Where Did All The Tomato Plants Come From?

I’m a late middle aged software engineer that has never gotten the farm out of his system. I grew up on a small farm in Pennsylvania, mostly corn, and to this day some of my happiest memories are from the farm.

A few years ago I started a small (8’x12’) tomato patch. Small, because where I now live we have no soil, only clay. So just digging that patch was a good physical workout. I’ve spent the last 7 years mulching it with leaves (ours and all those I could acquire from our neighbors), grass clippings, etc. That patch is now a 25’x25’ patch that produced a bounty of tomatoes and peppers last year. I know, I said tomato patch but one has to branch out (plus my daughter loves grilled peppers, onions and mushrooms).

The last few years I’m sure my neighbors have been talking about the crazy guy in the neighborhood, you know, the one that has a fenced in garden plot piled high with everyone’s leaves. Well I’m the one smiling now, because after these 7 years when I roto-tilled the patch (we’ll talk about the tiller acquisition another time), there is beautiful dark soil instead of clay. I can vouch for how far the dirt has come because my daughter and I teamed up and expanded the garden to a second 35’x45’ patch (she’s into plants that like to stretch out – squash, etc.). The new garden is just a big clay patch; literally you can make figures out of the clumps as you work it. It’s going to take a few more years to bring this patch into shape.

Ok, back to the tomatoes. When we ordered seeds this year, I as usual went a little overboard on varieties (8). This is the first year the little guys were started in Cow Pots (I love these creations), the 6” square variety. Well, with all that space and lots of seeds, what else could I do but put 4 or 5 seeds in each pot? Of course virtually all the seeds germinated which left a big sad job, having to prune back the sprouts. My daughter always reminds me of how I can never seem to pull out the smaller sprouts leaving just the big guys. I was determined to take on the task this year, and then it happened. I saw the spare Cow Pots sitting there when I was about to do the deed. Wait, rather than pull out and kill the little sprouts I decided to “transplant” them. The odds weren’t in my favor, I figured they wouldn’t make it but at least I’d have tried. Well, the original 24 tomato plants became 100 tomato plants after all the transplants were successful.

Now, add to the bounty of these initial plants, the other (haven’t counted) tomato plants that I’ve since started (a few varieties I just had to try).

So, the short answer to this posts’ question is they came from my inability to not bring to fruition every little seed that germinated!

~Dennis