Gather your tomatoes while ye may

Yes, Fall is here, and that means that most of your garden has either slowed down or stopped all together. There are some things you can do though to prolong at least your tomato crop. The picture above is a good example of one. Just clip your green tomatoes off with a stem long enough to stick in a jar or vase of water. This will keep really green tomatoes hydrated so they stay juicy as they ripen instead of getting dry and mealy. Tomatoes that are just about to ripen can be snatched from the jaws of hungry vermin by simply bringing them inside and setting them out on the counter. I like to put them on a paper towel as the bottom will sometimes rot when in contact with the non-porous countertop. They should ripen before they dry out and thus retain their full juiciness. You may lose some to the indoor nasties (fruit flies) but most will make it as long as they don't have cracks or holes already. You may put your youngins into a paper bag, some claim this speeds up the ripening process as they can share their little ripening gasses. I on the other hand am crossing my fingers that mine ripen very slowly, as we are already swimming in tomatoes - never thought that was possible. The last option, I would actually like to dispell - if any of you have had luck with this though, please let me know. That option is pulling up the vine with remaining green tomatoes intact and hanging it upside down in the basement. I tried this last year with several of my vines, and even some of my potted ones, and all they did was shrivel up and rot - every last one of them. They didn't even ripen one little speck. I would have been much better off with one of the other methods. Anyone else have any other tricks? I'm all eyes. And please, don't be afraid of the new comment procedure, it won't bite - at least not as hard as the comment spam did.