div is at the top of my list now for a great early.

[Idahowoman]

Victory seeds also sells Moravsky Div.

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by Idahowoman

Victory seeds also sells Moravsky Div.

Thanks, I should have rememebred that b'c I think I sent Mike the seeds.

As I said above, it's a huge task for Tania to update each year for every single variety where seeds are available.

And my memory was perfect until yesterday.

[Douglas14]

Thanks for the correction Carolyn. I've got to quit relying on my memory for some of these easier to mispell names LOL.
Moravsky Div had very good production and flavor for me last season. It's first fruit ripened before Kimberly(to be fair, I had one Kimberly plant and two Moravsky Div plants last year). It was quite a bit larger than Kimberly as well. Whereas Kimberly had a very nice sweet flavor, Moravsky Div had a delicious more balanced flavor. I'm looking forward to it again this year.