Perennial Herbs

Herbs are a perfect addition to your garden! They are extremely easy to grow and come back year after year. You can harvest them for your meals, drinks, medicinal purposes, aromatherapy, in addition many have gorgeous blooms! What's not to love about planting herbs!

Mixed herb planter

Lavender Aromatico blue improved

THYME
Thymus vulgaris and it's many cultivars

  • English thyme is probably the most famous edible thyme with lemon thyme being a close second.

  • Creeping thyme is purely ornamental and comes in red, white, pink chintz and wooly. Wooly thyme can get 2-3 ft wide and grows beautifully over flat patio stones. Given good drainage and full sun, creeping thyme grows like ground cover. Plant these in the cracks of your patio and watch them grow.

    • Other creeping thymes include Creeping Lemon Thyme, Caraway Thyme and Elfin Thyme, a slow growing beauty. All great in rock gardens. Need full sun and well drained soil.

  • Golden Thyme: We carry Archers gold, Golden Lemon and Golden variegated and other variegated thymes like Silver Thyme.

  • We always like to try a few new ones. This year we have Tansparent Yellow Thyme, Magic Carpet Thyme and Lime Green Thyme.

Thyme coccineus

Thyme English

Thyme Lemon Variegated

SAGE
The green sages are more for culinary purposes and the others are more ornamental in your garden. A sprig of sage is a very nice garnish for a special meal.

  • Salvia oficinalis is a wonderful perennial culinary herb. The straight species is a great plant that produces beautiful blue salvia flowers and is quite ornamental.

  • Berggarten Sage is a green cultivar we carry.

  • Purple Sage

  • Tricolor Sage

  • Pineapple sage and Golden Pineapple sage grow into tall 5-6 ft plants that produce large racemes of red flowers in late summer. Plant them early in the season to get them to full size before they bloom. The foliage really does smell like pineapple.

Sage Berggarten

Sage Purpurascens

Sage Tricolor

TARRAGON
Tarragon Artemesia dracunculus is a perennial culinary herb that tastes a little like anise or has licorice like flavors. It is a staple in French cuisine and is often referred to as French tarragon.

MINT
Mints are also perennial herbs. They are best grown in the pot because they spread voraciously and can be difficult to eliminate from a garden once it’s established. Mints are used in cooking and in making teas and cocktails, like mojitos. All mints grow best in full sun and a well drained soil.

  • Peppermint and spearmint are the two most popular mints.

    • Mojito mint, a spearmint

    • Kentucky Colonel spearmint our favorite for many years

    • Chocolate mint, a type of peppermint,

    • Corsican mint has tiny tiny leaves and is great in cracks in patios. It is not aggressive like the other mints, in fact this one is more challenging to grow.

We carry several more ornamental variegated mints that look great mixed with annuals in pots!

Mint Corsican

Mint Kentucky Colonel.

Mint Peppermint

SPRING AT VINEYARD GARDENS

Spring is a very busy and productive time at Vineyard Gardens. Our landscape division crews are already out doing spring clean ups. Our in-house production is busy planting bulbs, liners, bare root perennials, roses, trees and shrubs. The nursery is in full swing unloading truck full of plants from New Jersey, Virginia and Oregon. And the early spring flowers, like pansies and pieris japonica, are in their full bloom glory.

We also just put the poppy’s and primulas outside to harden off and we have our usual beautiful crop of 5” perennials. It is an exciting time of year!

We always start a bountiful selection of leafy salad greens

We always start a bountiful selection of leafy salad greens

We recycle. sterilizing plastic growing containers and trays

Labeling is critical from day one! As plants are potted up, each one has to be accurately labeled.

St. Patrick's Day is traditionally when you plant your peas out in the garden. If you missed it we've got you covered. Peas like to do most of their growth in cool temperatures

Leafy greens like cooler temperatures to produce quick, tender leaves for your salads and cooking. the earlier you get them in the ground the better!

Seedling production using plug trays

Getting strawberries started early is important for this season's production. We give them a jump start but you should be planting them out as soon as we're 'frost-free'.

In the Fall, any bulbs left unsold get potted up and forced for Spring color.

We have become well known for our well grown Delphiniums. Here they are early in the season

Perennial production House 4

Growing on 4in perennials, its economical to buy your perennials early in smaller sizes. better for the plants too!

Our Landscape Division are already out there doing Spring Cleanups, if you haven't set yours up yet, call the office today!

Pansies are in full color at the nursery!

ON THE RETURN OF THE VICTORY GARDEN

written and photos by Keith D. Kurman

This garden has been growing steadily over many, many years. It’s seen many crop rotations…brilliant success and demoralizing failures. But each spring brings a renewed excitement, to begin again…“This year we’ll get it RIGHT!”

“To free ourselves, we must feed ourselves.”

The quaint “grow your own” aphorism presents us with a challenge regarding a change from our consumerist mindset of being dependent on ‘others’ to becoming more independent.

This recent NY Times article, Food Supply Anxiety Brings Back Victory Gardens, does a wonderful job addressing the need for growing our own garden today during the current pandemic in comparison to the War Garden of 1918 and Victory Garden of 1919.

A garden this size is quite an undertaking! Unless you've grown up on a farm or garden for a living you might want to start a little smaller and build over the years. But it is about the size of one generous front yard! Something to think about!

Times and conditions have changed remarkably since the mid-twentieth century. Now, a quarter of the way into the 21st century, when and how are we going to adapt to these changed conditions and adopt new paradigms for the mid-twenty-first century? Some of these changes and challenges include:

  • Climate Change. This is a new term for something we’ve been aware of and fighting to address since the 1960’s, corresponding with the “back to the land” movement, self-help books and anti-nuke protests. The idea of growing your own food has gone in and out of fashion throughout the ‘modern age’.

  • Sustainability. This was not a consideration or even a word generally used in the mid 20th century but it applies now to everything from product development to agricultural production.

  • Water. There are so many factors applying pressure on our water sources. Just as coronavirus is invisible, so is water and the threat to its availability. Unfortunately, it is not on the forefront of public concern.

    The combination of climate change, sustainability and water shortage brings the priority closer to home.

  • Aesthetics. Aesthetics may seem like a frivolous or academic subject these days but it goes directly to our decisions about what we do to develop and maintain our own properties.

  • The Lawn. A pretense hung over from ‘between the wars’. They are wasteful of water and demand conditioning and fertilizers to keep them viable. They also occupy, usually, the sunniest part of the property. Would that area not be more beautiful providing sustenance for our families rather than exhausting our precious resources to satisfy our ‘aesthetics’? It is not that the philosophical perspective of ‘the lawn’ being beautiful is wrong, but if we were to change our philosophical perspective to value productivity more highly, then we may not feel the same way. If we find it necessary to supplement our food sources with what we grow ourselves wouldn’t the lawn be the first thing to go?

With all that in mind, and a lot of ‘alone time’ on our hands, let’s get to the question of Victory Gardens.

The NY Times article mentions how Victory Gardens started out as a big deal that quickly faded because ‘farming’ is hard work! True, but there are degrees to which we can go to supplement our nutritional needs without turning over our entire property to cultivation.

A Victory Garden can be anything from a potted rosemary on the windowsill to a window box with mixed greens to a raised bed by the kitchen door for growing your essentials. Of course beyond that you can go as far as your imagination and resources will allow.

Here's a small garden that's dedicated to mostly herbs (deer-proof!) a few Tomatoes and some flowers. There are no rules to break, its what works for you!

Let’s look at a few things we can grow that don’t require extensive time and materials to achieve.

I always go to the herbs first because they offer so much return for so little effort. Herbs as a rule don’t require a lot of fuss. They are generally from arid climates and grow under poor conditions. Plants like Thyme, Sage, Tarragon, Oregano and Chives are tough perennials that only require a patch of earth, some sun and occasional watering. But they provide a rich, fresh flavor to common dishes. Try adding them to the oil in your pan when you begin a sauté, it makes a big difference.

Annual herbs: Parsley, Cilantro, Arugula, Dill and Basil. These flavorful plants might require a little more attention to keep them productive but they can easily be grown in a pot as well as a cultivated garden plot. There becomes the question of quantity, if you use them a lot then you’ll need more space. It’s a good idea to stagger their planting so you have a continual crop. There are hundreds of plants that might fall under this category and you can certainly expand your collection as you become more adept at growing and harvesting, but these few selections are a good start and if you’ve checked the prices for fresh herbs at the grocery store you’ll see how this might really save some money.

Leafy greens are the next category of easily grown foods. We may be used to only a few lettuces but there is a dizzying range of possibilities, so again you can go as far as you’re inclined to labor. All are nutritious and most are flavorful! The lettuces, mustards, radicchio, endive, spinach, chard and kales are what we call ‘Early Season’ because they germinate and grow best in cool, lengthening days. They can be done in pots or window boxes or they can take up several rows in a vegetable garden.

Being limited in time and space shouldn’t stop you from growing some of the smaller root vegetables. Easily started from seed, and best when done so, are radishes, carrots and beets. These you would want to seed in succession so you have a continual supply ready for harvest. We may think of beets as just the red, bloody sweet beets but there are so many different varieties that make delicious eating, especially at the smaller size. Carrots don’t need to be the long ‘perfect’ carrots of agriculture, some of the best tasting are the smaller, heirloom selections that can only be gotten from a reputable source (like Vineyard Gardens!) The greens of these delicacies are all edible too and very nutritious.

Of course there are many food crops that require a little more space and attention to their cultivation; potatoes, cabbages, broccoli, the squashes, cucumbers and melons, and to some extent peas and beans. Peas are not that difficult but you do need quite a few plants to reap a meal-sized serving. With the proper tending they will produce a succession of crop but you need several plants to feed a family of two! Beans can be very gratifying, but again you need several plants to produce a family sized yield.

We can’t talk about vegetable gardening without talking about Tomatoes. Tomatoes are THE most popular plant by far of all vegetable crops. There will need to be a post dedicated solely to tomatoes to cover all the different varieties and the growing conditions. Suffice to say. Homegrown tomatoes are delicious and when well grown are a source of pride, but they can also be frustrating. They take a lot of space, time and resources to make them work but again, it’s up to you.

The last two categories of growing that one needs to consider are staples and fruits.

The Staples are mostly all grain plants, like corn, rice, wheat, and barley.. Although you CAN grow these in your back (or front) yard they generally require too much space to harvest a measurable yield.

The Fruits would certainly require a separate post but this will have to do as a placeholder. Growing the woody fruits, stones, pomes and berries (including Grapes) are some of the most frustrating endeavors of humankind! The space, time, materials and skill required to bring in a harvest is probably what doomed the whole Victory Garden Movement. It’s not impossible but it does require commitment, motivation and sophistication.

So there’s a start to it! All the details of ‘How To’ can easily be gleaned from books, online or questions you can ask our expert horticulturists at Vineyard Gardens nursery.

We may not be able to save the world or prevent pandemics by ‘growing our own’ but we might be able to supplement our diets with what we have grown ourselves and that has the added virtue of feeding our souls. It’s also a great way to spend part of a day in quarantine!

“We must cultivate our gardens.” (Voltaire-ish)

Gardening styles and techniques are as varied as there are gardeners. You live, you learn, that the Tao of growing. “What it takes!”

Nothing compares to the delight of discovering that your efforts have borne fruit! Even an acorn squash, sprung up out of the compost, makes all the labors worthwhile.

Raised beds are the most popular way to grow healthy veggies. They're easy to manage and plants seem to thrive in them and produce well. Great for Herbs and Leafy Greens... Tomatoes too!

A spectacular spot with a modest Herb Garden consisting of stepped raised beds and planted with herbs for kitchen use and plenty of leafy greens for salads.... and a few poppies too!

This is spring at Vineyard Gardens

Gorgeous pictures of our beautiful in-house spring production taken by our talented in-house photographer, Keith Kurman.

Forget me not’s

Alyssum

red leaf lettuce

tat soi (miniature Chinese cabbage-like).

spicy micro greens

mustard greens

musk melons

mixed mesclun greens

lettuces

The Delphiniums are coming right along!

House 4, 5” perennials

In the seeding house, we grow most of our veggies and greens here on site from trusted seed sources. We also grow all those other interesting and unusual annuals you find at VG.

PLANTING, GROWING AND HARVESTING GARLIC

We have an abundant supply of garlic in stock! It is a wonderful crop that is planted in the fall and harvested the following summer. It is easy to grow and requires very little space in the garden. Garlic is also a natural pest repellent!

PLANTING

  • Best time to plant garlic is in the fall. Plant 6 to 8 weeks before first expected frost date.

  • Plant in a spot that has not recently been used for garlic or other plants from the onion family.

  • Plant in a sunny spot with well drained soil.

  • Work several inches of compost or manure and fertilizer into the bed.

  • Break apart cloves from bulb a few days before planting, keep the papery husk on each individual clove.

  • Space the cloves 4-6" apart. Rows should be spaced one foot apart. The cloves should be planted with the pointed end up and the blunt end down. Push each clove 1-2" into the ground, firm the soil around it, and water the bed if it is dry.

  • After planting, lay down a protective mulch of straw. The mulch should be approximately 4 inches thick. Mulch will help prevent the garlic roots from being lifted out of the ground by freezing and thawing.

Spring Care

  • Mulch should be removed in the spring after the threat of frost has passed.

  • In the spring, as warmer temperatures come, shoots will emerge through the ground.

  • When the leaves begin to grow, it is important to feed the garlic plants to encourage good growth. Gently work in Osmocote into the soil near each plant.

  • Cut off any flower shoots that emerge in spring to encourage bulb growth.

  • Keep well weeded. Garlic doesn’t do well with competition.

  • Water every 3 to 5 days during bulbing (mid-May through June).

  • Fertilize again just before the bulbs begin to swell usually early May.

  • By June remove any remaining mulch and stop watering. The garlic will store better if you allow the soil around the bulbs to dry out.

HARVESTING

  • Harvest garlic when most of the leaves have turned brown. This usually occurs in mid-July to early August.

  • Dig up bulbs (don't pull), being careful not to bruise them. If the bulbs are left in the ground too long, they may separate and will not store well.

  • Lay the garlic plants out to dry for 2 or 3 weeks in a shady, dry spot for two weeks.

  • Do not get the bulbs wet or break them apart, or the plants won't last as long.

STORAGE

  • The bulbs are cured and ready to store when the wrappers are dry and papery and the roots are dry.

  • Either tie the garlic in bunches (4 to 6), braid the leaves, or cut the stem a few inches above the bulb. Hang the braids and bunches or store the loose bulbs on screens or slatted shelves in a cool, airy location. You may want to set aside some of the largest bulbs for replanting in the fall.

  • During the winter months check your stored garlic bulbs often, and promptly use any that show signs of sprouting.

Heirloom vs Hybrid Tomatoes

Tomato season is upon us and there are so many varieties available. How do you choose which to grow? The first step is to understand the differences between heirloom and hybrid tomatoes. Both varieties have their stengths and weaknesses. Read on to learn more!

HEIRLOOM

Heirloom tomatoes are varieties that have been grown without cross-pollination for at least 40 years. They are open-pollinated, which means pollinated by insects or wind without human intervention. That allows them to remain stable in their characteristics from one year to the next. Gardeners appreciate their consistency in taste and agree that most heirloom varieties tend to have greater flavor than hybrids. Heirlooms are often grown locally and allowed to ripen on the vine which affects their flavor. They often produce only a small number of fruit. Since they have not had the selective crossbreeding as hybrids, Heirloom Tomatoes tend to be more susceptible to pest disease, especially fungus, which makes them crack and split.

 HEIRLOOM PLUSES

  • STABILITY: Heirlooms produce large numbers of seeds and bear tomatoes identical to parents

  • TASTE: Heirlooms are considered flavorful, and even superior to commercially-produced varieties

  • DISEASE-RESISTANCE: More susceptible to disease.

  • INDIVIDUALITY: Many heirlooms have unique shapes and sport a variety of colors, including purple, yellow, white, orange, pink, red, green, black and striped.

 HEIRLOOM MINUSES

  • INDIVIDUALITY: Unusual, misshapen or inconsistent tomatoes.

  • PRODUCTIVITY: Heirlooms take longer to mature and produce fewer tomatoes than hybrids.

HYBRID

Hybrid tomatoes typically yield a crop that is uniform in both appearance and timing. Typical supermarket tomatoes are hybrids that have been carefully crossbred to achieve a desired combination.  Some of those characteristics may be bigger in size, better disease resistance, dependability, less required care, early maturity, higher yield, and/or specific plant size.

 HYBRID PLUSES

  • PRODUCTIVITY: You'll harvest more tomatoes

  • DISEASE-RESISTANCE: Hybrids have a reputation for not being as susceptible to diseases and pests as their heirloom counterparts.

  • STRENGTH: Hybrids are known for yielding tomatoes of similar size and with fewer blemishes.

  • LONGEVITY: Harvested hybrid tomatoes have staying power. They endure the long hours on at the roadside farm stand better than heirlooms

 HYBRID MINUSES

  • FLAVOR: Most gardeners agree that hybrids are not as flavorful as heirlooms

  • INSTABILITY: Long term hybrids don't produce seeds as strong as what birthed them- according to experts. However, many gardeners claim they save hybrid seeds year to year which produce seedlings and fruit that is true to the original hybrid.

At Vineyard Gardens we carry both hybrid and heirloom tomatoes. A few of the  hybrids we carry are Burpees Big Boy and Big Beef, two of the largest ones, and Celebrity, a midsize disease resistant variety that we have carried for years.

HEIRLOOM TOMATOES VARIETIES at VINEYARD GARDENS

AUNT RUBY'S GERMAN GREEN TOMATO OG (85 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. “The biggest surprise I’ve ever experienced in tomatoes,” said the late Chuck Wyatt, vintage tomato collector. Until you try it, you won’t believe a green tomato could be this good. I rate it second only to Brandywine for flavor and it is on just about everyone’s top-ten list. Oblate 12–16 oz fruits blush lightly yellow and develop an amber-pink tinge on the blossom end when ripe. Don’t allow them to get too soft before picking. The green flesh of this beefsteak is faintly marbled with pink. Flavor sweet and tart, rich and spicy. The central large tomatoes are the best. Flavor deteriorates when cold weather sets in. Created a sensation at a staff taste test in September 1996, where it was rated “good” or “excellent” by all who tried it. [Wow, that long ago! I still grow and love it based on that test. -ed.] Aunt Ruby’s is not just the best green eating tomato, it also makes a delicious basis for salsa verde. Originally from Ruby Arnold’s German immigrant grandfather, introduced in the 1993 Seed Savers Exchange Yearbook by Bill Minkey of Darien, Wisc. Nominated to Slow Food’s Ark of Taste. ③

BLACK KRIM TOMATO OG (80 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. Don’t wait too long to harvest this delicate heirloom tomato. At half green and still firm they are already dead ripe and perfectly delicious. If you wait till they are fully purple, you will not be able to get them from garden to table intact (to say nothing of market) and they will disintegrate like a hunk of road-kill. Krims are strikingly iridescent purple on the outside, usually with dark green-black shoulders and noticeable catfacing. Interiors are part black, too, with an unusual juicy yet meaty taste and texture, described as having “…a smoky flavor like a good single malt scotch.” Fruits average 12–18 oz. Krim hails from Krymsk on the Black Sea in Russia. ①

CHEROKEE PURPLE TOMATO OG (77 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. but with relatively short vines. No list of the best-tasting heirloom tomatoes would be complete without Cherokee Purple, an unusual variety from Tennessee said to have originated with the Cherokee Indians. Fruits are globes to slightly oblate, averaging 10–13 oz, with dusky brownish-purple skin, dark green shoulders and brick-red flesh. The real attraction is their rich taste, described as “sweet rich juicy winey,” “delicious sweet,” and “rich Brandywine flavor” by aficionados maintaining it in the Seed Savers Exchange. Ranks in my top five for flavor. Expect some concentric cracking. Amy LeBlanc suggests the vines should not be pruned because the delicate fruits sunburn easily. Indigenous Royalties. ①②

GARDEN PEACH TOMATO  OG (71 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. Yellow fruits blush pink when ripe and have thin fuzzy skins somewhat like peaches, soft-skinned, juicy and very sweet. Light fruity taste is not what you’d expect in a tomato. Burpee in 1893 called it “delicate, melting in the mouth like a grape.” For well over a century savvy gardeners have brought Peach’s little 2–4 oz fruits indoors before frost to keep for several weeks. Jim Stockwell from North Carolina would not be without it. “Not only are they early and prolific but their unusual flavor and no core sizes make them perfect for grilling without falling apart.” Doreen Mundie says also wonderful dried. Amy Goldman places its 1890 origins with plant breeder Elbert S. Carman, owner and editor of The Rural New-Yorker. It was introduced the 1890 catalog of Hallock & Son’s of Queens, NY. Showed some tolerance to LB in Colrain in 2014. ③

GREEN ZEBRA TOMATO  OG (77 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. A most unusual beast in the tomato menagerie, this zebra starts out green with darker green stripes, softening and blushing yellow and apricot when it ripens. It might have remained a mere curiosity but for its delicious sweet rich flavor. Small-medium 4–5 oz fruits are emerald green inside. Perfect exteriors hold up under adverse conditions and don’t crack. “The perfect salad tomato,” says Anne Elder of Ann Arbor, Mich. “Tried Green Zebra for the first time last year. The tomatoes were a big hit with our customers,” said Tammy Martin of Ruckamuck Farm in Milbridge, Maine. Sometimes incorrectly shows up on lists of heirloom tomatoes, but was developed by Tom Wagner of Tater Mater Seeds in 1985 from four heirlooms. Kent Whealy ranks it in his top ten tomatoes. Susceptible to SEPT. ①

PINEAPPLE TOMATO OG (85 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. Garden author Michelle Owen says, “I roast…these exceptionally sweet red-streaked yellow tomatoes…in a hot oven, then sauté with ridiculous amounts of garlic, rosemary and extra virgin olive oil and throw over pasta. Before I face the firing squad, I will ask for this as my last meal.” With its silky smooth texture and complex fruity taste, Pineapple may be the best striped tomato. Typically grows huge fruits in excess of 1 lb that get a little funky cosmetically. Fruits hold tight to stems so bring scissors to your harvest. Cut in half, it looks like the interior of a pineapple except with yellow and red marbling. It doesn’t taste like a pineapple, though, nor like a typical red tomato, either. Its unique mild low-acid fruity sweetness needs a fruit name all its own. Originally from Kentucky, but our seed stock came from Martha Gottlieb of Common Ground Fair Exhibition Hall fame. ①

PINK BRANDYWINE TOMATO  OG (82 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. with potato-leaf foliage. Pink Brandywine is the heirloom that launched a movement, leading many gardeners to be flavor-positive preservation-aware seed-savers. As Brandywine’s popularity exploded, so did its production as commercial bulk seed. But like all heirlooms, our favorite old-fashioned OPs with their hand-selected hand-me-down genetics need special care. Fedco Seeds has partnered with Daniel and Corinne at Blackbird Rise of Palermo, Maine, to keep building the Brandywine legacy. For four summers, they’ve grown hundreds of plants from our classic Sudduth/Quisenberry strain, selecting for that perfect Brandywine color, flavor, bountiful size and shape that says “homegrown comfort.” The result is this extra-select strain of large oblate pink meaty beefsteaks, trending away from small-fruited, less-vigorous and late-ripening traits. Of course, that precious balanced deep flavor with perfect hints of tart still rings true! Oblate meaty beefsteak fruits average right around a pound, ripening unevenly throughout the season, often preferring cool early fall to peak heat of August. ①

ROSE DE BERNE TOMATO OG (80 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. This Swiss émigré could be considered the Brandywine of continental Europe. Like Brandywine, has many strains, and is widely considered in France, Germany and Switzerland to be the best-flavored tomato. Only medium-sized yet delivers the robust flavor of the bigger types. It bested some formidable competition in my trials—including June Pink, Gulf State Market and the celebrated Eva Purple Ball—with a rich sweetness the others couldn’t match. I enjoyed one juicy 5 oz translucent smooth pink fruit after another. No slouch in the appearance department either, the unblemished globes are perfectly round, the soft skins not excessively fragile and the color and size very attractive, making it another excellent field-to-market variety that does not require high tunnels. Some LB tolerance. ①②

RUTGERS 250 TOMATO  OG (76 days) Open-pollinated. Semi-Indeterminate. For years we’ve fruitlessly searched for worthy hybrid beefsteaks, just something with flavor and texture beyond packing peanuts. So far, all we’ve found are insipid red blobs. Surprising us in a 2017 trial of newly released open-pollinated slicers was Rutgers 250, a super-uniform tomato that looks and performs like a hybrid, but with flavor! Rutgers University tomato breeders went back to the parents used to breed our original Rutgers strain, and lightning struck twice. This ½ lb deep red slicer is smooth, solid, and blemish and crack free. It’s a perfect palm size, holding and ripening off the vine for at least 10 days. And a real sandwich-maker: tangy-tart with tomato-y depth, and lightly sweet. While touted as a “retro re-release,” the former and latter Rutgers versions are very different tomatoes; 250 ripens a little later than the original, the immature skin color is paler green and the plant is a head shorter. And 250 is more productive and has modern market looks and savvy. But it’s also meaty, juicy and firm without being hybrid fiberboard dry or grainy. ② NEW!

WEISNICHT'S UKRAINIAN TOMATO OG (85 days) Open-pollinated. Compact Indeterminate. with potato-leaf foliage. Thanks to Ryan Voiland of Red Fire Farm in Granby, Mass., for helping put this little known but extremely tasty heirloom on the map. In 2015 at the 31st annual Massachusetts Tomato Contest in Boston, Voiland won first prize in the heirloom category for his entry of Weisnicht’s Ukranian. A panel of food writers, chefs, produce experts and state officials judged the tomatoes on flavor, firmness/slicing quality, exterior color and shape. Mine in Colrain, though not entered, did pretty well in the size and yield categories as well. We received the original seeds for this scrumptious pink tomato from Scott Weisnicht of Waupun, Wisc., in 2004 and in my trials that year it received an unusually high 4–4.5 out of 5 taste evaluation, #1 among the 43 varieties I grew that cold wet summer. In 2013, I savored my first fruit in Colrain on Sept. 4, the flavor sweet, rich and complex with delicious acid overtones. Often bi-lobed, the medium-large 8–18 oz fruits are sparse seed bearers. They begin producing in late August or early September with a 3–4 week moderately productive main harvest period. Scott Weisnicht also supplied us with our first seeds for the much-revered rare Pride of Wisconsin melon. ①

BLACK CHERRY TOMATO OG (75 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. Two-bite cherries (avg 14–28g) with the dusky color and complex flavor typical of the best black tomatoes, juicy and delicious. Somewhat late for a cherry tomato, fruit ripens slowly and individually until frost, but worth the wait. Examine each plant closely at picking time: the dark-hued cherries are easy to lose in the foliage. Best flavor if left to ripen on the vine till nice and dark. Seems to tolerate the usual tomato diseases but fruits will crack readily in rainy weather. Combine with Sun Gold and any bright red cherry for a lovely display. Brix 7. Developed by Vince Sapp of Tomato Growers Supply and released 2003. ②

FARGO YELLOW PEAR CHERRY TOMATO OG (82 days) Open-pollinated. Vigorous Determinate. Introduced 1934 by Oscar Will & Co. of Bismarck, ND, yet another of famous breeder AF Yaeger’s creations. He crossed Bison with Yellow Pear for earliness and higher yields. Each plant produces about three dozen sweet tasty 1 oz fruits. About twice the size of regular pear tomatoes, the meaty morsels are crack resistant. ①

HONEYDROP CHERRY TOMATO ECO (62 days) Open-pollinated. Rampant Indeterminate. From a selection of F-1 Sunsugar, Rachel and Tevis Robertson-Goldberg of Crabapple Farm in Chesterfield, MA, developed Honeydrop and sent us the original seed, with their blessing to keep the production going. Honeydrop’s sweet juicy fruity honey-colored treats taste almost like white grapes. They are much less prone to cracking in wet weather than Sun Gold. Seeking to add another light-colored cherry to our selection, we trialed it against Blondkopchen, Dr. Carolyn, Isis Candy, Lemondrop and Weissbehart. It bested them all by such a wide margin in earliness, sweetness and complexity that we declined to add any of those others. Parthenocarpic. Still retains a percentage of recessive pink off-types but see Pink Princess; these are also yummy! OSSI. Breeder Royalties. ① BACK!

SUN GOLD CHERRY TOMATO  (57 days) F-1 hybrid. Indeterminate. To quote one customer, “Without these little babies, there’s no summer.” A perfect combination of deep sweetness with a hint of acid tartness, so good that for almost a decade it took away our incentive to trial cherry tomatoes because no others could match it. In a field replete with choices, we are drawn to Sun Gold like candy. What is its elusive alluring tang? Quart after quart grace the table, yet we rarely reach surfeit July through September. Small fruits averaging 8.2g, borne in prolific clusters, ripen very early to a rich apricot color and keep producing till frost. Very prone to split so pick early when rains are forecast. Brix 8. Resists F1, TMV. ⑤

SUPER SWEET 100 CHERRY TOMATO (78 days) F-1 hybrid. Indeterminate. Like the famous Sweet 100, but with more disease resistance. Very popular hybrid cherry tomato ripens clusters of 1" round sweet fruits. Should be staked. Will split in rainy conditions. Resistant to V and F1. ⑤

AMISH PASTE TOMATO  OG (85 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. Always one of the most popular items in the Seed Savers Exchange. Listed members’ comments tell all: “large red meaty fruit,” “wonderful paste variety,” “great flavor for cooking, canning or fresh eating,” “the standard by which I judge canning tomatoes,” “huge production,” “great for sauces, salsa, canning.” Strong producer of oxheart fruits up to 8 oz with thick bright red flesh. Larger and better than Roma. Flavor has been consistently good even in poor tomato years. Wisconsin heirloom from Amish farmers in the 1870s, first surfaced in the 1987 SSE Yearbook. We have observed some inherent variation, based on how this variety responds to its environment. Needs room and good nutrition to set mostly nippled fruits. Crowding, shading or stress reduces fruit size and nippling. Boarded Slow Food’s Ark of Taste. ②

BLUE BEECH PASTE TOMATO ECO (90 days) Open-pollinated. Indeterminate. This large elongated paste tomato won our sauce test in 1997, besting several well-known varieties. We received seed from Annette Smith of Blue Beech Farm in Danby, Vt., and have named the variety in her honor. Smith got the tomato from her neighbor’s niece’s uncle who brought it to Vermont from Italy during World War II. This Roma type has been acclimated in chilly Vermont for the last 50 years, so it is better adapted to cold climates than Roma. Some years it makes a richly textured sweet sauce that’s just brimming with flavor. “Also very fine for fresh eating,” says Lillian Kuo of Orleans, Mass. Fruits, not very seedy, averaging 6–8 oz, often have green shoulders. Needs long season, but our increasingly mild extended falls have facilitated ripening. 1999 Fedco introduction. ① BACK!