After a devastating battle with late blight last summer I vowed not to grow any tomatoes this year. That thought lasted all of two months. One sideways glance at a shiny, new seed catalog and I folded like a lawn chair in a wind gust.
My plan of attack— or my lame excuse, whichever you prefer to call it—is to choose early-fruiting tomatoes. If I can’t fight late blight, I’ll try to get ahead of it. I know the tomatoes probably won’t be as tasty as the late-summer heirlooms, but they’ll still be better than the pale pretenders at the grocery store.
I perused Cornell University’s “Vegetable Varieties for Gardeners” citizen science project website and found several well-rated, early-fruiting varieties I want to try.
I ordered ‘Jetsetter’, ‘Early Goliath’, ‘Thessaloniki’ (which is an heirloom from Greece) and ‘Bloody Butcher’ (yum, what a name!). I’m also going to grow ‘Legend’, a tomato bred at Oregon State University to be resistant to late blight.
I’m happy that I decided not to ban tomatoes from my garden. We’ll find out in August whether my gamble pays off.