Tomato disaster!

[Chippy Minton]

Had a disaster with my tomatoes, they were growing nicely in the greenhouse, one of those plastic jobs, unfortunatley a gust of wind blew it over. Now the problems, plants fine, labels scattered to the 4 corners, I have beautiful plants but no idea which variety is which, I have Red Alert, Black Russian and red and yellow Tumbling Tom. In order to locate them in the right environment I need to know which is which, at least which are the tumblers.

I've potted them on, will there come a point where I can tell or do I just hope?

[rustylady]

Oops, no idea how you will be able to tell the difference, specially at seedling stage.

[ninjajane]

I had all my seedlings doing well on a windowsill when I got burgled and they kicked several off the windowsill. I saved some, but they got mixed up and I grew some tomato teasers which I have no idea what's what, but they all seem happy and thriving (so far)

[CaroltheCarrot]

o thats horrible ninjajane,hope they caught the b**gers

[smallblueplanet]

...I have Red Alert, Black Russian and red and yellow Tumbling Tom. In order to locate them in the right environment I need to know which is which, at least which are the tumblers.

Well I think when the plants get bigger - maybe 10 inches or so? - then you'll be able to spot the Tumblings as they probably will have started trailing. The Red Alert & Black Russian are trickier, is either a potato leaf type?

But I think that you should be able to tell which is which when the plants are biggish, only the Black Russian is indeterminate and needs its side shoots removing, but it won't hurt if this isn't done straight away. So I'd treat them all the same...don't remove any side shoots and then when you can recognise the BR do it then.

[ninjajane]

no Carol, they think it was kids but I made a fair bit on the insurance (they valued my mac at today's replacement price rather than the devalued price! so you have to think silver linings ) but I'm proud of the victim seedlings that I have just repotted into their final pots. They are fighters obviously!

I do have 1 that's a potato leaf, think its a Berner rose, but I can't tell the difference with the others and treating them the same.

[Chippy Minton]

Thought I'd let you know how it panned out. Turns out one of the varieties was Red Alert, a bush, which I'd forgotten about. They were obviously smaller after a few weeks so 4 of those now on the kids window sills and the rest in a trough outside. The rest of the random tomatoes are planted, some in pots the others in a bed outside, for tomato surprise! My replacements in the greenhouse are a bit behind but hey ho!

[ninjajane]

surprises are good CM turned out 3 of my tomato teasers are tigerallas, very easy to identify and very prolific fruiters

[Chippy Minton]

Final word from this experiment - BLIGHT! Ho hum, the kids have fresh tomatoes on their window sills, just everything outside is brown mush. Lovely weather for the time of year....