When will you ripen, little one?
It has been the hottest June and July on record in western Washington, and among the driest. Yet the same annual lament arises from gardeners from Longview to Lynden: “When are my *^#$ing tomatoes going to ripen?!?”
When we lived in Seattle, only a patch of the front yard got much direct sunlight. Most of that was occupied by a huge rosemary bush. I tried growing tomatoes once in the front yard and failed miserably. Our current home has two south-facing decks. The upper one gets scorched by the Sun all day year-round. Finally, I thought, I can have an edible garden!
Two years ago I grew bumper crops of basil and other herbs. Last year I supplemented the herbs with a banana pepper plant that provided plenty of fruit. This year I got Cubanelle and Padron pepper plants. In addition, in the ultimate leap of faith, I got two tomato plants. The peppers are very prolific. So are the tomatoes, but I have yet to see so much as a blush of pink on any of them.
I’m not sure what I’m doing wrong. The plants get watered nearly every day. I doubled down on the watering on the 90°-plus days. Today I rearranged the deck so the tomatoes are on the brightest corner, where the herbs were. If this doesn’t work, I’ll think about making my mother’s green tomato pie with what’s currently on the plants.
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