It has been a pleasure to grow tomatoes this year.  After several years of drought, it was so nice to give them the water they needed and not just be in survival mode.  And they did thrive.  I planted the paste tomato ‘San Marzano', a ‘Super Sweet 100' cherry tomato and a ‘Carmello' that was billed as having a long growing season.  I think all three varieties lived up to that promise.

     In fact, they all continued to flower and fruit during our warm November and even into December.  This season I had enough to share with my mom, who seemed to love my tomato deliveries.  Now I do remember having to pull in green tomatoes in the past due to impending hard freezes.

     But this year was different. We got a lot of rain in December.  The soil in our raised bed was soggy.  What I saw happening with the ‘Carmello' and ‘San Marzano' varieties was the development of deep cracks on the stem end of the tomatoes as the fruit enlarged.  Now the cracks were an open door for any nearby fungus or bacteria.  Many times, by the time the fruit was fully ripe it was unusable.

    So, I decided to pull all the tomatoes off.  The cracked ones I put in the kitchen to watch and see if there would be anything salvageable after they ripened.  The smaller un-cracked tomatoes I put on a covered tray out in the cool garage.  There I think they will slowly ripen.  And if for some reason they don't, I have several good recipes for green tomatoes!

     Now interestingly, the ‘Super Sweet 100' did not seem to have the cracking problem. So, I left them all still growing on the vine.  They aren't ripening as quickly in the cool temperatures, but I am just thankful they are still growing.  So, until we have a hard freeze…