How long do tomato flowers live if not pollinated?

9 years ago

This is my first time growing tomatoes and the variety I'm growing is Black Krim. I'm in zone 9 in Southern California. I have 2 plants in the ground, and 1 plant in a self watering container. They were transplanted on May 8th and are currently about 5ft tall now (~6 weeks). I've been pruning the suckers and tried to keep each plant to just 2 main vines, but one plant has 3 vines (I topped the 3rd vine). The vines are very thick, easily 1" in some areas. I've been pruning once a week to keep the branches from gettting too dense, and to keep them from hanging onto the ground.

I have lots fo flowers, but only 1 tomato so far. The single tomato is down near the ground and is probably from the first set of flowers to grow. I first noticed it 3 weeks ago and now it's maybe a bit bigger than a golf ball. There's probably sets of flowers every 8"-10" all the way up to the top of the vine. I've noticed that several flowers have fallen off. Some flowers don't seem they they ever opened, or barely opened (or maybe I just missed it when they did). Some flowers are withering, and some have petals that have opened wider.

I've attached a pic of my black krims. The fence behind the trellis is about 6ft tall. Off the top of my head, I think I made the squares in the netting either 6" or 7" apart.

My questions are:
1) when tomato flowers bloom, how long do they live before they are no longer fertile?
2) if tomato flowers are properly fertilized, how long does it take before you actually see the tomato forming?
3) once a tomato is forming, is it supposed to grow really really slow?
4) the tag for my plants say it takes 75-85 days to maturity. I'm basically around day 44 with only 1 visible tomato. Should I be worried something went wrong?

This post was edited by NoSpamKevin on Mon, Jun 23, 14 at 2:39

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Comments (8)

NoSpamKevin
Original Author
9 years ago
Here's a pic of the first tomato from 22 days ago
NoSpamKevin
Original Author
9 years ago
Here's a pic of that first tomato from yesterday
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2ajsmama
9 years ago
How hot has it been there since this month?
carolyn137
9 years ago
Agree with the question asked above about temperatures.

Most of my friends in the LA area would have sown seeds around Xmas time and set out hardened off seedlings in late Feb, early March so that they get good pollination and set fruits before the high heat sets in.

High sustained heat causes blossom drop since that sustained high heat denatures ( destroys) the pollen, which is protein, thus no or little fruit set.

If in East LA, how near the coast are you since there's something called the June glooms, where there's lots of fog and higher humidity and that can be a problem as well since high humidity can cause pollen clumping, which makes it less effective in fertilizing the wee ovules in the tomato ovary which then leads to fruit formation.

Carolyn, who just went back and looked and found that you transplanted on May 8th, which is several months after they should have been set out. Sigh.
Bets
9 years ago
In spite of the heat and/or humidity, you may get a few tomatoes, but when the weather cools your plants will resume setting tomatoes with a vengeance. (Unless they have succumbed to some disease or something unfortunate happens....) I believe your area actually has two growing seasons and you might have planted late enough to hit a second one.

Good Luck!

Betsy
NoSpamKevin
Original Author
9 years ago
Thanks for the responses everyone.

Yes, I transplanted on May 8th. Our growing season is extremely long (like 8-9 months!) We had a heat wave the week before, and the week after I transplanted, where temps were in the mid 90's and reached 103 for a couple days during each week. Since then, it has cooled off.

I am in East LA/San Gabriel Valley, which is about 7 miles south of the foothills and at least 30 miles from the coast. Temps here are 2-3 degrees warmer than Los Angeles. According to accuweather.com, the observed weather temps for June have been on average in the low 80's with the high at 86 and the low at 77. Those are daytime temps. Night temps have been around 60. Humidity has been unusually high between 60%-80%.

I checked my tomatoes this morning and found a 2nd one growing. It's only about the size of a small cherry though. I checked the flowers around the 1st tomato at the bottom of the plant I can see what looks like a tiny tiny tomato in the center of the petals but it must be like 4 weeks behind.
NoSpamKevin
Original Author
9 years ago
tomato forming next to the original tomato from 3+ weeks ago
NoSpamKevin
Original Author
9 years ago
black krim stalk