Rogue Tomatoes Overtake the Farmlette

Last month, I wrote about the accidental tomatoes growing in the lower yard with wild abandon. No amount of pruning could tame those billowy beasts, so I pretty much gave up after the first hour. I also gave up on trying to fertilize them, as they had grown so massively, the Medusa-like tangle of branches and leaves had utterly engulfed the ground.

Mulching was unnecessary. Watering was a game of hide-and-seek. I even forgot to water one week… or maybe it was two. And were there really only three plants in there? I swear it looks like I’ve got triple that going on.

After continuing to semi-neglect my rogue tomatoes these last few weeks, this is what they look like now.

My little monsters are all grown up. Messy. Unkempt. And slinging armfuls of sweet, juicy tomato crack.

Every time I go foraging for tomatoes, I feel like I’m entering the Amazon. I need to be armed with a machete and a GPS unit — especially when I’m crawling through the clingy, bushy mass to fetch those dangling-in-the-middle-of-nowhere tomatoes.

The tomato monsters have completely overtaken the lower yard and are close to overrunning my young pineapple patch. We had to stake a few metal cages above the tomatoes for the branches to climb up and over.

I measured one branch to be over 10 feet long, sprawling along the ground with a vengeance… no signs of stopping and we’re only in July. It’s almost like the movie The Ruins… the vines start to take on a life of their own, overtake the farmlette, and consume any helpless being that comes upon them.

At least we’ll be well-fed before any of that happens though. Clusters of large cherry tomatoes are growing everywhere, hanging on branches in all stages of ripeness. Every time I peel back what I think is just dead foliage, I hit a pay load of delicious red goodness wallowing in the dirt.

And my favorite thing about them? After I’ve filled up basketfuls of fruit, I come out of the jungle — clothes, hair, hands — smelling like fresh summer tomatoes.