And they stay fresh pretty much as long as you want them to.

Seriously. They barely taste like the same ‘fruit’.

Also one of the easier garden vegetables (yes, vegetable, fight me) to plant. Great for beginners.

Honestly, with my raised beds, between compost, seeds and fertilizer I probably lose money compared to buying tomatoes from the store. Home grown garden tomatoes are 10x better quality than grocery store tomatoes.

Bro I been growing edamame. Holy fucking shit. You’ll fucking cum.

And if ever there is a day you can’t buy tomatoes for whatever reason, you will have them.

Not to mention the cost of watering.

Sure, but if you keep the same plot, over time that cost will average out.

You sound like a weird tomato version of Gaston.

I think they’re meming that 4 that was their total yield from all the plants they were able over the 2 months.

if you were to grow your own you’d probably be limited by something - space , light, and soil quality, and weather (maybe)

that’s probably why you say “if”

God damn. That would be like buying a new pet like a kitten or something and then a year later finding out you can’t eat it.

The tight temperature range is something I very much agree with you on. I think climate conducive to their growth play a big factor in disease immunity as well. I’ve seen them thrive like weeds in sub tropical regions. But for some reason, even in controlled conditions, they fail to do that well here in my area.

I have like six different tomato plants growing out of jars (started as seeds) hydroponically. They take almost no effort. It’s actually super easy to grow them if you eliminate nature from the process lol.

Dude, I grow tomatoes in a 4’ x 6’ plot of dirt by the sidewalk in Montreal with zero tending and I have more tomatoes than I know what to do with every year. What are you doing so wrong?

It’s not too surprising. Tomatoes are usually eaten uncooked, so the seeds are almost always viable when they hit the sewer system. Add to that tomatoes are tropical, so when a seed hits the soil it’s gonna start growing.

Seriously. Someone post the King of the Hill clip. You know the one.

It was only the other day I learned that the reason for this is mostly due to how they ripen, which I’m sure you already know.

For those that don’t, when you pick a tomato from your garden, you’ve picked it at your desired color and freshness. When you buy a tomato from the supermarket (most if not all), you’re buying a tomato that wasn’t fully ripened on th vine, but instead is blasted with some ethylene, a naturally occurring gas that normally is produced by tomatoes actively ripening, causing the tomato to continue to mature but not develop some of the complexity of taste you get from proper vine ripening. They’re often picked a little green when in super-farms because they’re firmer and less prone to damaging that way, and then ripened during packaging. That, and the tomato you eat from supermarkets and fast food are all super homogenous and bred specifically for mass yield.

You could look into: companion planting (some plants help or hinder others. Eg, basil and tomato are good friends); no-dig gardening (alongside having a good soil microbiome); green manure; sacrificial crops to lure pests away from your main crops; aspect and soil type.

Higher potassium and phosphates increase flower and fruit growth. Higher nitrogen increases leafy growth.

Don’t grow the same type of plant in the same patch every year.

Start them off inside, plant 3x as many as you want, choose the best and discard the rest when it comes to planting out.

Tomatoes grow well in containers or large pots, these can be moved to catch the sun or to avoid a storm and can also be moved away from some pests.

Cherry tomatoes grow well in hanging baskets…

removed by mod

It’s so hard to know any specific advice but I’d say when you’re getting into gardening plant more than you need and try different things - ideally write on labels what you’re doing with that one, like try some in bigger pots, different soil, more light or shade, different pruning styles or planting times. It’s fun and a great way to get a feel for your plants, instead of thinking ‘oh this plant is rubbish’ try to come at it more like ‘oh that’s what happens to a tomato without enough light’

Also YouTube is full of great gardening videos, the lesson type ones get boring once you know what they’re going to say but watching people show you their garden and talk you though everything and how it’s been growing, what they’ve done too it and etc can be endlessly fascinating

Try cherry and grape tomatoes. I’ve grown cherry tomatoes for the past two years along with starting grape tomatoes this year and I’ve had much more success with them than larger varieties. I think they tend to be more disease resistant, more vigorous, more productive, and fruit matures more quickly.

Also try growing them in bags or raised beds where it’s kept away from the ground where pests can get at them easier. Another thing you can do is cover the soil around them with straw mulch in order to reduce soil splash onto the plant when it’s being watered–this can transmit diseases to the plant. Pick off all the bottom half foot of leaves or so on the plant when it’s big enough too to reduce soil splash hitting leaves.

Honestly, might not be a popular opinion but I live in a big city and the amount of gardening-related local Facebook groups is insane. And since it’s Facebook, it’s all old people who have decades of experience with this shit. AND it’s region specific so they are constantly throwing down relevant advice for the zone you live in. 10/10 it’s literally the reason why I keep Facebook haha.

I grew these morning glories and by jove Im gonna eat these morning glories!

absolutely this. I see so many people who look at the very real possibility of economic instability, even in the temporary case, and are sure that the three most important things to get through it are guns, guns and guns. Some of them, maybe, know a little first aid. So I’ve made it a thing for me to be the guy in the apocalypse that can do a little bit of everything else. Canning, winemaking, cheesemaking, all the other various ways that people have figured out how to preserve food, and basic gardening and herb lore. I’m networking with people who know how and what to forage, nurses who know what basic supplies would be needed to treat minor injuries and diseases and how they can be improvised with what’s to hand, and other like-minded people. Everyone is sure that in order to survive they’re gonna need to be self-sufficient rugged individualists and that it’s mostly gonna involve raiding and repelling raiders but if you look at times of uncertainty the people who actually survive know how to generate food and medicine from nothing and have small, tightly knit communities where they know and take care of one another. If your plan for economic uncertainty is just guns you’re gonna end up dead of a bacterial infection next to a pile of guns. If, however, you know how to make soap from fat and ash, and have a sensible number of guns with which to acquire animal fat, and can generate food from the dirt, you’re a lot more likely to actually do well. Economic uncertainty isn’t going to be an action film.