[greentiger87]

I'm confused by your use of the term "root stock" - these are not grafted tomatoes, are they? Are these in the ground? What do you mean by "disease is a vector"?

I've overwintered tomatoes many times, but never on the scale I plan to do this year. Tomatoes, like the other nightshade vegetables, are very amenable to hard pruning. I often prune to stubs or foot tall "trunks" in the peak of summer to allow the plant to regrow for a fall crop. Only *indeterminate* tomatoes will do this reliably; determinate varieties will almost always die. Peppers and eggplant are so well suited for this that enthusiasts even refer to them as "bonsai".

Wild tomatoes are perennials in the tropics, so "overwintering" isn't all that unusual. However, I have much milder winters that you do, so that definitely aids my success. My disease problems are foliar only, so I don't have to worry about soil borne issues like southern blight/wilt.

As a side note, I've noticed that in my particular growing conditions, tomatoes can easily run out of magnesium by the time they produce a full crop. At one point, I was even mistaking magnesium deficiency for a devastating, defoliating fungal disease. A generous sprinkling of epsom salts along with a high nitrogen fertilizer is very helpful in promoting strong regrowth after hard pruning. Conditioning plants with potassium silicate (Dyna-gro Pro-Tekt or a similar product) and/or seaweed seems to improve cold tolerance and overwintering success.

I think you'd have an easier time and more success by taking cuttings and potting them up, supplementing them with grow lights indoors when the weather gets too cold. You may need to start a second set of cuttings from the 1st set to get plants that are manageable indoors until you can plant them out again. Tomatoes root from cuttings incredibly easily. Of course, this is only if you really want plants identical to the survivors.

Frankly though, you'd be much better off drooling over some new varieties and finding seeds for plants that are innately resistant to your major problems. There are just too many options to limit yourself to Super Beefsteak clones, whose survival may have had little to do with genetics.