We've been picking tomatoes for the past two weeks or so and whilst the
quantity of fruit per truss is normal, the size of individual toms is
very small this year.......about 60% on a truss are the size of cherry
types such as Gardeners Delight !

We've never had this problem before. The compost mix, watering, feeding,
greenhouse ventilation and variety (Shirley and Gourmet) etc are all as
previous years, but the toms are just small !
Even my single plant of Beefsteak type has undersize fruit.

No signs of disease or pests. Peppers and chillies using the same
compost are great.

As most of the toms are ripe or colouring nicely its probably too late
to do anything about increasing the size this year but I wonder if
anyone has suggestions to prevent this happening in future.

Plants are in 3gall buckets on the greenhouse floor.

Best Regards...pp

p. pleater wrote:

We've been picking tomatoes for the past two weeks or so and whilst the
quantity of fruit per truss is normal, the size of individual toms is
very small this year.......about 60% on a truss are the size of cherry
types such as Gardeners Delight !

Same here. Also the total crop is well down on last year. The weather
perhaps? Too wet and damp?
Mine grown ring culture in very large re-cycled plastic pots about 4
gallon capacity.

Peter
--
He spoke with a certain what-is-it in his voice, and I
could see that, if not actually disgruntled, he was far
from being gruntled.
P.G. Wodehouse 1881 -1975

"p. pleater" wrote in message
...
We've been picking tomatoes for the past two weeks or so and whilst the
quantity of fruit per truss is normal, the size of individual toms is very
small this year.......about 60% on a truss are the size of cherry types
such as Gardeners Delight !

We've never had this problem before. The compost mix, watering, feeding,
greenhouse ventilation and variety (Shirley and Gourmet) etc are all as
previous years, but the toms are just small !
Even my single plant of Beefsteak type has undersize fruit.

No signs of disease or pests. Peppers and chillies using the same compost
are great.

As most of the toms are ripe or colouring nicely its probably too late to
do anything about increasing the size this year but I wonder if anyone has
suggestions to prevent this happening in future.

Plants are in 3gall buckets on the greenhouse floor.

Best Regards...pp


Same as mine also, must be the weather

"p. pleater" wrote in message
...
We've been picking tomatoes for the past two weeks or so and whilst the
quantity of fruit per truss is normal, the size of individual toms is very
small this year.......about 60% on a truss are the size of cherry types
such as Gardeners Delight !

We've never had this problem before. The compost mix, watering, feeding,
greenhouse ventilation and variety (Shirley and Gourmet) etc are all as
previous years, but the toms are just small !
Even my single plant of Beefsteak type has undersize fruit.

No signs of disease or pests. Peppers and chillies using the same compost
are great.

As most of the toms are ripe or colouring nicely its probably too late to
do anything about increasing the size this year but I wonder if anyone has
suggestions to prevent this happening in future.

Plants are in 3gall buckets on the greenhouse floor.

Best Regards...pp



Same here, last year the Gardeners Delight were almost golf ball sized, this
year they are tiny, like marbles!! And the trusses are extremely elongated.
I'm glad it's not just me, I was worried.

Kase
Manchester

On 4 Aug, 21:43, "Kase" wrote:
"p. pleater" wrote in message

...





We've been picking tomatoes for the past two weeks or so and whilst the
quantity of fruit per truss is normal, the size of individual toms is very
small this year.......about 60% on a truss are the size of cherry types
such as Gardeners Delight !

We've never had this problem before. The compost mix, watering, feeding,
greenhouse ventilation and variety (Shirley and Gourmet) etc are all as
previous years, but the toms are just small !
Even my single plant of Beefsteak type has undersize fruit.

No signs of disease or pests. *Peppers and chillies using the same compost
are great.

As most of the toms are ripe or colouring nicely its probably too late to
do anything about increasing the size this year but I wonder if anyone has
suggestions to prevent this happening in future.

Plants are in 3gall buckets on the greenhouse floor.

Best Regards...pp

Same here, last year the Gardeners Delight were almost golf ball sized, this
year they are tiny, like marbles!! And the trusses are extremely elongated.
I'm glad it's not just me, I was worried.

Kase
Manchester- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Am I right in thinking this year's summer has been generally colder
than last year's (which was, if anything, more rainy)? There've
certainly been lots of north and east winds. Maybe it's that as well
as lack of sun.

"Ornata" wrote in message
...
On 4 Aug, 21:43, "Kase" wrote:
"p. pleater" wrote in message

...





We've been picking tomatoes for the past two weeks or so and whilst
the
quantity of fruit per truss is normal, the size of individual toms
is very
small this year.......about 60% on a truss are the size of cherry
types
such as Gardeners Delight !

We've never had this problem before. The compost mix, watering,
feeding,
greenhouse ventilation and variety (Shirley and Gourmet) etc are all
as
previous years, but the toms are just small !
Even my single plant of Beefsteak type has undersize fruit.

No signs of disease or pests. Peppers and chillies using the same
compost
are great.

As most of the toms are ripe or colouring nicely its probably too
late to
do anything about increasing the size this year but I wonder if
anyone has
suggestions to prevent this happening in future.

Plants are in 3gall buckets on the greenhouse floor.

Best Regards...pp

Same here, last year the Gardeners Delight were almost golf ball
sized, this
year they are tiny, like marbles!! And the trusses are extremely
elongated.
I'm glad it's not just me, I was worried.

Kase
Manchester- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

Am I right in thinking this year's summer has been generally colder
than last year's (which was, if anything, more rainy)? There've
certainly been lots of north and east winds. Maybe it's that as well
as lack of sun.

That's a good point regarding temperature. One of the things we
particularly noticed this year was the very rapid and wide temperature
fluctuations in the g/house.
We were saying only recently that this year seems to be a never ending
cool April season....showers and shine. Low dull weather GH temps would
rocket within seconds to almost 100 as cloud cleared the sun, then drop
to chilly just as quickly.
Of course temperature changes are nothing new, but it does seem the
swings are maybe more extreme so far......but it could be just
imagination and me clutching at straws here?

Another thing we've noticed is that the fruit have tougher skins,
particularly the smaller ones.

pp, in Notts.

On Tue, 5 Aug 2008 19:29:25 +0100, "p. pleater"
wrote and included this (or some of this):

That's a good point regarding temperature. One of the things we
particularly noticed this year was the very rapid and wide temperature
fluctuations in the g/house.
We were saying only recently that this year seems to be a never ending
cool April season....showers and shine. Low dull weather GH temps would
rocket within seconds to almost 100 as cloud cleared the sun, then drop
to chilly just as quickly.
Of course temperature changes are nothing new, but it does seem the
swings are maybe more extreme so far......but it could be just
imagination and me clutching at straws here?

Another thing we've noticed is that the fruit have tougher skins,
particularly the smaller ones.

Colder temperatures = harder/thicker skins

(Compare outdoor and greenhouse tomatoes)


--
®óñ© © ²°¹°-°²

In article , p. pleater
writes


Another thing we've noticed is that the fruit have tougher skins,
particularly the smaller ones.

pp, in Notts.




That's what we were thinking about the tumbler ones or something similar
which we are growing as an experiment in a pot on the patio. They
thrived much better and have been cropping for three weeks yet my
sungold on the vegetable beds up the top of the garden have yet to get
very ripe.
We thought it was the variety but maybe I'll have another go next year
then as they certainly are earlier.

No sign of blight yet! Fingers crossed!
--
Janet Tweedy
Dalmatian Telegraph
http://www.lancedal.demon.co.uk

I grow only Gardeners Delight and in 8 litre pots. I've been cropping for 6 weeks. No problems with size, but I do feed well and cut back if I think they are growing too big so that they won't lose their flavour. Out of a dozen plants one decided not to grow more that 2 trusses. Most of the tomatoes on the second truss were a bit small - down to about one inch- but contained about a hundred tomatoes. Too many to want to count
bigal west wales.