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OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato

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philcaseinWPA

10-29-2007 06:45:30




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Well last night it hit 28 degrees so I guess the tomatoes are done. Not real sorry but still some were still nice. I planted this patch late so I didn't expect to get top yield off it. Just some nice ones late into the season. Oct 28 is pretty late for a frost around here but I have picked into November a couple of years. The only thing I regret is it will warm up now and if I would have gotten by last night I could have picked another week.
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Phil

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El Toro

10-30-2007 13:43:16




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 Re: OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato in reply to philcaseinWPA, 10-29-2007 06:45:30  
What do you use to chop up the tomato vines? I've always use a rotary mower, but it doesn't chew up a lot of the stalks. It takes them a long time to rot up in my garden. I should have one of those old silage cutters. It would make short work of the vines. You had a nice field of tomatoes. I only plant around 36 plants and I use heavy reinforcement wire for cages. I've had the cages for over 30 years. I mulch the plants
with shredded newspaper and grass clippings. Makes it easy to pick them. Hal

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mark

10-29-2007 10:53:08




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 Re: OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato in reply to philcaseinWPA, 10-29-2007 06:45:30  
That's one hell of a 'mater patch Phil!

Okay..now the questions. How do you lay the black mulch material...is it plastic or something else? Next..how do you get rid of it, now that the season is over? What is the spacing on your rows. Do you drip irrigate and how do you fertilize? Just how many plants did you have out? Interesting operation you have there. We had our first frost here in eastern KY last night, 27F.

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philcaseinWPA

10-29-2007 11:34:53




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 Re: OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato in reply to mark, 10-29-2007 10:53:08  
The black material is 4' wide 1 mil thick black embossed plastic mulch. It comes on a 4' roll that is 2400' long. Also available in 4000' lengths but it is heavy to move. We fertilize after we plow and before we finish the field. Then we run a 6' rototiller down the rows and then lay the black plastic with a mulch layer. T-Tape drip tape is buried under the mulch at the same time. The rows are 6' apart give or take however straight I drive. The plants are 2' apart in the rows. This field only had about 450 plants and was planted in late June or early July. Our main field had about 3000 plants. I leave a spray row between every 6 rows. It also makes harvesting easier. We stake tomatoes using a weave method. Between every other plant a 4' stake is driven in and then twine is tied to the end stake and weaves between the plants wraps around the next stake then weaves between the next 2 plants and wraps around the next stake. When you get to the end you go back the other side of the row weaving on the opposite side of the plants and tie it off when you are back at the beginning. As the plants grow taller you add anther string about 6 - 8" higher. We usually use string 3 times sometimes 4. This planting only got 2 strings so it is down somewhat. The strings keep the fruit off the ground and we get much less rot. We fertigate during the season ie. inject fertilizer through the drip tape as we irrigate. third party image
For a lot of boring pictures of the farm this and past years go here:
Link
There are videos of the mulch layer and our planter working.

For my daughter's blog of this past summer's farming adventures go here:
Link


Phil
40 39 12 N, 80 19 58 E Google earth

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mark

10-29-2007 15:23:16




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 Re: OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato in reply to philcaseinWPA, 10-29-2007 11:34:53  
Boring? HAR! To you maybe because you live it year after year, but never to me...I'll never get too old to learn.

What is 'embossed' plastic? 1 mil is awfully thin, seems to me...how you keep from making holes in it when you are harvesting? Do you sucker your plants? How do you keep the balks between the rows weed free? I'd think the tiller might catch the mulch and rip it out. How do you inject the fertilize into the irrigation lines? and finally.....where do you market all the tomatoes? I think I enjoy learning about what I call truck or market gardening/farming more than anything else. I am wanting to start raising green beans, if I can find a used Pixall that I can afford. Thanks for the great pix and information..very nice operation.

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philcaseinWPA

10-30-2007 05:42:41




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 Re: OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato in reply to mark, 10-29-2007 15:23:16  
Hi Mark,
Embossed plastic is manufactured so that it has a very slight texture I think, it is not even noticeable. It is supposed to stay on the ground better. It is either 1 mil or 1.25 mil but very thin but strong. Deer make more holes in it than any thing else. The manufacturer I use is Pliant and I buy it through Zimmerman Irrigation (Trickleeze). We either spray between the rows with herbicide or run the rototiller down the rows or both. If you are real careful you can run a rototiller real close without catching the edge of the plastic. This year I used Sandea, Sencor, and Dual as a banded spray between the rows. It worked well in the tomatoes. I planted after we sprayed. You can spray Sencor over the top of tomatoes and potatoes to control broadleaf weeds or Poast to control grasses. To inject the fertilizer I have an apparatus called a dosatron that uses the water pressure in your irrigation supply line to suck a liquid fertilizer solution into the system, uses the venturi principle. (Same thing that makes a perfume atomizer work or gives an airplane wing lift.) We market all of our tomatoes retail either at our on farm stand or at 3 farmers' markets we attend. We are fortunate to be in an area with a large population and not many farms.
Phil

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Walt Davies

10-29-2007 09:38:00




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 Re: OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato in reply to philcaseinWPA, 10-29-2007 06:45:30  
Looks like time to make tomato juice. Walt



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philcaseinWPA

10-29-2007 10:14:58




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 Re: OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato in reply to Walt Davies, 10-29-2007 09:38:00  
Time to go south :)

Phil



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IH2444

10-29-2007 07:43:57




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 Re: OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato in reply to philcaseinWPA, 10-29-2007 06:45:30  
should have picked em green. Yummy fried green tomatoes.



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old

10-29-2007 07:24:52




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 Re: OT Frost on the pumpkin er tomato in reply to philcaseinWPA, 10-29-2007 06:45:30  
Ya we got our first frost yesterday and then again this morning we had our second one. The weather man calls for 70 degrees today for a high



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