2013 Project Photos

[Boutique Tomatoes]

For 2013 I've gone even bigger, planning on continuing to build a local market for something other than your standard red and yellow slicer varieties. After last years market research and evaluation grow out of around 200 varieties I trimmed down the number of varieties and this year am growing around 150 lines, primarily salad size, cherries, currants and a few rows of slicers and my sausage paste types that I use for salsa.

I've got a much smaller number at home, mostly the varieties I am using in crosses this year.

It didn't seem like it would take as much time as it does when I was planning it all out. I need to finish weeding Saturday and if we get some rain to soften things up a bit it will help with pounding stakes next week.




While my breeding efforts from this point forward are going to be more focused, I still have a fair number of segregating lines in this years grow out. I've also got several hundred plants from 65 (?) of Tom Wagner's lines.
Because it was my interest in the blue lines that triggered my interest in breeding, I've got a lot of those. 57 lines in the field are 'blue' tomatoes.

These next two fruits are different plants in a segregating line that has both stripes and antho, it looks like I will have a least one elongated cherry type and one saladette sized version. There are about 20 plants from this cross in the field, these two were just next to each other yesterday when I was weeding so I sat down and took pictures.





It was a horribly late and wet spring, so I have lost a few plants. However, temperatures have been very mild, pretty much perfect for fruit set.



I'm not really looking to start farming, but to build a local market for unique varieties and facilitate my breeding projects. I'm hoping to involve a couple of other local projects so that I end up getting a cooperating grower started at some point down the road. I'll post some more specifics about the project sometime soon.

[Redbaron]

Facinating

[PA_Julia]

Very very interesting!!

[Boutique Tomatoes]

The gestation of the project idea came from people asking me if I sold tomatoes the past few years and the interest of some friends who own a popular local restaurant. In the past year multiple programs in the area have been started to provide access to land for market gardeners/farmers in exchange for a portion of the produce to be donated to local food pantries. I talked to people from Goodwill and the city about the possibility of doing something this year at a location downtown, but there was a glitch because it was next to the river and supposedly the DNR needed to be involved. That was going to push into the summer so this year the 'farm' is at a friends house.

The general idea is that I'm going to do the leg work to prove a market exists and have all the materials needed along with a customer list, experience and numbers to show that this can make a profit (even in a rough year). This will allow me to partner with someone in one of the market grower programs next year and have some 'skin in the game' (but hopefully not spend all my spare time in the field next year).

Next year working with the UW Extension office we'll apply for a USDA crop development grant to develop 'boutique' tomato varieties incorporating disease resistance genetics, something I am starting the crosses for now. The majority of the grant funds would be earmarked for doing Marker Assisted Selection testing of breeding lines, which is a stumbling block for small breeders.

If it all comes together I can help someone start a business, indulge my breeding interests, improve the local food offerings and possibly do something good for the tomato world. Now to hope I don't burn out or have my wife decide I'm spending too much time playing farmer this year...

[Mashman]

If I didn't know better, I would say you are into it Mark.... Always fascinated with your pics..... keep them coming...much appreciated on this end...

Michael

[madddawg]

I m interested in what you got going on there. I will try to keep up with ya.

[Boutique Tomatoes]

Originally Posted by Mashman

If I didn't know better, I would say you are into it Mark.... Always fascinated with your pics..... keep them coming...much appreciated on this end...

Michael

Just a little. I've already been giving impromptu garden tours when people see me out in the field and come over to see the depths of my obsession.

Right now I'm a happy camper, I got fertilizer down on Saturday and woke up to the sound of rain today. Looks like we'll get a steady rain for 4-5 hours today, a chance of another storm tomorrow afternoon and then a week of sunshine in the high 70's and low 80's according to the forecast. Maybe Mother Nature decided to take pity on me finally.

And I already had one hopeful chef text me asking if I had any early ones ripe yet this weekend because they were working on a new menu...

[Boutique Tomatoes]

Rain came down a little longer and harder than I would have liked...



A good year to select for disease resistance, I just wish so much fertilizer wasn't ending up in the creek.

[Redbaron]

Mark,
Might want to take a peek at the Red Baron Project. Far less damages from that kind of flooding.

[Boutique Tomatoes]

There is a creek at the edge of the field there that flooded, in the corner the water was probably more than a foot deep.

My goals are a little different than yours, I want to develop boutique varieties that do well in standard field cultivation conditions and diseases here in the Midwest. Unfortunately alternating flooding and drought conditions are all too common. ;-)

One of the new varieties that seems to be thriving is Lee Goodwin's Starfire Isis. Some of the varieties around it are denuded sticks with a clump of healthy leaves at the top where the Starfire Isis plants are bushy and healthy with no signs of disease. I need to ask Lee what it's background is again...

[Redbaron]

AHA, very true Mark! Since you want to develop boutique varieties that do well in standard field cultivation conditions and diseases, I guess it is up to me to try and change what is considered "standard field cultivation conditions". Hopefully for the better!

[tlintx]

That's nice to hear about the Starfire Isis, as it's one of my summer plants and I'm hoping it does well!


Tl

[Boutique Tomatoes]

Some of the early cherries are starting to ripen now, my daughter Katie stayed with me today so she could help in the patch. Checking the bottom branches of more than a quarter mile of tomato rows she found the first full quart.



Since we're all about the tomatoes here, a shot of just the tomatoes.


We're growing a lot of currant types this year because the chefs we took tomatoes to last year went gaga over them. This is Gold Nugget Currant.



Indigo Kumquat is a new F1 antho variety I'm trying this year. I expect I will grow out seeds next year to see what happens, as the tiny plum/grape tomatoes are intriguing. The one on the far left there is ripe, these have a lot more antho color than the catalog picture showed.



Treasure Trove is a yellow cherry from Tom Wagner.



As part of my search for an antho currant type I'm growing out some of this Bosque Blue x Ted's Pink Currant from Cornbreadlouie.



I'm also growing out some of ChrisK's F1 crosses from last year. There are 4 plants of all of the ones I took, but I've got to go out and number each plant of this Sungold cross because of the possible variation from using the F1...



I'm going to head out and start taking pictures of some of the interesting things showing up in the antho grow outs, even though they are still green they have me excited about what's to come....

[Mashman]

You have the magic touch Mark.

Michael

[Boutique Tomatoes]

Mostly a combination of obsessive, lucky and having the time and space to grow a lot of plants.

The Blue Green Zebra that I found last year from Tom Wagner's Blue Green was interesting and unique so I grew out a dozen plants of it this year. Last year it was a salad size, this year I have a couple of plants showing what look to be bigger fruits.



I've got about 50 plants of various woolly lines this year. This one is Tigerpillar from Tom Wagner.



Quite a few of the woolly plants are derived from Tom's Seattle Woolly Blue Mammoth, this one is a selection I got from Heritage. It has woolly foliage, fuzzy skin, stripes and antho.



Unfortunately a few plants aren't tagged in the field. I believe this is also from SWBM, but I'm not sure of the seed source. It's similar to the one above, but the striping pattern and fruit set is different.