Container Tomato Yields Big Results

In a surprise victory for small-space vegetable gardeners, a container-grown tomato won the largest tomato contest at a local garden center and a $100 gift card payday.

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It was a baffling Lycopersicon esculentum twelvemonth in my Denver , Colo. , veg garden . Despite the challenges of a late natural spring blizzard , showery May weather and a lack of blistering summer Night , I grew a swag - winning tomato .

I ’ve compose about the good practice forgrowing a giant tomato , but because this was such a hard horticulture twelvemonth , I ignore just about all my own advice .

I did n’t purposely plant a tomato variety known for bring out crack - big tomatoes , and I did n’t clip all the other love apple to point energy to the biggest one to help it develop . Instead of get thisAmana orangein a large , well - rectify veggie bed , I planted it in a bragging terrace container . There were no fancy soil amendment or fertilizers either .

The Lycopersicon esculentum did all the work on its own , arise to 1.32 pounds by the sentence I snip it from the plant . Once it was harvested , I immediately drove to the love apple competition patronise by Burpee Home Gardens atTagawa Gardensin Aurora .

There were four other magnanimous tomato plant entries , and each was count on one of the produce scales . The prize - pull ahead proclamation amount as a delicious surprisal along with the $ 100 terrific prize gift card .

The competition included family for the uncanny tomato and the tasty tomato plant , too .

In a year where there should ’ve been a mess of unearthly tomatoes , there was only one . I was expecting to see a right harvest of misshapen love apple , tomatoes with catfacing or even Lycopersicon esculentum with peak terminal rot . But none of those appeared .

The tastiest Lycopersicon esculentum contest had about a dozen launching of all different sizes and colour . Garden centre staff worked quickly to cut and process tomato to the judges who betray each first appearance .

The award for the top pillage was a tie ; an Early Girl and a tomato called Compost Surprise because that ’s where it volunteer to sprout and grow . The boy who entered it in the competition beam when his tomato was choose .

The tasty tomato victor was a bit of a surprisal , too . It was hard to believe an Early Girl intercrossed tomato could beat the discernment of all the heirloom tomato entries .

This contest reaffirm one of my theories about vegetable gardening . As persevering gardeners we can work as hard as we can to produce great veggie gardens , but in spite of our best efforts plants will storm us when we least have a bun in the oven it .

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An Amana orange tomato won the top prize in a large-tomato contest weighing in at 1.32 pounds.Photo/Illustration: Jodi Torpey

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