That's the song that plays in my head when I step onto the porch. If I had known these would get to be 6 feet tall, (1) they'd have proper cages, and (2) perhaps there'd be fewer of them, too. They've been pulled in from the edge of the porch so that our downstairs neighbor doesn't get bombed with perfectly ripe tomatillos.
One of them keeled over in a squall earlier this week, and we swiped an empty (metal?) bean pole to rig up better support. The tomatillos are staked with bamboo -- not strong enough. One of the other bamboo stakes snapped when the wind-stricken plant landed on it.
Looks like we'll have our first fruits in another week, maybe? And then there will be a lot of canning, I'm sure.
The other tomatoes are all minding their own business and bulging along. Cross your fingers that they're getting enough sunlight despite their space-hogging neighbors. (As you can see in the lower left corner, the peas are a lost cause.)
The Red Robin cherry tomato plants seem to be determined to not grow another millimeter, no matter how much fruit they set. It's like hunting for Easter eggs under the leaves.
Notes for next year:
- Buy a house with a yard
- Try basil from seed, in a large pot or two, after Jane's method
- Use cages for the monsters
- Maybe try some other plants, instead of all tomatoes... I like the salad table a lot.
- Suggestions welcome :)
I'm terribly impressed with the size of the tomatillo plants - obviously you have lots of sun for them and very good soil. When it comes time for a house, make sure the garden part of the yard will have sun. I live in the woods and over the past 20 years the trees have grown (the noive!) and now block all sun where the garden patch was. So sad in some ways...
It's wonderful you are striving to support the local farmers (Local Heros is what the ad campaign here in Western MA calls them) and the food is eversomuch better, isn't it?
Posted by: Leslie | July 28, 2007 at 07:29 PM
Yeah, it seems like we would have to make a choice between songbirds (shade) and a big garden (sun). Of course there's a happy medium, but there are a lot of wetland woods around here. If we find something bordered by conservation land it will likely be shaded.
The local food is definitely better! :)
Posted by: Korinthe | July 29, 2007 at 12:49 PM
Our Tomatillo plants were huge aswell. We had them in a sunny spot in grow bags and had to tie them up with bamboo and string and still they fell over. Next year I plan to put them in the garden instead as then the roots will be deeper and hopefully they will be sturdier. I live in the north UK so they have done really well! But I picked them all this morning and now have no idea what to do with them...It seems a shame to turn them into chutney (pickle) or to freeze all of them as we havn't the space. They would make more salsa than we could stand!!
And my plants had those weird root things too on thier stalks.
La
Posted by: Larissa | October 01, 2007 at 09:43 AM