More tomatoes started
March 22, 2026
tomatoes, vegetables | permalink
I was talking to neighbor CM yesterday, and she said she was going to try to start a small garden this year. I asked if she wanted tomatoes and what kind, so I started six more seeds of the bush round tomato that I'd saved seeds from on Sept 30 last year. While I was doing that, I also remembered that MH gave me Juliet tomato seeds last spring that I didn't up using (already had plenty started), so I threw six of those into some soil as well for him.
Updates:
- March 30:
- 5 bush tomato seedlings
- 2 Juliet seedlings
- Apr 1:
- 5 bush tomato seedlings
- 4 Juliet seddlings
- Apr 3: planted two Juliet seedlings in the cells where nothing came up
- Apr 13: potted up the Juliets
- Apr 14: potted up the bush tomatoes
Tomatoes, basils, and cauliflowers started
March 9, 2026
vegetables, tomatoes, herbs, cauliflower | permalink
In the basement, now under grow lights, I started the following seeds, in order from left to right by six-pack:
- 6 basil, collected from ones I grew last year
- 6 more basil, also from ones I grew
- 6 cherry/grape indeterminate, noted to be from a spouse favorite after a taste test, from a descendant of the original 2024 volunteer and packaged on Sept 8, 2025
- 6 cherry/grape indeterminate tomato seeds from the original 2024 volunteer
- 6 round bush heirlooms from March 31, 2025, from one of the store-bought tomatoes I used last year
- 6 round bush heirlooms from ones I grew, packaged on Sept 30, 2025. On the package I noted "Very good plant, seems to not get too big/little to no blight"
- about 20 cauliflower, bought from store, in a burlap roll, inspired by GrowVeg
Aside from maybe planting more of these if they don't all come up, I don't intend to start anything else inside.
Updates:
- March 14: 5 cauliflower seedlings are already up and about 3/4" tall.
- March 15, 4pm: 9 cauliflower seedlings now up
- March 16, noon:
- 10 cauliflower
- 1 basil
- 1 tomato (indeterminate, from Sept 8 2025)
- 5 tomato (indeterminate, from original 2024 volunteer)
- 3 tomato (bush, from Sept 30 2025)
- March 17, 10pm:
- 10 cauliflower
- 4 basil
- 5 tomato (indeterminate, from Sept 8 2025)
- 6 tomato (indeterminate, from original 2024 volunteer)
- 4 tomato (bush, from March 31 2025)
- 6 tomato (bush, from Sept 30 2025)
- March 18, 9pm:
- 12 cauliflower
- 4 basil
- 6 tomato (indeterminate, from Sept 8 2025)
- 6 tomato (indeterminate, from original 2024 volunteer)
- 4 tomato (bush, from March 31 2025)
- 6 tomato (bush, from Sept 30 2025)
- March 20, 9pm: 1 more basil
- March 23: 1 more basil
- March 25: 1 more basil (now 7)
- March 27:
- potted up all the tomatoes (with an extra from the original volunteer, since I apparently dropped two seeds in one cell)
- a couple of the bush tomatoes are starting to develop true leaves
- one of the cherries/grapes has a set of three initial leaves instead of two - haven't seen that before (in my limited experience). I noticed this a week or so ago but kept forgetting to note it.
- planted five basil seeds in the cells where the first ones didn't come up
- Apr 3: a cauliflower seedling has come up in one of the tomato pots
- Apr 8: I think it's broccoli, not cauliflower that came up in the tomato. Now there are four of them. And another tomato.
- Apr 12: potted up the round bush heirlooms from the Sept 30, 2025 seeds into bigger pots. I topped up the soil on all the other tomatoes.
- Apr 13: potted up the cauliflower. Lost one somewhere along the way so now there's 11.
Reaching peak tomato
August 4, 2025
vegetables, tomatoes, observations | permalink
Seems like today is the start of having a good amount of tomatoes every day for the rest of the growing season. It won't be long before we've reached our capacity to eat them and will need to give some away. Maybe two weeks? I may also make an extra batch or two of marina sauce to freeze.
Tomato starts
April 15, 2025
vegetables, observations, tomatoes | permalink
All the grape tomatoes planted from seeds (from last year's volunteer) on March 12 now have first true leaves. Two of the four heirloom tomatoes planted from seeds (from tomato bought from grocery store) on March 31 do as well; not sure the other two are going to survive. One of the five grape tomatoes (again, from last year's volunteer) started on March 19 has a true leaf, none yet on other 4.
Tomato starts
April 7, 2025
tomatoes, vegetables, observations | permalink
First (tiny) true leaves on a couple tomato seedlings have started.