This year I grew 3 different heritage tomatoes (all from Real Seeds), Baby Yellow Pear, Purple Ukraine and Urbikany.
Least successful was the Baby Yellow Pear. This is the 3rd year I’ve tried it and although I hate to criticise any heritage vegetable I really think it’s a waste of time. The seedlings were streets behind my other varieties, developing very slowly and only producing its first ripe tomato on the 1st September. The plants aren’t very productive either, I’m lucky to find 4 tomatoes a day from a dozen plants (and as you can see, they’re not too large!) and I have now had to pull them all up anyway as they’ve got mildew. The other two years they also got mildew very early, last year before they had even flowered!
So I’m afraid I won’t be growing Baby Yellow Pear again as it’s really been hopeless for me. It’s possible they might do much better in a tunnel or greenhouse, but as I have neither I’m not in a position to try this out.
Fairing much better was the Purple Ukraine. This was a healthy and vigorous plant, it set fruit early and had the first ripe tomatoes in the garden. They were absolutely delicious, very sweet with a really good flavour. Some of the tomatoes where HUGE! The only drawback is that the plants were irresistible to every slug, ant and wasp in the garden – way before they were ripe half the tomato had been eaten, and there didn’t seem any way of preventing this. (By the way, I’ve never seen a slug, ant or wasp on any other tomato varieties in my garden!?). I’m still going to plant them next year, because they really were so tasty that I can’t resist! If I can’t beat the bugs I will pick them green and use them for chutney as they are very fleshy inside; which is what I’m doing with the rest of this year’s crop.
By far the best tomato I’ve EVER grown was Urbikany, a new discovery this year! The plants are prolific and sturdy and I’m bringing in basketfuls like this every few days. The fruits are fairly small and perfectly round, at first glance they don’t look much (yes, it’s round and red, not very imaginive I know!) but the taste is really SUPERB! A really full-on tomato flavour! They’re also quite fleshy, so they are perfect in salads or cooked. I’ve used them in pasta sauces, tomato ketchup, etc and they are great. They’re also still going strong even with all the rain and gloom we’ve had this year, and it looks as though they’ll keep producing for quite a while yet.
I’ve kept piles of seeds, and next year this will be my main tomato crop, with maybe a few Purple Ukraines for variety.
Laura said
Hi there
I also garden in France in a small farm in the Cevennes. I came to your blog from Hills and Plains Seedsavers and its great. Glad i found it and will be back I’ve added you to my blogroll.
I grew a lot of heritage tomatoes this year and will have seeds to swap if you would like to try some of the vars I grew this year. I will be posting my best of and seed swapping list in the next week or so. I would like to try the Purple Ukraines and the Urbikany. I’ve been looking for a good smallish red tomato for slcing and your experience of it sounds pretty impressive.
M. T. Nester said
I read once that you can put the baby tomatoes down inside a length of pantyhose or knee-highs and tie it up loosely at the stem end. Supposed to keep bugs and creepy-crawlies from munching on your ‘maters while the stretchy fabric expands with the growing fruit. Never tried it myself, but sounds like it might work.
Scarlet said
Who said gardening and lingerie don’t go together?!
Sounds like a good idea, I’ll give it a try next year and let you know if it works!
mamawhatthe said
I love “review” posts like this. It helps narrow things down when confronting the seed catalogs and wondering “but what’s it REALLY like?”. Sadly, my tomatoes were mostly a bust this year. But that just means it’s game-on next year!