Today’s the Day! Ok, I know I said that yesterday was also the day, but that was for racking the mead. Today’s the day for transplanting tomatoes. I’ve been anticipating and delaying for quite a while, but there’s some hot days (upper 70s Fahrenheit – about 25 or 26 Celsius) and warm nights (50F – 10C or higher) coming our way. Cooler weather arrives on or about June 4, and that worries me. By June 5, the overnight low sinks to 45F (about 7C), but I just cant see keeping my tomatoes in pots during June! I plan to transplant in the evening, transplant shock would be amplified during the afternoon, so pictures and details tomorrow!

When I wrote about cluster thinning to improve wine grapes, it got me thinking about tomatoes. Could the same technique improve the quality of tomatoes (and wine made from them)? I always have a problem with blossom end rot on my Romas, and I think that may be clue.

This rot occurs because the plant can’t fully ripen it’s fruit, and it can be caused by improper watering, nutrient imbalance, or over cropping. I’ve tried to correct this problem by more careful watering and closer attention to the proportion of nutrients in my fertilizer, but with no success at all. Maybe I’m just not doing it right, or maybe those weren’t really my problems. Thinning has worked for me every time, and this makes me think that it might improve the fruit on other tomatoes, like the Gold Nuggets that I’m going to make wine from, that aren’t hit by blossom end rot.

Tomatoes aren’t grapes, of course, so there’s a limit to how much knowledge of one I can apply to the other. I’m not even going to try limiting fertilizer or water to my tomatoes, for example. I’ll probably try thinning, though, and maybe some other grape pruning ideas. I’ll keep you posted.

I’ve been looking at the 10-day forecast for clues on when to transplant my tomatoes. I wrote about the balancing act between trying to get them in the ground as soon as possible, so they can start spreading their roots in the soil right away, and keeping them from cold overnight lows that will hold back their growth. Well this morning’s forecast calls for overnight lows of 50 (10 Celsius) starting on 5/22, dipping to 47 (about 8 Celsius) on the 26th. Historical averages are 49-50 for the rest of the month. I think planting them on the 22nd would be a good balance between getting them in the ground early and keeping them from the cold. I’ll be keeping an eye on the forecast between now and then, but I’ve tentatively marked the 22nd as Transplant Day.

I’m tempted to say something like, “I can almost taste the tomato wine,” but I can’t because I have no idea what it will taste like. I’m still excited though!

Almost all commercial wine is made from grapes. There are good reasons to ferment grapes, but there is no good reason to ignore other fruit. I’ve sampled good commercial cherry wine, and while it’s not available locally, I know of some wineries that specialize in blueberry wine. I have made good, if I say so myself, wine from blueberries, raspberries, plums, apples, and rhubarb.

Since I’m particularly excited about making wine from what I grow in my own garden, I’ve started growing fruit trees in pots, just like my grape vines. A rhubarb patch yields enough “fruit” (most of us think of it as fruit even though it’s technically a vegetable) for rhubarb wine every year. But my bonsai orchard won’t produce fruit for years, and I’ll count myself lucky if my bonsai vineyard offers up enough grapes for a gallon of wine this year. So I’m going to make tomato wine this year!

It’s not as weird as it sounds. Though we all think of tomatoes as vegetables, they’re botanically fruit. Fruit of the vine, no less, and I can grow them from seed, harvest the fruit, and make wine in one season. The future members of my “tomato vineyard” have already sprouted, and I hope to transplant them outside in mid-May. I’ll keep you posted …