By Michelle Fabio

Have you ever had a tomato plant whose condition worsened so quickly there was no way to save it?

Well if University of British Columbia PhD student Saber Miresmailli has his way, that won’t happen again.

His new project is to create a monitoring device with a sensor system that would enable you to hear your tomatoes’ cries for help before pest damage sets in.
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By Tomato Queen

This year has been my first experience cultivating the purple Cherokee heirloom, and so far, my impression is that it’s a little bit precious.

According to Slow Food USA, that may be because it’s a bit endangered.

First off, imagine my surprise to only find twelve seeds in an itty bitty packet. Granted, you might expect to pay more for a packet of organic heirlooms.

But these are more precious than your average heirloom.

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By Michelle Fabio

You may have heard these terms thrown around at your local seed store, in catalogs, or even at tomato exhibitions—but what do they mean?

Indeterminate tomatoes are the traditional, large, homegrown variety, and will grow and produce fruit until the first frost.

They can grow up to 12 feet tall, although the average is around 6 feet, and they will bloom and bear fruit throughout the season.

These tomatoes are typically called “vining,” and they require substantial staking or caging as well as regular pruning.

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By Amelia Tucker

While you are putting away seeds from this year’s garden, be sure to write down a basic map of the plants locations so you do not replant anything from that family in the same area the following year.

This is referred to as crop rotation and it does apply to your small backyard garden just as much as the large fields of veggies grown by a big producer.

The basic idea is that you do not plant the same family of plants two years in a row.

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By Amelia Tucker

With the season drawing to a close, you should know which plants grew the best this year.

Why not save those seeds and get a jump start on next year’s gardening?

It is easy to do and you will be saving the seeds from the plants that grew best in your particular area, ensuring a better harvest every time.

Here is what you do:

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By Michelle Fabio

As summer winds down, you are hopefully seeing a lot of green tomatoes on your plants.

In order to ripen, they’ll need plenty of warm sun, but depending on where you live, this may be getting harder to come by, especially as days grow shorter into September.

So what can you do to ensure the maximum production of your tomato plant at this point?

You need to think quality not quantity, and so we turn to the newest growths on the plant.

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