Is July too late to replant tomatoes in North Georgia, USA?

Question

I started my garden this year with 8 tomato plants. Between disease, over watering and a misadventure with a plastic softball I have lost about half of them. My wife wants enough tomatoes to can some salsa and probably some spaghetti sauce and I don't want to disappoint her.

Is it too late to grab some more tomato seedlings and try to add some more? Is there a late summer/fall variety I should look for that will produce a good number of yummy tomatoes? Our falls are fairly warm and we don't get much frost until October or sometimes even November.

Answer 1

I would say do it now. Get some seedlings and get them started and you should get a good crop in 90 days. I live in Florida and last year I started tomatoes in November and got a huge crop in the winter. What I did was anytime that the weather got below 40 degrees I covered the tomatoes and they made it through any cold weather just fine. We had many days last December where there was frost and temps in the low thirties and suffered no damage. We harvested steadily for over a month starting in early February.

Answer 2

If you can find some seedlings, you should still be able to get some fruit. Sounds like you've got about 90 days until frost, which is enough time for tomatoes to ripen -- at least according to the seed packets I've got handy. Just check the time to maturity on the plants you buy.