Reaver G's Tomato 'Big White Pink Stripe"
Solanum lycopersicum

This variety has been somewhat of a disappointment for me, before I ever got a ripe fruit. All six started out growing faster and healthier than my other two varieties but after getting to about a meter tall around day 45 they stopped getting taller. Even now, they still haven’t snapped out of it. I started harvesting fruit around the 14th (day 60 (or so) for a variety listed as 95 days). The fruits weighed between 6-11oz (170-310gr) and were yellow skinned with peach flesh.

Raw I found them mild and bland. I added some creole seasoning and like them this way. But when I put a slice of ham on white bread with the tomato, basil, and mozzarella then toasted it until the cheese was finished melting. Delicious. It may have been the yellow fruit combined with the mozzarella and ham but I almost forgot I was eating tomato, my mind thought pineapple! Very sweet when cooked.

Would I recommend it?
Not for the South East and not as a main crop. Maybe worth trying it out if you like sweet tomatoes for cooking recipes. But I am sure there are larger and more productive bi-colored tomatoes available that may taste better.
Will I grow it again?
Likely not. Though I plan on having an acre next year it’s not a long keeper, a drying tomato, or a market tomato so I don’t think I’ll find the room for it. Seeds are being put on my swap list.

Today, I added a 1" layer of straw beneath my BWPS like I did with the Amana Orange about two weeks ago, hopefully cooler roots will help the plant retain water. They are all getting tall enough to try and sprawl and since I can’t afford any real support today they are leaning a little to the left.
High heat and humidity has taken a toll on BWPS. Blossom drop is above 70% and blossom end rot claimed the earliest fruit on plant 6 so I sprayed the smaller ones with ‘stop rot’ calcium spray hoping that it will keep the other fruits from following the lemming. I also sprayed the leaves with fish emulsion two mornings ago, they’ve been producing small leaves so hopefully the added nitrogen will help the next few leaves a little.
The flea beetles have been getting worse so I added Sevin dust on these six plants with little results past day two, product returned; The aphids still showed up but flea beetles moved to the other plants to protest, unfortunately they held no hunger strikes.
Here are this weeks measurements for the BWPS, they’ve grown about 2+ inches last week. I’ve abandoned the old ‘XYZ’ formula and made a Reaves-like move to something new. The decision came ultimately came because of massive blossom drop and how much unfair attention it gave to suckers. Now I’m only including the height, number of flower clusters, and shoots with flower clusters on them.

• Plant 1: 30’’ tall – 4 flower clusters on 3 different shoots
• Plant 2: 26’’ tall – 2 flower clusters on 2 different shoots
• Plant 3: 30’’ tall – 3 flower clusters on 2 different shoots
• Plant 4: 27’’ tall – 2 flower clusters on 2 different shoots
• Plant 5: 33’’ tall – 3 flower clusters on 2 different shoots
• Plant 6: 32’’ tall – 4 flower clusters on 3 different shoots

The first two pictures are of slightly catfaced fruit. The third is of the tomato I pulled because of blossom end rot.

I charted new growth and flower development to compare to last weeks results. Here X represents the number of 3’’+ shoots that I can expect flowers to form on. Y is the number of suckers that I’m not expecting flowers on yet. Z is the number of flowers and does not count unopened, yellowing, or deformed flowers.

• Plant 1: 28’’ tall 4×1y12z
• Plant 2: 26’’ tall 2×0y2z
• Plant 3: 27’’ tall 2×1y17z
• Plant 4: 26’’ tall 2×4y17z
• Plant 5: 29’’ tall 2×1y17z
• Plant 6: 30’’ tall 2×4y17z

Plant 6 had the best week out of this group. Looks like almost 30 fruit are just about to start slow development. Yay!

Today I took measurements of my plants to chart and track desired results between my plants. X represents the number of 3’’+ shoots. Y represents the number of suckers. Z represents the number of flowers originally produced.

1. Plant 1: 25’’ tall. 3×2y30+z
2. Plant 2: 24’’ tall. 2×0y5z
3. Plant 3: 24’’ tall. 2×2y20z
4. Plant 4: 25’’ tall. 2×5y24z
5. Plant 5. 27’’ tall. 3×2y30+z
6. Plant 6. 25’’ tall. 4×3y30+z

It’s been 90 degrees all month and humidity has held at 99% so the pollen is getting fried. I’m going to attempt to pollinate them with my cherry tomato flowers because they have plenty of pollen. I’d rather have fruit and bad seeds rather than no fruit and no seeds.

Soil was amended with MG Vegetable Garden Mix and the twenty minutes before transplant they were soaking weak MG Tomato solution into their roots. They were mulched and watered in and took very well. They get more sun than the other two varieties.