2024 Tomatoes: A Season of Learning, Growth...and a Jungle Takeover

The Tomatoes I Grew in 2024: A Season of Learning, Growth… and a Jungle Takeover

I was so excited to kick off the 2024 tomato season—visions of sun-ripened, homegrown tomatoes danced in my head. But after years of trial and error, I’ve learned a few golden rules when it comes to growing tomatoes in Vancouver, BC:

1️⃣ Wait until after the May Long Weekend to plant. Jump the gun, and you’ll end up with shivering, sulking tomato plants that refuse to grow.
2️⃣ Always start with young plants. Our warm season is not long enough to mess around with seeds unless you have a heated greenhouse…which I don’t.
3️⃣ When in doubt, go for cherry tomatoes. They ripen faster, produce like crazy, and taste like little bursts of sunshine. A go-to favorite? Sweet 100’s—widely available, wildly delicious, and guaranteed to make you feel like a gardening genius.

Enter: My Tomato Lineup for 2024

This year, I discovered Phoenix Perennials in Richmond, B.C. and went on an online tomato plant shopping spree (because who needs self-control when ordering plants?). While they seemed to take forever to arrive, they actually showed up right on time—healthy, beautiful, and ready to rule my garden.

Here’s what I grew:

🍅 Artemis Tomato – Meh. Not bad, but not writing poetry about it either.
🍅 Crokini Tomato – Also not a top contender.
⭐ Pear Drops – Started out black, then ripened to yellow, which was both cool and slightly dramatic.
⭐ Cherry Drops – Also started black, then turned red—a moody, yet tasty tomato.
⭐ Orange Icicle – A medium-sized, Roma-shaped beauty that looked like it belonged in an art exhibit.
⭐ San Marzano – The ultimate big, meaty plum tomato—hello, homemade sauce!
⭐ Sungold – Little orange balls of pure joy. If you haven’t grown these, fix that ASAP.
⭐ Copia – A large, yellow-red swirled tomato that basically said, “I’m fancy.”
⭐ Sun Sugar – Produced like it was in a competitive sport, and I loved every second of it.

The Great Tomato Takeover

Now, here’s where things got interesting.

I was out of town for two weeks during peak growing season (rookie mistake), and while my caretaker did an amazing job propping up the plants, no pruning, no pinching of suckers, no tomato discipline whatsoever took place.

When I got home, my tomato garden had turned into a full-blown jungle. I’m talking vines everywhere, plants toppling over under the weight of fruit, tomatoes playing hide-and-seek—it was chaos. I half-expected to find a lost explorer in there.

It took me many hot, sweaty hours of hacking my way through the greenery to reclaim my tomato kingdom. But wow—what an incredible harvest!

Lessons Learned

✅ This garden space is PERFECT for tomatoes.
✅ Next year, I’m assigning someone tomato-pruning duty while I’m away.
✅ Tomatoes are sneaky and will take over your life if you let them—but in the best way possible.

All in all, 2024 was a wildly successful tomato season. I may have lost control for a bit, but in the end, I was rewarded with an abundance of delicious, homegrown tomatoes. And honestly? I’d do it all over again. ❤️🍅✨

These lettuces have been ‘growing’ for months!!