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Sunday 3 July 2011

Serendipitous Tomatoes


Several months ago I noticed that in one of the pots that some Flame Violets (Episcia) had grown into, a tomato plant had appeared. Well that was not really surprising since when I do not throw stuff into my compost pots I sometimes drop fruits, coffee grounds etc into other pots. So I put the pot by the side of the house whereI wanted the flame violets to spread and act as ground cover.
These ones have silvery green leaves and bright red flowers. 
I decided to leave the tomato plant and let it grow with the Flame Violets. I have grown tomatoes before on the farm and know you are supposed to stake and tie them and pinch back the little side shoots etc all supposedly to ensure that each plant produces the maximum amount of tomatoes. I did not do any this to this plant and it has grown and spread over quite a bit of ground and has been bearing lots and lots of tomatoes.
It turns out it is a Roma Tomato and I remember buying some a while back and then throwing them away because I did not use them in time.
 And YES that is one single plant. And it is still growing and spreading.


The combination of Tomato plant and Flame Violets seems to be good as the flame violet acts as ground cover letting the Tomato plant grow without too many weeds.



I took some pictures of the flowers because they look quite nice, not that they could ever end up in a flower shop or a flower bouquet since they are far too small. Still I think that their delicate simplicity and the fine hairs of the stalks and leave are quite interesting and came out reasonably well using the macro.


Its strange how you usually do not notice flowers of "edible" plants as being attractive ... well except for cherry blossoms and certain other fruit trees, but tomato flowers?








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