It's August, the height of tomato season. In backyard gardens across the country, late summer is a time of an abundance of vegetables, and the tomato is king. With their sweet, juicy flavor and high yields, it's no surprise that tomatoes are the most widely grown vegetables in American gardens.

Tomatoes taste best fresh from the garden, but often you have more than you can consume or even give away. What to do with all those extra fruits? Here are some ideas for processing and preserving fresh tomatoes and suggestions for ways to keep the harvest coming.

Indeterminate cherry tomato varieties, such as 'Large Red Cherry', will produce large plants and far more fruits than you can possibly consume. Keep these fruits picked or they will crack on the vine and rot, spreading diseases to other tomatoes. Other dwarf varieties with small fruits, such as 'Patio', don't produce an excess of fruits so they are perfect for the occasional tomato salad.

One way to preserve the excess of tomato fruits is to dry them. While any tomato can be dried, the best types for drying are small-fruited plum and pear varieties because of their low water content and meaty flesh. Also, dried cherry tomatoes make excellent snacks. You can air dry the fruits on a screen outdoors if you live where the temperatures are consistently in the 90s with low humidity. For everyone else, the best bet is to use a food dehydrator or oven to dry the fruits.

Cut the tomatoes in half and dry them in a 150-degree oven for 6 to 12 hours. Place the prepared fruits skin side down on a plastic-mesh screen, or on a baking sheet lined with cooking parchment or a silicon baking mat. Prop open the oven door slightly to allow the moist, hot air to escape. When finished, dried fruit should be uniformly dry and pliable, and not sticky when cool. Store in glass jars for use in soups and stews in winter.

Meaty tomato varieties, such as 'Roma' and 'Rutgers', are also perfect for making tomato sauce or canning. Check your local County Extension Office for the latest recommendations on how to can tomatoes. Large-fruited, slicing varieties, such as 'Big Beef' and 'Better Boy', produce watery fruits and take awhile to cook down into a sauce. The best way to store extras of these fruits is to freeze them.

Freeze tomatoes by scalding the whole fruits for 30 seconds in boiling water -- just enough time to loosen their skins. Place the tomatoes, whole or sliced, on a cookie sheet and place it in the freezer. After 24 hours, when the tomatoes are frozen solid, place them in containers.