Fleemo wrote:

...Dwight just forwarded me a URL for a website selling nearly ALL of the
recommended varieties listed above!

http://www.heirloomtomatoes.net


To give credit where it's due, Pat Brothers
made the original suggestion but didn't include the URL. I just found it
on Google and passed it along. Hadn't heard of the site previously, but
it does look interesting.

Sorry. Computer illiterate still. I found it googling and do not know
how to add the url to posts. I will figure it out sometime. It is on my
list of things to learn. Sorta low on the list. If you post an answer
telling me how to do it I will forget. Sorry again. Unless it is really
really easy and simpleminded. Like me.

Dwight Sipler wrote:

Fleemo wrote:

...Dwight just forwarded me a URL for a website selling nearly ALL of the
recommended varieties listed above!

http://www.heirloomtomatoes.net



To give credit where it's due, Pat Brothers
made the original suggestion but didn't include the URL. I just found it
on Google and passed it along. Hadn't heard of the site previously, but
it does look interesting.


Pat Brothers
The Powell House
Wake Forest, NC
USDA Zone 7b

I wound up placing my order today with another site that I found
called Tomato Growers Supply Company (www.tomatogrowers.com). Their
prices were slightly higher than heirloomtomatoes.net, but they
offered both heirloom and hybrid varieties. I wanted to try some of
the aforementioned heirlooms (recommended on an episode of Gardening
By The Yard), as well as some of the hybrids recommended over the
years here in rec.gardens.

"Dwight Sipler" wrote ...
New England, zone 5.5:

Correction: I read somewhere that a Tomato is not a fruit, but a
vegetable,
by act of Congress. (something to do with tariffs on imports).

That depends if you're a botanist or a bureaucrat. ;-)

From the Brooklyn Botanic Garden site:
"If the controversy over the tomato being toxic or benign weren't enough, an
additional debate has centered over whether the tomato is a vegetable or a
fruit. In 1887, the question went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court in
Nix v. Hedden. The real issue was money and protection for American growers:
if tomatoes were vegetables, they could be taxed when imported under the
Tariff Act of 1883. The Court's botanical knowledge was sound-tomatoes are
specialized reproductive structures that contain seeds, in other words,
fruits-but it chose utility over botanical technicalities and ruled on the
side of American farmers:

Botanically speaking tomatoes are the fruit of a vine, just as are
cucumbers, squashes, beans and peas. But in the common language of the
people...all these are vegetables, which are grown in kitchen gardens, and
....are usually served at dinner in, with or after the soup, fish or
meats...and not, like fruits generally, as dessert.
John Nix, the New York tomato importer, had to pay. The Court's pragmatism
was echoed in 1981, when the director of USDA's Division of Food and
Nutrition Service officially declared that ketchup was a vegetable as part
of the Reagan Administration's effort to justify cuts in the school-lunch
program."

Pat Brothers wrote:

.... I ... do not know
how to add the url to posts. I will figure it out sometime. It is on my
list of things to learn. Sorta low on the list. If you post an answer
telling me how to do it I will forget. Sorry again. Unless it is really
really easy....


*I* think it's easy, but then I've been working on computers for 50
years now. I even got my wife to learn how to do it. So I'll tell you
how and you can decide for yourself whether to forget it or not. (PS:
this works in Windows: I don't use Macs.)

(1) bring up website with your browser.

(2) at the top of the browser there is a window showing the URL. Click
on the window and the URL should be highlighted. If it doesn't become
highlighted, you can double click on it to highlight it.

(3) ctrl-C will copy whatever you have highlighted (the URL) into the
clipboard. Edit|Copy will do the same thing.

(4) whatever you put in the clipboard will stay there until you put
something else in the clipboard or reboot, so you can, at your leisure,
write a message. When you get to the part where you want to insert the
URL, ctrl-V (or Edit|Paste) will insert whatever is in the clipboard.
That's it.

Note that this cut-and-paste works with all sorts of other things such
as word processors and even some image editing programs. Try it. You
can't physically break anything by trying (just remember that if you
really screw something up, you can close it without saving your changes.
Also remember to back things up frequently, particularly the important
stuff.)

To summarize:

Ctrl-C copy (leaves selected text in place)
Ctrl-X cut (removes selected text)
Ctrl-V paste (inserts clipboard contents)



Since the URL is just a bunch of characters, you can always just type it
in. However, the cut-and-paste avoids typographical errors, particularly
on long involved URLs. It also includes the "http://" header, which
makes the URL into a link which you can just click on to bring up the
website.

"Bill R" wrote

A good source for just about any type of tomatoes seeds is
Totally Tomatoes, http://www.totallytomato.com

Well, not really. They tend to, uh, make stuff up WRT tomato varieties and
such.

Much better off to try Tomato Growers' Supply at:
http://www.tomatogrowers.com

They have at least as many varieties *and* are concerned with the genetic
integrity of the various heirlooms.

A few other sources:

Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds:
http://rareseeds.com
Specializes in heirlooms, particularly tomatoes and melons.

Marianna's Heirloom Seeds:
http://www.mariseeds.com
A magnificent selection of tomato and pepper seeds. Amazing variety.

Tanager Song Farm:
http://www.angelfire.com/biz2/collectibles4u/
Another immense source of tomatoes, complete with lots of great photos.

Finally, the late Chuck Wyatt's site at:
http://www.heirloomtomatoes.net
Again, great selection, reasonable prices.

A resource I've found invaluable is http://www.gardenweb.com - they have a
forum there specifically for tomatoheads. Carolyn Male, author of _100
Heirloom Tomatoes for the American Garden_, posts there regularly, as does
Craig LeHoullier, who discovered and named Cherokee Purple among others.

Jason