The Godfather of Tomato Growing

The Beet: A Podcast For Plant Lovers

Epic Gardening

Home & Garden, Education, Leisure, How To

4.8 • 1.6K Ratings

🗓️ 21 August 2023

⏱️ 12 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Craig LeHoullier has spent over 40 years gardening tomatoes. He loves the variety of available to gardeners, and he loves to teach people about their flavors and nuances. Kevin and Craig talk about the Godfather’s current tomato projects, and reflect on results they got in the most recent tomato season. Epic Gardening Shop Homepage: https://growepic.co/45fbyVq Book collection page: https://growepic.co/3P0tc9J EG homesteading book: https://growepic.co/3KI24da Learn More: 38 Types Of Tomatoes For Glorious Garden Success Connect With Craig LeHoullier: Craig LeHoullier, PhD (chemistry), advisor for tomatoes to the Seed Savers Exchange, co-leader of the Dwarf Tomato Breeding Project, author of Epic Tomatoes and Growing Vegetables in Strawbales (Storey publishing), approaching his 40th year of gardening. Instagram Website YouTube Shop the Store As an exclusive for listeners, use code THEBEET for 5% off your entire order on our store, featuring our flagship Birdies Raised Beds. These are the original metal raised beds, lasting up to 5-10x longer than wooden beds, are ethically made in Australia, and have a customizable modular design. Shop now and get 5% off your first order. Get Our Books Looking for a beginner's guide to growing food in small spaces? Kevin’s book, Field Guide to Urban Gardening, explains the core, essential information that you'll need to grow plants, no matter where you live! He also wrote Grow Bag Gardening to provide you with specialized knowledge that can bring you success when growing in fabric pots. Preorder Kevin’s newest book Epic Homesteading if you are looking to turn your home into a thriving homestead! Order signed copies of Kevin’s books, plus more of his favorite titles in our store. More Resources Looking for more information? Follow us: Our Blog YouTube (Including our Epic Homesteading and Jacques in the Garden channels) Instagram (Including Epic Homesteading,... Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	We have Craig Luhullier back on the show after a four-year hiatus, Craig.
0:08.6	You are back, PhD in chemistry.
0:10.9	What I call you in my own mind is I call you sort of the godfather of tomato growing just
0:15.8	because of the level that you have taken this passion of yours.
0:20.3	So since it's been, since 2019 since you've been on the show, why don't you kick it off
0:24.3	with a little bit of background on why I might call you that?
0:29.4	Oh gosh, so can a godfather of tomato is the French and German and Scottish and Irish maybe?
0:36.4	I've had a great time in the intervening four years and I want to really thank you for
0:40.1	having me back on.
0:42.2	I kind of view myself as a coach and a teacher as well as a researcher, so any opportunity
0:46.8	I have to help grow gardeners, you know, we all know what COVID did.
0:50.8	It's sent everybody's streaming to seed companies.
0:53.8	People like you and I are there to try to make the COVID gardeners become permanent gardeners
0:58.7	and help them right, help them through the frustrations, but so I jumped into this really
1:04.2	in 1986 when I discovered the seed savers exchange, developed a love of heirlooms, started
1:09.8	combing through the USDA collections, looking for tomatoes, our grandfather and great-grandfathers
1:14.7	may have grown, then started thinking about what container gardeners and patio gardeners
1:20.7	might need and put together a project to create the dwarf growing tomatoes.
1:25.8	You know, we moved to Hendersonville down here and I've been gardening for 40 years.
1:30.8	I'm just a miserable person at retiring because I find myself busier and busier than ever.
1:36.5	So I think it's my depth of interest in tomatoes and how I think that they encapsulate everything
1:43.4	interesting there is about garden and you can apply science, you can apply art, you can
	...

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