My Plan for Early Tomatoes/Updated 4/13 w/pics

[NJCher]

I'm going to plant seeds in a few days, however first I will warm up the soil using Wall O Waters and red mulch sheets. This would be five weeks before normal seed planting outdoors for tomatoes.

I have Wall O Waters, probably about five.



I saw a youtube video where someone did this using only Wall O Waters and by May 15, their tomato plants were 4' tall. They, however, were using seedlings. I'm using seeds because I'll be doing this at the school gardens and I won't be able to watch them as closely as if I did them at home (hardiness issue).



I ordered Turbo Tomato mulch sheets (enough to cover four raised beds).
Here's what advantage the sheets have (I edited, snipped from retailer):

12-20% Increase in Your Tomato Crop

--Outperforms black plastic mulches
--Warms the soil and controls weeds
--Use for tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, melons and more
--Can last 2 or more seasons (my cost for 4 was $34)

Lay this red plastic mulch down a few weeks before you transplant tomato seedlings to the garden. It'll warm the soil for those tender transplants. Leave down after planting, and it'll retain moisture and suppress weeds. Because water doesn't pass though the mulch, water your tomato plants with a drip irrigation system under the mulch or at the base of the plants.

Can last two or more seasons.

I'm also doing cucumber and eggplant.

April 13: I received my package and rolled out the first one this morning.



First, however, I filled the bed with new soil, compost, and organic matter. The black crate you see below makes a great "free" sifter for compost, getting out all the sticks, rocks, and large seeds from trees.



Cut it, put the rest back in the package, and found more rocks to hold it down.





The next steps will be to cut an X where I want my tomato seeds to go and water them.

Before I put the red sheeting on, I dug down into the ground. It was 89 degrees here today but it was cold in the ground.

[CrispyQ]

1. Homegrown tomatoes. My mouth waters.

Years ago I worked at a company with a small group of engineers. One lived by a lake & one by a river & that summer they started a competition to see whose tomatoes were the best, lake water or river water. Every Friday, we'd all bring in our favorite sandwich makings & judge tomatoes. Those were some of the best sandwiches I ever had!

Now, I spend money on heirloom tomatoes if my friend doesn't have extras from her garden.

Do you can, too?

[NJCher]

2. Do tell

What was the best: lake or river water? Judging tomatoes with friends or co-workers sounds like so much fun.

I have canned before and I have the jars and other items needed to do it, but the last few years we've been roasting tomatoes with basil and garlic and then we put them in gallon containers using a gallon-sized plastic bag. We put them on a cookie tin to make them perfectly flat, then stack them in the freezer.

If I can this year, I think I'll can chutneys, specialty salsas, and relishes with cucumbers, corn, coriander seeds, etc.

[CrispyQ]

3. LOL.

Well, none of us really wanted to say one was better than the other so we left it to our manager, who also didn't want that responsibility, so he flipped a coin & river won. The prize was a cute little clay pot shaped & painted like a tomato but the real prize was the fun we had.

How clever to freeze your tomatoes on cookie sheets! Good luck with your garden this year!