By Wayne J. McLaurin
University of
Georgia

I can’t recall how many news articles, bulletins, pamphlets and
other types of information I’ve written on tomatoes. Never have
written the perfect one. Nor have I eaten the perfect tomato –
yet.

There’s always that striving, though, for that illusive dream.

I talk to myself more and more as I get older, but the
conversations are still the same: I didn’t plant the right
tomato. I knew I should’ve ordered those seeds earlier. I’m going
to side-dress at the right time next year. I know drip
irrigation’s the key, so why didn’t I get it in this year?

How many questions can you raise for not having the perfect
tomato?

Too hot? Too many insects and diseases? Too wet? Too dry? Got to
get the weeds under control!

Reflect

Look back over this season. Have you made notes about problems
and when they happened?

You can lay odds on the same problems showing up next year within
a week of the time they did this year. Think back over the past
years and you’ll see this is true.

What to do?

Write down problems and possible solutions. This is the only way.
And you have to do it now, while the memories are fresh. If you
wait until January and start looking at seed catalogs, this past
season and the lessons it held will be a distant memory.

Now, what was that I was trying to converse with myself about?

(Wayne McLaurin is a professor emeritus of horticulture with
the University of Georgia College of Agricultural and
Environmental Sciences.)