I've been gardening for a long time now, and i think i am ready to grow my first batch of GIANT tomatoes. I've been researching, and there is way too much ambiguity to decide upon the RIGHT way. Can you please give me a step by step process. Also, what section of the plant should i decide upon the "chosen" tomato, the top section of the plant, or lower section????

Thank you much :)

Preparing the soil is paramount. If you want really big ones, either dig or till up to 3 feet deep. A guy I know rents a trencher for a few hours and trenches beneath each row of tomatoes to a depth of 2.5 feet. This gives plenty of room for roots to expand in search of water. Plan on at least 50 pounds of compost for each plant. More is better.

Transplant healthy plants into the prepared soil. Note I said "plants". This means at least a dozen plants in hopes one of them will produce a huge fruit. Provide a water source so the plant is never stressed for moisture.

Watch carefully for the first blossom cluster... and remove it. You want the second blossom cluster to set fruit. Select the biggest bloom on the second cluster and pinch off the rest of the blooms. The plant should be supported either with a stake or with a cage. Get some old pantyhose to hold up the fruit. When a tomato gets above about 3 pounds, it will break its stem if it is not supported. Use the nylons to tie a support under the fruit to hold it up. Don't bind the fruit, just support it.

Fertilize with a high quality source of NPK. The N should be pretty low while P and K should be high. The plant will require side dressing at least 3 times while the fruit is maturing.

Fusion

This is my plan.

I am growing Delicious Tomato Plants from seed. I have already started them right now... they will get alot of TLC.

I will till and hoe in manure and compost (maybe fertilizer?) into the soil once seedlings develop true leaves. I will try to till as deeply as possible,

Transplant the designated plants into the veggie garden, providing them wall o water.

I will feed them liquid fertilizer every week.

When first flower cluster comes out, i will pinch it out

Always sucker

When second cluster comes out, pinch out all but one of the biggest flower

begin to take out any developing buds and suckersm leaving one or two flowers alone
Fertilize like crazy when fruits appear

Provide water everyday

Good enough for a 1+ pound tomato?

I do not know if this will work or not, but here is what I have done. Two soil tests this spring said that my soil is in excellent shape basically, with only a couple of elements like zinc being a little low. From ammending heavily over some years, the clay beneath my topsoil has become conditioned so that I am convinced that it holds nutrients and moisture much better than it did in the beginning, and that roots can go deep into it.

I recently obtained a trailer load of premium aged, composted horse manure and have spread an inch or so on the surface of my garden. I then opened a deep furrow with my plow and put strowed a generous strip of the horse manure in it, followed by an equal amount of my good home made compost made of many diverse fruits, veggies, shredded leaves and kitchen scraps, along with a strip of fine alfalfa hay bits some handfulls of epsom salts and some powdered all purpose fertilizer like you put in a hose end sprayer.

I then covered the row back up and soaked it down good to settle and work until my little tomato seedlings are big enough to transplant. I am running late with them, health reasons delayed my getting them started, but by the time they are ready the ground should be good and warm and the danger of frost past.

I have a number of the varieties that have the genetics to make big tomatoes, including Big Zac, Mortgage Lifter, Big Beefsteak, Neves Azorean Red, Burpee's Porterhouse Beefsteak, Supersteak, Box Car Willie, Amish Big Rain Bow, Cherokee Purple, Aunt Gerties Gold and a few others.

I grow as a hobby for taste, and productivity but have not tried anything extra for a big tomato like pinching blooms, pruning etc. thus far. I may devote one or two plants of a couple varieties for that this year, to see if some will beat this Neves Azorean Red that I grew last year. I had several others of similar size.

I do use soak hoses and lots of good shredded oak leaves for mulch and deep soak my rows when needed.

If I get anything worth bragging on, I will come back and post a picture.
Bill P.

I'd also add Porterhouse to fusion's list. I only trialed it this one season but it has shown tremendous potential to produce a really large tomato!