Tomatoes

[nippie]

Why do my lovely seemingly ripe tomatoes have a ring of hard unripe flesh around them when I cut them in half?
They are healthy plants with good sized fruit but horrible insides. :'(
I am growing them in the greenhouse, ring culture method for the first ( and last ) time  ???

[nippie]

[tim]

Wish I could help. I have had it several times. Got an answer but I've lost it.

An annoying feature.

Just thought - it might be akin to 'blotchy ripening', which may be caused by lack of potash.

[valmarg]

Oh dear, and I was hoping someone would come up with an explanation, as we have a few tomatoes similarly affected.

valmarg

[valmarg]

C'mon Tim, go look in your archives - pleeeese.

Bippie, after one year, never state that you are growing 'for the first and last time'.

Us old gardeners have 'good years and bad years'.  You definitely do not give up after one year's bad crop!!

You grow fantastic crops of a particular crop one year, and the next year you have zilch.

You just make the most of what you got.

That's the beauty??? of growing your own

I think!!

[tim]

Hence the sense in several varieties - they can't all go wrong?

Asked HDRA a couple of years ago, with photos - & I'm not sure that I was wholly convinced by their answer. Haven't had it since. Shame I can't recall.

[nippie]

Thank you all for replying, it's good to know I'm not the only one with the problem, or that it was anything in particular that I did  ;D
Valmarg, I didn't mean I wouldn't grow toms again,rather that I shan't use the ring culture again. I have had far better results in grow bags or straight into the soil in other years  :-\
BTW my gardeners delight are a delight this year so sweet and tasty  :)

[valmarg]

Nippie, I have done a google, and the RHS site comes up re tomatoes with:-

"Disorders of the fruit are common; greenback, where hard green areas develop on the shoulders of ripening fruit, is usually caused by heat injury and insufficient potassium.  Good ventillation, shading, use of tomato fertilisers and choosing greenback resistant cultivars will help avoid this.  Variations including blotchy ripening and whitewall, where the skin of ripened fruit develop irregular yellow patches, with hard white patches inside.  Similar remedies and avoiding over use of nitrogen fertiliser will help prevent this."

I think with the hot weather we have had recently, 'heat injury' would fit the bill!

valmarg


Hope it helps!

valmarg

[tim]

All good stuff.  It was the difference between greenback (very common) & blotchy ripening, where the whole circumference is affected (very uncommon) that I was trying to establish.

[valmarg]

Oh dear Tim, my understanding of the RHS site, is that 'heat injury' can produce both the 'greenback', and also the blotchy ripening, etc.

I would have to say that OH has a saying, "It's not very often you're right missis, but you're wrong again", and this may be 'yet' another example!!

The peculiar thing about the 'irregularly ripened' tomatoes was that I grilled some for breakfast, and they stayed as hard as they were before cooking .  Obviously I had some 'normal' tomatoes on the grill pan, and they went beautifully mushy.

Having trawled the www net, I am none the wiser about this.

Either way, it is only a small percentage of the crop, and they get squished through the passata machine.

I don't think we will be going short of tomato products for the next few months!!

valmarg

[tim]

'None the Wiser '- title of Brother-in-Law's autobiography. Very good!

But I now see that I messed up my last post. To me, 'blotchy ripening' & the totally hard surround may have the same cause but a very different effect. As I say, even after HDRA's kind help, I'm none the wiser.

And tell OH to 'look to his onions' - I've never known you wrong!!

[valmarg]

Going off at a tangent to start with, who is brother in law?  None the wiser rings a bell.

I understand what you mean about the blotchy ripening and the totally hard surround.  Even the American sites I have been on are as vague as the RHS.

I couldn't agree more with your posting of 6 August, that the more varieties you grow, the less liklihood of this problem.

The ones that are affected by yellow/greenback are Bloody Butcher, which is a heritage variety, and is the very earliest to ripen.  The variety affected by the blotchy ripening is Olivade.  This is a thin skinned plum variety.

The beefsteak/large varieties we have are Supersteak, Brandywine, Mortgage Lifter, Black Russian, Marion, San Marzano, Costoluto Fierentino, and Ferline.

Of the plum varieties we have San Marzino, olivade, italiano (I think).

Cherry varieties we have Gardener's Delight, Yellow Perfection, and several other yellow varieties  I would need to go into the greenhouse to read the labels.

The problem is that I buy the seeds and OH has the job of growing them.  He is of the opinon that we have crammed too much in the greenhouse.  Guess who disagrees with him - you can't have too many tomatoes!!

Tim sweetheart, as we've been married for nearly 40 years, OH does know best!!
Posting on this site is a subject I know a bit about, BUT I can 'sound off' on things I'm not too knowledgable on (off goes the duck gun) as a previous employer used to say, and, more often I'm wrong than right.  But it's fun stirring up the pile!!