Nice janice! When did you plant out? Was it earlier than normal?

Plant out was 13 March. The conventional wisdom for my area is wait until after St. Patrick's day. I beat that by a few days. I planted and mulched, but didn't stake the cages so I would have options. All turned out well.

And thank you!

That is nice, Janice.

I planted out mine less than a week ago. The plant is about 10" tall. But I have detected tiny bud on my Big Beef.

Thanks Sey. Good luck to you in your quest. I also found some little tomatoes on one of my big beefs. I need a better photo. My husband laughs a little at my tomato obsession, but I am happy to see celebrating plant out, first bud, or first tomato is perfectly normal here.

Plant out here is generally around Mothers Day. I may try to beat that by quite a bit. Very warm and dry for the next week so if I can get the garden ready I may try to get at least some of them in the ground by April 23.

If the Avg. LFD is fast approaching and the last frost you have had has been a while, then the chances of at least one more frost go up significantly. Just the law of averages.

I hear you NC. We have had a very cold spring with a lot of hard freezes in the last week or so. The next 10 days are 70's for highs and 50's for lows. If at the end of the next 7 days they are not forecasting anything dangerous in the 10 day I will probably go for it. Still a risk but one I can navigate with protection and extra plants. I have over 200 seedlings for around 50 spots.

I hear you! Our LFD is April 1. Our last frost this year up until April 8th, was March 1. Up until 3 days prior to the freeze on April 8th, there were no forecasts for any freezing weather. Mother Nature and the law of averages had other thoughts.

Past our LFD by 4 weeks. During this time we have had days with highs shooting up to 90F, quite few days in 80s and 70s. But mostly averaging about 65F. The last week of April has been much cooler with lows in 59 to 63F range which is still above average for this time of the year. Come next Saturday, we will see warm temps going up to high 60s and low 70s. So the month of May is up to a nice start.

One out of 3 plants in my garden have buds that are swelling slowly. I can't wait to see them yellow flowers.

Sey

I wish you luck and speed. The Cherokee Purple above and 2 more CPs like it are top bloomers and fruit setters. I also have some duds. I have two Beefsteaks that have set nothing.