Charles Wilber tells his personal story of learning to work with nature, and his philosophy and approach to gardening. He reveals for the first time how he grows record-breaking tomatoes and produce of every variety. There's no magic involved. Just a well thought out system that gives plants more than they could ever want, and makes it possible for them to reach their full potential. Wilber's compost is the cornerstone along with a wide circumference around plants layered with compost, alfalfa meal and mulch. Valuable pruning and watering details are given, too, as well as a new way of looking at seeds. As you will learn, growing awesome tomatoes integrates every aspect of gardening that you can imagine.
The secrets of a master, laid out in a short and enjoyable read. It's hard to argue with the success of Wilber's approach; the book is full of pictures of towering tomato plants in full leaf from ground to top, practically dripping with full-sized fruit. There are some profound ideas sprinkled between the instructions too. Throughout this book are themes of ambition, metrics of success, and humanity's relationship to nature. I didn't expect to take so much away from this book, but I was pleasantly surprised, and have even re-read it a few times. This book inspired me to get serious about growing productive tomato plants, and to focus on quality of plants over quantity.
Wow. When I put this on hold, I imagined that the "record" detail was size of tomato. Well, he grows large tomatoes, but only as a side effect of growing LARGE tomato plants. His system utilizes compost, mulch and selective pruning, and he routinely grows tomatoes that need a ladder to harvest the upper reaches. Plants that reach nearly 30 feet (no, that's not an extra zero, I meant thirty feet), and produce hundreds of pounds of fruit.
Yeah.
Food for thought, that's for sure. I'm not going to marginalize my tomato plants this year. They need proper caging to really shine, and I'm certainly going to pay more attention to how they grow (branching and flowering patterns). And make compost. :)