Backyard patio tomato war heating up

We have a tomato-growing contest going at our house and Regina is winning.

After stumbling out of the starting gate, my tomato plant is catching up. I’m confident that by the time we reach the backstretch, my Big Boy will overtake her fancy potted tomato, and I will win.

Hers came from the plant store with two small tomatoes attached to a husky stalk enveloped in suspiciously green foliage.

“It’s not a tomato,” I said, “I don’t care what they told you at the plant place.”

“You’ll see,” she said. “You’ll see big time when my tomato starts growing.”

By contrast, my Big Boy is anything but big as it fights the elements in the garden plot in the backyard. Actually, it is a lone survivor. Two other plants died. So did the zucchini and the two pepper plants.

I’ve seen signs of robust life lately and the Big Boy had four blossoms as of Friday. Meanwhile, the patio-potted tomato suffered an invasion of microscopic critters that crumpled its fancy leaves and left wart-like bumps.

“What’s wrong with my tomato plant?” Regina asked me, in a near panic.

I approach garden problems the way old-time doctors practiced medicine. They prescribed aspirin and a phone call in the morning if things didn’t improve.

I recommended that Regina dust her plant with Sevin and check it the next day. She did but the bumps didn’t disappear so she called farm services agent Mike Reeves, who confirmed my treatment. He said her plant’s infected leaves would be permanently scarred. That disappointed her. She was going for looks; I’m after tomatoes.

She attends the plant every afternoon, inspecting leaves for new trouble and administering water, and Sevin as a prophylactic.

“If that thing were a real tomato it wouldn’t put up with the constant pampering,” I said.

“You’ll see,” she replied.

We are now in the official Great Expectations stage that farmers know well.