The Most Interesting Tomato Plant of The Month! JUNE

Most Interesting Plant

It's got nothing on the Most Interesting Man in the World advertising campaign run by Dos Equis Beer. It's not smooth. It's anything but suave. However, it may leave you with the lasting image of "grow tomatoes, my friends."

The Most Interesting Tomato Plant of the Month is featured to your immediate right. What makes it the most Interesting Tomato Plant of the Month? Take a close look at that photo. Does that tomato plant look normal? If it looks like it needs a good drink of water, or it's about to up and DIE on me, congratulations! You too have noticed something odd. There's something not quite right here.

Believe it or not, this plant gets the same amount of water and care that other healthy-looking plants in the 2022 garden get. So, you may be asking, why in HADES does it WILT like that? Tomato plants that show signs of severe wilt are not something a tomato grower wants to see. It means something isn't quite right in Dodge City, or "Houston, we have a problem."

Help Me! I'm DYING!

The Most Interesting Tomato Plant of the Month is a gift from my tomato growing friend, Nels Christensen. We have deduced that the name of this particular variety is called the Korean Long. Now, don't get me wrong, but I know what you're thinking. A name like that automatically induces the thought of "OH, THAT MUST BE A REALLY GOOD TOMATO!!!!" Not so fast, my friends.

As it turns out, the Korean Long plant in the Christensen garden is exhibiting the same characteristics. It's wilting. Badly wilting. Like my Korean Long plant, the Christensen plant looks like it could keel off and die at any moment. Which leads the both of us to believe that the plant is SUPPPOSED to look like this. The wilt is normal. Nothing to see here, folks.

That leads us back to the name: Korean Long. Does this, perchance, mean this variety hails from Korea? It might. Nobody really knows the history behind this plant. Plenty of growers are searching for it. Nobody has come up with anything yet, other than the conclusion that this variety must hail from somewhere in Korea. Which could be right. It could also be wrong. This could be a case of wonderful marketing.

Paste Tomato? MEH!

Short and sweet? The Korean Long is a PASTE TOMATO. Don't get me wrong here, but I normally do not swoon over paste tomatoes. It's the same thing that commercial farmers grow by the tens of thousands in the six-county, Sacramento region. All of these paste tomatoes have a date with cannery operations located north and south. They will eventually wind up in grocery stores across the nation as cans of tomato paste, tomato sauce or tomato chunks.

Call me a tomato snob, but paste varieties really don't excite me much as an heirloom tomato grower. Given a choice, I'd much rather have slices or chunks of vine-ripened Brandywine, Black Krim or Mariana's Peace tomatoes. I have a feeling that most tomato snobs (or snots, if you prefer), would make the exact same choice. It's not like paste tomatoes are the tomato of choice in your high end restaurants either. "Give me a salad featuring your finest paste tomatoes," said no tomato snob (snot), ever.

I do have a strong suspicion that the name of Korean Long may have resulted from a marketing brainstorm session at one of many seed suppliers in the good ol' USA. I've attended many meetings like this. It could have gone a little like this:

Marketing Guru #1: "Boss, we've got this new tomato seed that just came in from Korea!"

Sales Manager: "It's a paste tomato. We've got a million seeds in stock that are also paste tomatoes. Everyone grows paste tomatoes. What makes this one so special?"

Marketing Guru #2: "Well, it is from Korea. I think. Instead of calling it a common paste tomato, how about the name of Korean Long?"

Sales Manager: "Brilliant idea! You've earned a promotion! Stick it with the name of Korean Long and add another $1 surcharge to the seed price!"

The Korean Long

Before you dismiss this idea as far-fetched, be advised that it's the same brilliant kind of thinking that resulted in the marketing campaign of: Garden Plants That Deter Mosquitoes. If you forked over $5 for any plant that supposedly deters mosquitoes, you've been duped my friends. No plant deters mosquitoes. Plants attract mosquitoes, and other fine friends.

But this does give me a really good idea. How about a tomato plant that deters mosquitoes? Would you shell out a few extra $$ for that? Or, better yet, a tomato plant that deters midnight raids by rats and other garden pests?

I think I'm onto something here!