In search of the wild tomato
Not many have heard of the wild tomato. Tomatoes conjure up images of neat and tidy gardens and farmer's markets. Plants grown purposefully and carefully cultivated. But few stop to think about those abandoned garden plots where no one weeds or tends to them. Past year's fruit, maybe having been missed in the picking, dropped to the ground, sowing seeds that work their way into the soil. Even without human attention, these seeds will grow and sometimes thrive, even in the midst of tall weeds and grasses. They are a tenacious plant and well worth searching for. This is our quarry.
At first glance, there doesn't seem to much in this garden plot filled with waist high grass and weeds. Most people would overlook it and move on to more fruitful looking gardens, but we are intrepid searchers and know that the wild tomato grows in the most unlikely of places.
It takes a practiced eye to look at a sea of green and be able to pick out the distinctive tomato leaf. In this abandoned garden, they are there, growing under the cover of green, blending in with the plants around them. The perfect camouflage.
Once the tell-tale leaf has been spotted, it's time for careful work. What you see waving amidst the grasses is just a small bit of the actual wild tomato plant. It has a growing tendency of growing along the ground, snaking it's way through weeds and grass in search of light. If you start pulling up the grass in order to get to the tomatoes, you may find you have accidentally uprooted a wild tomato. With the rarity of these plants, you will want to be careful if you hope to return and find ripe tomatoes for picking.
Instead, you must carefully uproot each grass stalk, looking carefully to be sure it is grass and not tomato. Such is the retiring nature of the wild tomato that it entwines and runs under the grasses in grows in so as to be indistinguishable. It takes diligent and careful work to uncover enough plants for a potential future harvest.
After hours of work, if you have been lucky with your searching, you may discover a large, previously unknown plot of wild tomatoes. Tend them carefully... staking, weeding, watering... and with a bit of luck, you may get a harvest, all the more sweet because of the surprise of finding tomatoes growing in such a wilderness.
Of course, you could also decide to plant tomatoes and actually tend the garden, thus eliminating the need for this level of search and discovery, but where's the excitement and challenge in that, I ask you?
At first glance, there doesn't seem to much in this garden plot filled with waist high grass and weeds. Most people would overlook it and move on to more fruitful looking gardens, but we are intrepid searchers and know that the wild tomato grows in the most unlikely of places.
It takes a practiced eye to look at a sea of green and be able to pick out the distinctive tomato leaf. In this abandoned garden, they are there, growing under the cover of green, blending in with the plants around them. The perfect camouflage.
Once the tell-tale leaf has been spotted, it's time for careful work. What you see waving amidst the grasses is just a small bit of the actual wild tomato plant. It has a growing tendency of growing along the ground, snaking it's way through weeds and grass in search of light. If you start pulling up the grass in order to get to the tomatoes, you may find you have accidentally uprooted a wild tomato. With the rarity of these plants, you will want to be careful if you hope to return and find ripe tomatoes for picking.
Instead, you must carefully uproot each grass stalk, looking carefully to be sure it is grass and not tomato. Such is the retiring nature of the wild tomato that it entwines and runs under the grasses in grows in so as to be indistinguishable. It takes diligent and careful work to uncover enough plants for a potential future harvest.
After hours of work, if you have been lucky with your searching, you may discover a large, previously unknown plot of wild tomatoes. Tend them carefully... staking, weeding, watering... and with a bit of luck, you may get a harvest, all the more sweet because of the surprise of finding tomatoes growing in such a wilderness.
Of course, you could also decide to plant tomatoes and actually tend the garden, thus eliminating the need for this level of search and discovery, but where's the excitement and challenge in that, I ask you?
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