Dwarf Growers: "How did your garden grow?"

[Greatgardens]

The section under the Project Dwarfs for reporting results is not easy for general use (IMO) due to the number of threads and being grouped by family rather than variety. So I think this might be easier -- how did your Dwarfs do for 2018?

What did you especially like? Ditto for dislikes. Any particularly noteworthy characteristics that you found -- such as longer bearing, better disease resistance, very good flavor? I have a whole thread: http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=47389

But I can summarize the highlights pretty easily (grown in Earthboxes in 5b).

Best in show: (Dwarf) Coastal Pride Orange (not a Project Dwarf). A 4-10 oz. production machine -- good flavor, rugged plant, very long bearing, pretty fair foliage disease resistance, pretty good shelf life. All-around Blue Ribbon Winner for me!

Best repeat winner: Dwarf Pink Passion (heart). Early, smallish 3-6 oz, very good production, fairly long bearing, good mild flavor, very few cracks and splits.

Best newcomer: Dwarf Velvet Night. Small 1-3 oz "cherries," great flavor, good production. Fair amount of splitting. More disease prone than others. But I'll definitely plant this again -- it's taste is that good!

Biggest disappointment: Better Bush hybrid -- virtually every fruit had radial cracking. Puzzling, because this is different than my past experience with this "old-timer." Really poor disease resistance for a hybrid.

Also-rans: Dwarf Golden Heart (a really weak heart shape, but did produce a long time), Dwarf Purple Heart (lots of disease), Dwarf Arctic Rose (lots of odd-ball shapes), Perth Pride (a splitting machine), Husky Cherry Red hybrid (not very sweet + lots of disease), Chocolate Lightning (decent tomato, but a flavor I just didn't like).

And of course, these are just my opinions, but may give you some ideas if you are thinking about growing some of them.

-GG

[habitat_gardener]

Tasmanian Chocolate was pretty good for a month, but for the past couple weeks has been producing only small (guessing 2 oz.) fruits; maybe weather related?

[GrowingCoastal]

Tasmanian Chocolate and Boronia are my two new-to-me great tasting dark dwarfs this year. Hot all summer and had yellow shoulders on the TC fruit which were exposed to the hot sun.

Wherokowhai was another new one for me this year. Good balanced flavour and fruity. I would grow these 3 again.


Tasty Wine is another new one for me but I am finding the fruit a little bland tasting so I don't think I'll grow this one again.


All were grown in 5 gal. pots.

[MickyT]

I was blown away by Tasmanian Chocolate this year. It is my first experience with a dwarf and it is the most productive out of about 35 varieties, the plant has produced 19lbs of perfect tomatoes and still going. The plant is about 5' tall now.

On the other hand Better Bush F1 is an all around disappointment. Husky Cherry Red is OK.

I think I will try a lot more dwarfs next year.

[Greatgardens]

@MickyT -- how did TC do as regards cracking/splitting?


@everyone -- who grew any of the new dwarf cherry tomato releases? Any of the Bendigo varieties or Dwarf Mary's Cherry? What did you think?

[Labradors2]

deleted

[MickyT]

Originally Posted by Greatgardens

@MickyT -- how did TC do as regards cracking/splitting?

TC didn't have any cracking, catfacing or BER, just perfect tomatoes. (They are on the right side of the tray in picture)

[ScottinAtlanta]

Wild Fred as always my best producer. Perth Pride a close second. They seem to like hot weather.

[Greatgardens]

Really nice looking tomatoes, MickyT!

[greenthumbomaha]

That is quite a haul. I am getting ideas for a small neighbor grandchild 4 X 4 garden from last years mmmm contributions.


Do you know what the large tomato with the radial cracking is in the left of the tray? It looks strangely familiar to me


- Lisa

[oakley]

Thank you for starting this post GG in the 'general discussion' section.

I have wanted to do the same for those not yet jumping into the Dwarf releases.
Just last season for the first time, 2017, I grew project unreleased as well as a few released
varieties and will add a few more 2019.

I battled some leaf mold early on and the thick stemmed dwarfs did much better than my
leggy indeterminate heirlooms. Something a southern grower may want to try.
(we have had southern heat and humidity in the NorthEast.) Still unseasonal heat at 95 today.

Excited to add TC and other darks next year.

[clkeiper]

MickyT those look great in the photo. well done!

I had good and bad.
I grew dwarf purple heart in several different places. One in a greenhouse right in the soil, one in a pot, one in the garden right along other dwarf's and non dwarfs and a friend took one home too. the pot and the one in the outside garden? not ONE tomato on either plant I finally pulled them last week. they were wasting my time. the one my friend took home produced long before the one in my greenhouse.. but the ones I ate were fabulous.
dwarf golden gypsy did better for me this year than ever before. some years they were pretty stingy in giving fruit.
dwarf lemon ice-- I have no idea how it got to a marketable variety if anyone else's looked like mine. spindly, hardly any fruit. both plants. one main stem and a couple of fruits which pulled it down in a heap on the ground.

and the dwarf project this year? every one was grown in my front yard far away from the rest of my garden and they did wonderful. no water except to get planted and whatever rain we got. they look great and have a heavy fruit load on them.

[Greatgardens]

@clkeiper-
Did you by chance grow any of the new dwarf project cherries? There are 3 Bendigo varieties, so evidently the developers/selectors thought they were good and sufficiently different from each other to merit releasing them all.

[Hunt-Grow-Cook]

I grew Velvet Night and Pink Opal, both tasted fantastic imo. Assertive and intense but still balanced by some sweetness. Production was so-so, they were grown in grow bags and admittedly didn't get the proper attention as compared to the rest of the garden. Will certainly be trying both again next year.

[MickyT]

Originally Posted by Greatgardens

Really nice looking tomatoes, MickyT!

Originally Posted by clkeiper

MickyT those look great in the photo. well done!

Thank you!!!

Originally Posted by greenthumbomaha

That is quite a haul. I am getting ideas for a small neighbor grandchild 4 X 4 garden from last years mmmm contributions.


Do you know what the large tomato with the radial cracking is in the left of the tray? It looks strangely familiar to me


- Lisa

Lisa, that one is from a plant that I bought as a seedling which was just labeled "Brandywine" so I don't know which particular Brandywine strain that is. But it's very tasty and the fruits didn't have that cracking for most of the season, just recently. This is the biggest tomato from that plant earlier in the season.