Like any ‘Beefsteak’ type tomato, Mortgage Lifter needs a long growing season. 80 days ‘on average’ from fruit set to ripe fruit. So, keep an eye on the temps - you may need to be throwing a sheet over it some evenings.
My First Freeze (Zone 5) is usually October 15th, but it was 42 degrees this morning at 6am and there was frost on my VW’s window.
This is all in keeping pace with one of the worst growing seasons I’ve ever experienced. It’s a CONSPIRACY I tells ya! A CONSPIRACY against ME, specifically! ;)
And, yes. Donating food is just fine, too. I was my own ‘favorite charity’ for many years while trying to keep us all fed.
Yikes! Did you mean 80 days from transplanting to mature plant (fruits ready to begin ripening)? If it takes 80 days for the fruit to ripen, even if I pick early in ripening, I'll be in to "good chance of a hard freeze" nights.
In any event, "Oh, golly." How to get a sheet over a tomato plant that's now slightly over 8 feet tall (it's outgrowing the almost 8' supports), and not damage it...
(The Mortgage Lifter's vines are rather brittle, more so than some other tomato varieties, it seems.)
Step 1 - carry my 8' step ladder out there. Do NOT leave near the one good (as in revived and still exploding with growth) Opo plant!
That Opo plant is now flowering again. I've only spotted one female flower bud, so, I'll wait a couple days and possibly give the plant one more modest shot of Super Phosphate. It sure doesn't seem to need the nitrogen in Bloom Booster: The Opo plant also followed the top of a fence that runs past a ~22' Mimosa tree: the Opo somehow senses such things and has reached over a couple feet and latched onto the tree. I just let it go and now it's already several feet up that tree. That's actually good - if that section flowers, it will make for a "high" source of pollen. If a large fruit or two develops up there, it may break down a branch or 2 on the tree, but, I don't really care - that tree is just sort of a weed in that spot anyway.
FWIW, I transplanted this (my biggest) Mortgage Lifter into it's 5 gallon pot roughly 120 days ago, but the others that went into the ground, which are seriously less vigorous plants, started setting a few fruits only a few days earlier. The two that suffered moderate hornworm damage haven't even flowered, and seem to still be in a "slow recovery" mode.
Yes, all have been fed "tomato plant food" and starting about a month ago, Miracle Grow Bloom Booster. Interestingly, the potted plant got (and gets) more shade. The others got more like 80% - 90% full sun until recently, with shade until ~10:00 a.m. now that shadows are getting considerably longer. If I might ask, what was your opinion on taste of the Mortgage Lifter fruits? (The hornworms liked the leaves on the 2 they got in to just fine!)