The very large tomato thread

[Gerardo]

Great site Mark. I've been digesting the Haifa Tomato info and I really like the specifics per growth stage, plus the adjustments based on your particular growing situation.

Those Polyfeeds are quite appealing. It would be a lot of fun to fine tune the parameters just to see how far I could get it.

[carolyn137]

Which varieties with fused blossoms? I can't make a list but almost exclusively large pink fruited PL varieties and always on initial blossoms, the next flush of blossoms, rarely.

Carolyn, who had no use for the large monster fruits that were malformed to an extreme so removed those fused blossoms ASAP, much to the chagrin I'm sure of Marv Meissner who wrote the book on how to grow big ones and is still a friend.

Carolyn

[Gerardo]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

...much to the chagrin I'm sure of Marv Meissner who wrote the book on how to grow big ones and is still a friend.

Carolyn

I ordered his book from Amazon. Used. Let's just say shipping was more than the product itself.

[AKmark]

When are you guys starting your plants? Don't overlook Delicious and Terhune, not the potato leaf version of Terhune.

[carolyn137]

I think you folks should check with the varieties that Marv Meissner suggests since he wrote the book.

I could suggest some, perhaps I did earlier in this thread, I can't remember, but I still suggest looking at Marv suggestions and there are other links to a person who just grew THE biggest tomato which I'm sure you can find on Google.

https://www.google.com/search?q=Marv..._AUIBigA&dpr=1

Also check out the BIG Pumpkin site on Google where the BIG tomato folks hang out and wheel and deal seeds.

Carolyn

[Gerardo]

Originally Posted by AKmark

When are you guys starting your plants? Don't overlook Delicious and Terhune, not the potato leaf version of Terhune.

I'm gonna give suggestion #22 a shot. I have a large concrete pot that's easily 40+ gal, I'm gonna transfer two healthy indeterminate plants from 7 gal containers, keep them healthy, and a few months from now use them as surrogate parents for the larger children.

[Deborah]

After the picture taking, ribbons won and all that, do the growers actually eat these? Or make sauce?

[AKmark]

Carolyn, please do throw a couple of names out here, let us give them a try, everyone uses the other varieties in the mega size tomato, tomato circle. I think you surely could think of a couple varieties that have traits we want.

[Ricky Shaw]

^ Yeppers, this right here. I've got a few Big Zac F1's starting life now.

[lubadub]

Hello Carolyn. I saw some growers asking what varieties of seed they should try in order to grow big. Some of the seeds that have produced large tomatoes in the past include Delicious (Hunt Strain), Brutus Magnum, Big Zac and Megamarv. More recently success has come from growing Big Zac offshoots, F5, F6, F7 and F8 Big Zacs. The lines that have come through more recently Fabrice Boudyo from France have done the best having produced 2 tomatoes over 8 pounds with one breaking the world record set by Gordon Graham over 20 years ago. Seeds for the Big Zac offshoots can be obtained through growers posting mostly on Bigpumpkins.com and probably on Ebay as well. They will be sold in auctions later this year and early next. By contacting the growers you might be able to get some free. The thing about these seeds that make them worth growing is that they produce lots of fused blossoms and even single tomatoes may get over 3 pounds. Good luck! Anyone determined to get these seeds should have little difficulty since most of the growers give seeds away free is you send them a SASE. Marv

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by lubadub

Hello Carolyn. I saw some growers asking what varieties of seed they should try in order to grow big. Some of the seeds that have produced large tomatoes in the past include Delicious (Hunt Strain), Brutus Magnum, Big Zac and Megamarv. More recently success has come from growing Big Zac offshoots, F5, F6, F7 and F8 Big Zacs. The lines that have come through more recently Fabrice Boudyo from France have done the best having produced 2 tomatoes over 8 pounds with one breaking the world record set by Gordon Graham over 20 years ago. Seeds for the Big Zac offshoots can be obtained through growers posting mostly on Bigpumpkins.com and probably on Ebay as well. They will be sold in auctions later this year and early next. By contacting the growers you might be able to get some free. The thing about these seeds that make them worth growing is that they produce lots of fused blossoms and even single tomatoes may get over 3 pounds. Good luck! Anyone determined to get these seeds should have little difficulty since most of the growers give seeds away free is you send them a SASE. Marv

Marv, thanks for stopping by and there are two items I want to ask you about.

First, at another message site Dale just listed his varieties today, and I know you know him and was going to ask you first if it would be OK to ask him if I could post it here when I realized he's already public and here's his website/

http://www.gianttomatoseeds.com/index.html

I didn't check his prices but thought it might be useful for those in this thread to take a look at it.

Now Brutus, and I'm confused here.

I was sent seeds by Andrey in Belarus a couple of years ago who described it as Brutus and said......Polish CV ( commercial variety, cjm), red,ribbed, indet, giant, 500 to 2000 gms

Then I look at Tania's page for it and see

http://tatianastomatobase.com/wiki/Brutus

And from the Czech Republic, and Vladamir posts here a lot and has been very helpful to many in terms of histories, his spanish tomato project and more.

then I look at Tania's page as follows

http://tatianastomatobase.com/wiki/B...b=General_Info

Then I look at the following and find your name

http://tatianastomatobase.com/wiki/B...b=General_Info

The person who originally grew the Brutus from Andrey kind of disappeared, so I found most of the seeds that the person had and sent them to Bill Minkey in WI for seed production this past summer.

Just noting here that Dale in a list had changed the name he had to Brutus Magnum

And here's the report I got back from Bill.

I sent it to him as Brutus but he sent it back as Giant Brutus, I think a simple error on his part. And I'veknownBill for years and he's a very experienced tomato grower and seed producer

Ind, RL,Red beefsteak, ribbed, very good to excellent flavor, around 24 oz.

Still with me?

So do I have Brutus Magnum and if so is it from Poland or the Czech Republic?

I have seeds for it and planned on listing it in my upcoming seed offer, whenever.

Carolyn

[AKmark]

Marv, Glad you chimed in, we are pumped, and ready to go.

[AKmark]

I had to try some Boudyo Big Zac, that was a stab in the wallet

[Gerardo]

Originally Posted by AKmark

I had to try some Boudyo Big Zac, that was a stab in the wallet

Ouch indeed, a karambit said hello to your wallet for those bad boys. Let's hope they produce the big one.

Patiently awaiting the arrival of Marv's book.

[KarenO]

You guys need a woman in this contest.
Where is Pa Julia? I think there should be two categories. One for big ugly fused messes and one for big beautiful singles. (Such as the one in my avatar.... )

KarenO