Let's hear it for the volunteers!

This patch of entirely volunteer tomatoes has been one of the most fascinating things in my garden this season. This bed in front of the house was empty this spring after we pulled out some overgrown boxwood hedges with issues last fall that had grown far too close to the house, which we plan on painting.

I filled in low spots with my homemade compost, which obviously does not get hot enough to kill seeds, because a bunch of cherry tomatoes sprouted. Out of curiosity, I let them grow and am now enjoying regular, sungold, black and yellow pear cherry tomatoes. 

volunteer cherry tomatoes with direct-sowed poppies

While the deer have definitely chomped these plants, especially early in the season, they haven't bothered them as much as the purchased plants I'm growing in Earthbox containers in the back yard. The volunteers are also producing larger fruit for the most part and are producing well now, while the purchased planted are shriveling up. 

I'm not entirely sure why that is. The seeds are certainly different. The volunteers might get more a little more sun. But I also water them much less, at least directly, although I water the zinnias planted around them and maybe that's enough. There is also clay soil in the front beds, which is likely beneficial this year since we've been in a moderate drought since June.

tonight's volunteer harvest

In fact, without these volunteer plants, my tomato harvest this year would have been quite the disappointment. But with them, I have all I can eat for salads and snacking. Now I have a conundrum, because although a tomato patch in front of the house isn't quite the look I was going for, they have produced so well that I'm tempted to grow more here next year. 

Have you had volunteer vegetables produce better than purposefully planted ones? And is a tomato patch in the front of the house tacky or tasty? I'm also considering incorporating more food into my landscaping and would love to see any pics of that in practice!