From

Location

Message

Date Posted

Navarre,OH

Trying to get a pallpark est. of a few fruits I have growing.
List the weight, circumference, and kind of tomato please.

8/25/2011 9:50:53 PM

Sourthern Utah

bill, my biggest so far this season is 1.54 lbs,, 15.5 circ, grown on the 3.94 pennington,, big zac

8/27/2011 11:06:51 AM

Muddy Waters

Smiley about 2 lbs 17 inch circum!!

8/27/2011 12:18:13 PM

Brittnau , Switzerland

24.5 Cc and 4.5 Lbs Heavy on a 5.07 Boudyo plant
24 CC and 4.3 Lbs on the same plant also

8/27/2011 2:15:03 PM

On top of Brush Mountain, Pa.

I have not yet measured mine but there is a problem with the circumference of tomatoes to estimate weight. Some tomatoes are a bit hollow like some of the pumpkins are and so can weigh light. Marv

8/27/2011 2:25:53 PM

France

Three circonférence for estimate weight .Its good

8/27/2011 3:09:23 PM

Navarre,OH

Very true marv never thought about that. I am growing a few diff types. One of my pink brandywines at 22" would prob weigh alot diff from a big zac at 22". Guess I'll just have to wait and see. I'm not good at the waiting game. LOL

8/27/2011 4:23:55 PM

Saskatchewan Fosston Canada

how do you guy's do the estimation on the tomatoes?

9/3/2011 8:27:20 PM

East Carbon, Utah

We addressed this in some detail on Perry's Greenhouse last year:

http://www.perrysgreenhouse.com/vbforum/showthread.php?4584-Tomato-weight-estimation.

I collected data on about 1,200 tomatoes last year in order to get a handle on how fruit density, shape, variety, stage of maturity and dimensions relate to weight.

Given good circumference measurements in 3 dimensions and stage of maturity, we can estimate weight within 10% for about 80% of large tomatoes using ellipsoid formulas and density adjustment factors. Measuring just one circumerence is even less reliable for tomatoes than it is for pumpkins for estimating weights.

The other 20% fall into two categories -

1) Deeply lobed or highly irregular shaped. For these, I just estimate what % volume of the measured ellipsoid shape is taken up by air due to indentations and subtract accordingly: 5, 10, 15, maybe 20%. With this (granted arbitrary) adjustment, we can still get in the ballpark.

2) Hollow seed locules. As Marv mentioned, this phenomenon can really throw off weight estimates. In my limited experience, this phenomenon is variety specific. Two varieties that come to mind are Homer's German Oxheart and Elmer's Old German (I'll post pics of these in my grower diary shortly). A clue that you might have hollowness in the seed locules is when a still green tomato has a lot of give to it when gently squeezed. For these, there is a lot of guessing. I would start with taking off 20% and hope it's an underestimate.

Hope this helps. Let me know if you want the formulas (e-mail dale@gianttomatoseeds.com).

10/10/2011 1:54:30 PM