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| I have 4 tomato plants (White Queen) growing in pots under grow lights. They are doing great, and are about 5 weeks old with big leaves developing and visible growth everyday. They are 10 to 12 inches high, 10 the shortest plant, and 12 the tallest. Overnight they have all developed little blooms on them on the top. I have researched a little and it is inconclusive to me whether the blooms should go, or stay. There seems to be multiple different approaches. Im leaning towards go, but wanted to get some opinions on the matter. Heres a pic of the largest (foot tall) one (the burnt looking areas near the bottom are from neem oil that I used about 2.5 weeks ago during the day without waiting until the lights turned off... needless to say now all the lower leaves on the plants have little scorch marks now) : |
Follow-Up Postings:
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- Posted by carolyn137 z4/5 NY (My Page) on Mon, Feb 24, 14 at 16:40
| If it were me I'd take off all buds and blossoms so that all energy can be put into vegetative growth, not letting them go into the sexual cycle of blossom formation where energy would be diverted to from vegetative growth and forming, especially, a strong root structure. At 5 weeks that's a really tall plant. When do you expect to set it outside? I take all buds and blossoms off a seedling before setting out plants, and set out plants from 6 to about 9 inches tall b/c I find they adapt best to growing in real dirt. Carolyn, who notes that there was about a 1 and 1/2 hour delay in posting this b'c my neighbor down the road a bit came up here to complain about the weather.LOL |
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- Posted by gelatodave (My Page) on Mon, Feb 24, 14 at 16:52
| I would pinch of the buds and suckers on that plant. Looks very healthy. Nice job! |
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| I assume thats a good thing that its this height at 5 weeks? They seem to be doing very good judging from the internodal length and amount of foliage. Stems are getting thick. I misjudged by quite a bit how long it would take for these tomatoes to grow. I tried starting some indoors last year, and they got very spindly and grew pretty slow under what I had then. This year I decided to give them a lot more light; 600w MH in a reflected enclosure, and a heated base, and theyve just exploded beyond anything I expected. To answer your question, I plan to keep one inside as an experiment, and plant 6 outside (3 new ones just started and 3 from the original 4) as soon as temperatures rise I guess. Im in Maryland right now, and tomorrow itll be a high or 39, and the next day a high of 33... so theyll be inside for a while longer. Looking at an extended forecast, it seems lows of around freezing or below are scheduled even through early April... so I guess Im not putting them outside for quite a bit. I probably should have been starting them now or even a week from now, instead of 5 weeks ago, now that Im thinking about it... but live and learn =) |
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| Oh hah, you noticed the little off shoot on the third branch? I was thinking about popping it off and sticking it into seed cell to see what happened. Ive read they will grow into new vines, never tried it though. Not sure where a 7th White Queen would go though... Ive read they can get extremely large and I might be overestimating how much my outdoors growing areas can hold with 6. |
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- Posted by Whosurtomato 6a Southern IN (My Page) on Mon, Feb 24, 14 at 17:33
| You might want to start some more for backup. If it's two months before you can get them they are going to be huge. The size they are now is about right to set out. The bigger they are the harder it's going to be on them and might really cut down on your production if they make it. |
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| That plant/seedling looks quite healthy and normal (not leggy) to me. It is almost perfect size to be planted out, if possible. But probably in zone 7a it is too early right now. I have not started most of my matoes yet, because I cannot take care of them indoors for a long time. I will start germinating them a week from now. Good Luck to all ! |
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| I snipped off the blooms... The largest plant, the one pictured, had 21 buds and counting on the snipped off bloom. |
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- Posted by theforgottenone1013 5b/6a MI (My Page) on Tue, Feb 25, 14 at 12:47
| If it were me I would have probably let the blooms stay and develop into tomatoes. It's obvious that you've got a great set-up for growing tomato seedlings since it's only 5 weeks old and is so big and healthy. And if it wants to put out fruit, I say let it. Here's why I say that. As the others have already mentioned, that plant is going to be huge by the time you can plant it into the garden and you'll be pinching blooms off the entire time. You'd probably be better off starting new seeds now for planting in the garden later and keeping this one as a container plant. Rodney |
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| I might let the next set of blooms go through. Good point that theyll be inside for a long time anyway. Ive never had early blooms before, at least not that Ive noticed, on outside plants. Do early blooms stifle the plants growth potential? That would be a reason to me for snipping off the blooms... but if early blooms do not adversely affect growth potential, I think I might keep them on the one Ill be keeping inside, at least. |
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- Posted by carolyn137 z4/5 NY (My Page) on Tue, Feb 25, 14 at 14:05
| Yes, early blossoms can and often do slow plant growth potential, for the reasons I mentioned in my first post here. There have been folks who have done the obvious, that is snip off all buds and blossoms on plant A and don't do it on the exact same plant in the same season,hopefully. Results have varied, as one might expect , since different folks grow their tomatoes in different ways, some use amendments, some don't, and the weather in any given season can differ widely depending on where the plants are being grown. I think someone above mentioned what I'm going to suggest but Im too lazy to go back and check. I can't see the need for starting new plants when all you have to do is take some sucker ( lateral branch) cuttings, stick them into small pots with artificial mix, not water b'c if you do that the roots just have to readapt to a solid matrix. Quite a few folks keep varieties over the winter and as the plants get bigger they have to take sequential sucker cuttings to get a plant the size they want to set out. Carolyn |
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| Oh forgot about that carolyn, you did mention it! Hypothetically, if you never let a tomato plant bloom, would it grow longer with new foliage indefinitely? And Im planing on popping off that sucker that shown... I read they should get about 3 inches and then be removed. The genes on the plant shown must be really good; its blatantly out doing all the other plants, even though they were all planted at the same time and have had the exact same conditions. Not as if the other plants are doing poorly though... this one is just doing something stellar. |
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