Tomatoes

[Dutchoma]

This year and last year the Moneymaker tomatoes that I grew have gone brown, mouldy and rotten before they are red. The two that I picked last year when they were grass green, did eventually go red and I could eat them. The rest went rotten on the plant. This year I picked them all when they were green and some of them have already gone rotten, I fear the rest will soon follow.
I am not sure what the problem is: the breed (my husband always grew ‘boring old moneymakers’ and I kept on in his memory), the soil, (I moved them from one side of the garden to the other), the weather, or maybe I didn’t water them enough?
Any ideas?

Have the leaves of the plant also gone brown? It could be blight, with the damp weather there's a lot of it about. Dispose of the plants and affected tomatoes in household waste or council composting, don't home compost. Or are the fruit going brown from the bottom? In which case it could be blossom end rot.

The leaves have indeed gone all brown now and the fruit is going rotten all over, so you are probably right in suggesting that it is blight. I’m afraid that I am a bit of a haphazard gardener, the garden is too big for me now, but I would like to keep the tomatoes going. I had 5 cucumbers and quite a few courgettes.

Does sound like blight unfortunately. Best bet now is to pick any unaffected tomatoes and put them on a sunny windowsill to ripen. It's disheartening isn't it, my kitchen window sill is also full of ripening tomatoes. But it doesn't happen every year and if you spot the signs early enough you can usually save a lot of the crop. I was reading a James Wong book on growing for flavour and he recommended pinching out the top of the tomato after it sets one truss. You only get one truss per plant, but they grow bigger and ripen much earlier, before blight is a problem, and you can fit more plants in a smaller space so I think I'll give that a try next year.

Op I really love that you’ve kept growing moneymaker in your Dh’s memory. Do you think he’d understand you thinking about another variety ? Not a tomato grower here but wonder if there is a less blight prone variety he would probably have moved onto also ???

It was a disastrous year for tomatoes. I sowed 200 seeds and ended up with one, single, solitary (bloody delicious) tomato.

It's not you, it's the blight! It has been SO BAD this year.

There's not really anything you can do, short of growing them under cover, eg in a greenhouse. You can get blight-resistant varieties (not blight proof!) varieties, or you could only grow cherry tomatoes which ripen sooner so hopefully get a good crop before the blight sets in.

Yep sounds like blight. We lost all our plants to it this year but did manage to pick lots of green tomatoes to ripen off the plant. Initially we did it on a table outside but then in a bag with a banana. Got a good few punnets. But yes, bloody blight

@HeronLanyon

Op I really love that you’ve kept growing moneymaker in your Dh’s memory. Do you think he’d understand you thinking about another variety ? Not a tomato grower here but wonder if there is a less blight prone variety he would probably have moved onto also ???

He was so much better at it than me, he really cherished those tomatoes. I would do a variety, yellow, stripey, big Italian ones, black ones, with varying success, but he only ever grew ‘boring old Moneymakers” I miss him so much And now I can’t even manage them. I only had two plants.

But sounds as though this year he wouldn’t have done better what with ‘the blight’. (Can’t believe I’m talking about tomato blight from central London). You’ll grown them again. Support. It’s tough.

I am the only one of seven friends who has managed to get any decent amount of tomatoes this year.

Two have alloments, another 3 grown every year. I'm the relative notice.

Ive grown blight resistant varieties and a heritage one. Ive just about kept on top of the blight in the heritage variety.

He was so much better at it than me, he really cherished those tomatoes. I would do a variety, yellow, stripey, big Italian ones, black ones, with varying success, but he only ever grew ‘boring old Moneymakers” I miss him so much And now I can’t even manage them. I only had two plants.
@Dutchoma
I heard Raymond Blanc in a podcast singing the praises of MoneyMaker tomatoes for their wonderful flavour. But he was appalled by the name and wanted to rename them!

This year my tomatoes have been disappointing- I've grown six different varieties from seed and while they've been late and tasty, the output is pitiful

There's always next year!