San Marzano Tomato Growing Journal 2010

San Marzano Tomatoes Website - Growing, Varieties, History, Making Sauce & A lot more...

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April 19th: Transplanted four San Marzano tomatoes outside in containers that were approx. 7 weeks old. Three of the containers are 25 gallon (blue) and the fourth is about 20 gallon (beige). San Marzano's are large, indeterminate vines that will need a lot of soil. 5 Gallon buckets (containers) are far too small for this variety. Added tomato food and crushed egg shells into the hole before covering plant. Planted deep. Picture at right taken on April 25th at 8 weeks old.

Pink San Marzano's I didn't receive the Pink San Marzano seeds until recently. Although it's normally a little late to start them, I really want to get them going this year to see how they do as this is a very rare tomato. There's no way I could wait until the 2011 season. I will update this page with pics and information on them later.

Click on image to enlarge.

May 10th Update

My four San Marzano tomatoes growing in containers. The far left container is 10 gallon and features a much younger, San Marzano 2 that was transplanted on May 10th. The center three San Marzano tomatoes were transplanted April 19th and are in blue 25 gallon containers, a good, large size for a large tomato plant. The far right beige container is about 20 gallons (?) and was also transplanted April 19th.

Good strong growth (since transplanting) despite a lack of significant rains common for April. In the future, my garden will be located in the panorama shot below.

These are NOT the ideal cages for San Marzano tomatoes, (too short & flimsy), but since I have a chain link fence behind them, I can use this to my advantage. See below (June 5th update) where I have modified these cages to accomodate the thick, bush growth.

Pink San Marzano

As noted above, I am desperately trying to get a rare pink San Marzano tomato to grow despite a late start this season. I planted 2 seeds each in 6 peat pellets and only 3 germinated. It is May 10th and all I have is some small seedlings about 2-3 inches tall. Despite this late start, I am determined to get them going this year so I can report on this rare San Marzano as well as have plenty of seeds for next year. If I have to, I will finish out the season in a greenhouse in order to get fruit from this plant.

Future Garden Area

(Opens larger image in new window.) More clearing and work needs to be done before this garden area is completed, including the installation of raised beds and irrigation. This is behind our house and includes 6500 square feet. There is probably another 65,000 square feet of garden space off to the right of this image, which is to the north, - so there is plenty of room to grow, or grow all our own food I should say. Behind where I am standing to take this picture, is a well I just found out is functional - which is great news.

Update June 5th:

First, let me apologize for not updating sooner. We are remodeling our kitchen and it's taking about 3x longer than expect. It always does.

After May 10th, we have been blessed with lots of Spring showers (later than usual, but welcome nonetheless) mixed with a lot of Sunshine and warm temperatures. Oklahoma weather is really good on tomatoes during the first few months of the season. As you can see below, growth has been just phenomenal since we last updated. Little San Marzano tomatoes started popping out around May 24th and have grown to what you see below in just 2 weeks.

Each of the four older San Marzano's have about 10 to 15 tomatoes on each plant. The far left plant is a San Marzano 2 tomato plant that was transplanted on May 10th. I hope you are not confused: Far left, one San Marzano 2 tomato transplanted May 10th. Containers 2 through 5, three blue and one beige, are 4 San Marzano tomato plants transplanted April 19th.

As you can probably tell, the San Marzano tomato plant has very vigorous growth, and is often described as such. Observe the incredibly thick amount of stems and branches sprouting up from these plants. The leaves will feel very "thick" and are broad. I had to pull branches and leaves out of the way to get close up pictures of the fruit. Underneath it all, the soil is in almost complete shade. (Left & bottom images open larger in new window).

Since these tomato plants are in containers, watering is more frequent. But since it has been raining a lot, I've mostly been making judgement calls and using a moisture meter which tells me when the soil is getting dry.

Pink San Marzano Tomato

I've been very excited about my Pink San Marzano tomato ever since I caught a lucky break and received some seeds earlier this year. This is one of the rarest San Marzano tomatoes there is and has seldom been grown. I know of only two other people and the USDA that have seeds.

I got off to a very late start on starting the seeds for the PInk SM. Then, only 3 out of 6 sprouted, and 2 died during some unexpected harsh rains that came. This is the first picture I have taken of my one remaining pink SM since I didn't know if he would survive. During the last update, this plant was extremely small. Now he is healthy and growing strong.

Observations, he is growing much faster than an SM 2 I seeded/transplanted at about the same time (see tomato cage picture below). The leaves, stems and branches on this Pink San Marzano are NOT similar to the San Marzano 1's and 2's I usually grow. In fact, the foliage resembles regular, average tomato plants, and not the broad, thick leafed, heavy foliage of the San Marzano's. This matches the description Keith Mueller gives of the Pink SM on TatianasTomatoBase.com

A word about my cages. The cages I am using are NOT recommended for SM's. However, they were all I had this year. These commonly sold tomato cages are too narrow and too small to accomadate the heavy growth of San Marzano tomatoes. I have had to modify these cages by cutting a section off the bottom three wire rings and leaving the top one in place. See photo at right of San Marzano 2 tomato plant with modified cage. (Opens larger in new image)

If you are just growing a few of these in your garden or containers, these modified cages will work fine, or you might want to try a trellis, or L-shape trellis. If you have rows and rows of SM's, you'll of course want to use poles and strings, or something with more practical application.

If I need some kind of support where the wires were cut, I will string natural based twine from one vertical support to another to hold up any branches that need to be.

Final word: I notice a lot of other online gardening writers and blogges like to write, use and present complicated growing methods with exact instructions and in some cases, dramatically engineered growing support systems. However, like most of you (I suspect) I have a busy life with other demands. I've got a lot of other things to do and need to keep all this simple.

Update: July 5th

Again, I apologize for not writing sooner. It's been a busy summer in the new house trying to get it back into shape and fix and repair things that were neglected for a long time.

Here's a short summary of how the last 35 days have been: Great growth and production from the San Marzano tomato plants. Some really big fruit, no disease problems. A few pest problems at first but nothing bad. A little bit of blossom end rot but that has since disappeared now that the heavy rains are gone.

So far, and it will probably continue, the San Marzano 1 is more productive than any other tomato in my garden. Acording to my wife, the taste is also better than all the other tomatoes so far, including the San Marzano 2, Roma, Bloody Butcher, Amish Paste, Siberian, Gregori's Altai, and some others.

Some large San Marzano tomatoes on a decorative Romanian plate.

The San Marzano 2 tomato plants are looking to be more like determinate plants, than indeterminate. They are also not as full and thick as the SM1s, nor are they as productive. The fruit's are much smaller, like Romas, and don't taste as good as the SM1s.

San Marzano tomato plants pictured above, no SM2s pictured. Thick stems and branches and good, large fruit production.

Pink San Marzano

I am very pleased with how the pink San Marzano tomato plant is progressing. It is much taller than the San Marzano 1s, and the production is good. No mature fruit yet, but remember that this plant had about an 8 week late start compared to the others. There is really no yellow leafing to speak of, no disease problems and the number of tomatoes on the plant so far are around 15. Remember, this is a rare tomato and I will be excited to taste test it, as well as collect the seeds.

Pink San Marzano Tomato plant

Update: July 18

Tomatoes, Tomatoes, Tomatoes

The production from this strain of San Marzano tomatoes is truly amazing. They just keep coming and coming and coming. I've already harvested about a dozen tomatoes from the two plants below, and still the fruit just keeps coming. The temperature/heat index here has been above 100 for a few weeks now, and I think this will affect the blossoms and new fruit for a short time later on this summer. Even so, I think production is going to far surpass any of my other tomatoes this season. The San Marzano is also far superior in flavor than any of the other tomatoes. This tomato can definetely be eaten whole or sauced, and the sauce is great too. Homemade tomato sauce from fresh, garden grown San Marzano tomatoes is as good as it sounds.

Seeds for sale soon: I am also working to save seeds from this strain of SM's because it is truly a great one that I think needs to be shared. I've been saving all the seeds from the largest fruit that I harvest and hope to be selling them via this website soon, or later this year. The interesting part about the seed saving is there are ONLY about 20 to 40 seeds per fruit. That is extremely low. Much lower than many other paste tomatoes.

Two highly productive San Marzano tomatoes. I've already harvested about a dozen tomatoes from each of these plants. Despite the hot summer with it's super heat waves and humidity, these plants are resisting great and producing perfect fruit almost every time. Click on images to open larger in new window.

San Marzano 2: Production has picked up some, but still not great compared to the regular type above. These seeds come from Poland and are probably not the same SM2 that other gardeners grow. The flavor is good, but not as good as the regular type, but still beats out many of the others in the garden - according to my wife. The size is good, larger than regular Roma fruit, but not as large as the regular SM above.

Pink San Marzano: More new fruit on the vine, but only one that became ripe. However, that fruit was severely cracked and split from the heat. I will have to water this plant a bit more and lay down a rock mulch to try and keep the roots cool. Interesting note, I went looking for seeds and only found about 6. Six seeds in a ripe pink san marzano. That's virtually seedless, in my opinion. We'll see what the other fruit deliver.

Until next time...

Update August 11:

Despite the 100+ degree temperatures for 6 weeks now, the San Marzano heirloom keeps right on producing tomatoes. The plant is starting to age, decrease foliage, and decrease blooms and production, - it's natural life cycle, but it's stayed strong in the face of horrible summer heat. It's tolerated the heat better than all my other tomatoes. My Rio Grande Roma tomatoes are tolerating the heat fairly well too, but probably not as well as the SM heirlooms.

My San Marzano 2 tomatoes, (seeds are from Poland), continues to be a disappointment with A LOT less fruit production overall and poor tolerance of the heat. No pictures taken.

At right, is my Pink San Marzano. I realize they don't look so pink in this picture, which is a bit out of focus and too close, but they appear more pinkish in reality.

These tomatoes haven't fared as well as the heirloom's presented above and suffered from low fruit production due to the heat. They also cracked lengthwise, and came in much smaller than preferred. The size of the plant overal is quite large, both tall and wide, but the blooms and fruit couldn't endure the heat. The taste of these pink san Marzano's is really great and the seed count is extremely low, probably less than 20 per tomato.

Because of the high temperatures, or the traits of this variety, total production of edible tomatoes has been around a dozen fruit. Disappointing.

Update August 31th

Fruit production on all San Marzano's the last 2 weeks or so has halted in the face of 8 weeks of 100+ temperatures. News reports here said it was the second hottest summer in 100 years. The blooms have prematurely died because of the heat and I am waiting for temperatures to cool down. The heat index has averaged 103 to 110 most days these last 2 months. It's really been a bad summer.

No pictures. Nothing really to show right now.

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San Marzano Tomato Growing Journal - 2010