16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes
bcmolle, sorry for your loss. I think we see at least one fish head incident (fish heads, fish heads) every year. Oh no! (roly poly fish heads) It's running through my head and (fish heads, fish heads) I can't get it to stop! (fish heads, fish heads) Fish Heads YUM!
Betsy
It does work well but not many backyard gardens can keep the critters out. No mater how deep you dig them in. And yups, they will till your compost and do a fine mess of it getting to it.
Your compost bin, the one that gets fresh adds, needs a strong hardware cloth or similar sides and top to keep the animals out. And dug in deep to keep the flies away.
In a three bin system that works so well...i bury them deep under the middle bin.
Better used for stock for a fish chowder...
I do mulch and dig in about a hundred cod bodies and heads every fall and compost them as well...a costal home in Northern Canada...but that has been done for many years. Mulch with seaweed and collect sea urchin shells and double dig it all in.
No critters but moose... they prefer my blueberries.
A whole other gardening challenge i deal with every year...
To Prune or Not to Prune, both are options open to the gardener/grower.
About suckers and branching:
I have noticed that not every branch out can be labeled as "suckering". Some varieties tend to branch out and get bushy. For example my Mortgage lifter has 2 branch outs. This branching habit is more common in peppers and it is not a suckering. The so -called suckers normally start much later in the game at the lower nodes. I do prune 100% of such growth on indeterminants but I am not doing that with my determinants. That is my option.
My plants are being pruned to 3 stems and they are showing the same flower suckers. I may leave a few leaves of this sucker intact for shade purposes, but otherwise I prune it to stop it.
I have also noticed that some of the main stems break into two main stems, and by the time I notice it, both stems have a flower cluster, which makes it hard to decide which one to keep and which one to grow out. So I have been keeping the "sucker" stem but only to right after the flower stem. Maybe leave a couple leaves for shade. This way I get that extra cluster of flowers, but it will not grow any more after that.
There are a couple of other discussions running about this question here right now. Normally, assuming the plants are of proper size to transplant to the garden outside, then removing blooms is stopped once the plants are transplanted to their final growing place. Yours certainly sound plenty big enough to leave alone.
In other words, you remove any they have before planting and then leave them. If the plant can't cope with them, they drop.
Dave
Yes, I agree with above. You describe your plants as already strong, planted in large containers with good medium, they get plenty of sun ... so there shouldn't be and issue that leaving the blossom might cause some kind of stress on them and prevent them from growing bigger.
When I bought a 6" seedling (RC ML) it had some buds on it. I pinched them because I wanted the plan to spend all its energy on growth (roots, foliage). But when it flowered at 16" , I welcomed it with open arms .:D
Okay, I'll stop putting them out for awhile. Is there anything else I can do to help them recover?
Sorry but I don't think you understand what we are saying. You cannot radically change the environment of a plant without damage. The damage is done now since they weren't hardened off first so you might as well leave them out. The damaged parts will die and fall off but the new growth will slowly replace it and should be ok . Taking them back inside only to move them back out side later on will only reverse the progress made and then cause more damage.
Plants need to be very gradually - over a period of 7-10 days - exposed to the the outside when they have been grown indoors. This is called Hardening Off and there are FAQs here as well as lots of internet info about it.. They never go from inside directly into the bright sun.
Rather they go in slow steps from inside out into the world. First to sheltered shade like a screen porch or under a deck, then into shade protected from wind and high temps, then into light sun for a few hours, and gradually over several days into more and more sun for longer periods.
And once they start out they don't go back indoors again except briefly in the case of severe storms or such.
Dave
How are everyone's tomatoes beginning the month of June? Mine are growing and making little tomatoes. I planted both closed containers and draining containers to see if they show a difference. I used lots of coarse coir for both and am watering the same amount, also feeding live aerated Tea with a measuring cup to be sure everything is the same. Some of my closed containers are clear so I'm watching the moisture through them, to respond to all the plants, of course, keeping an eye on all the exposed plant parts. Still can not decide to prune or not, thinking same ones I have two, will try pruning one Indigo Apple and not the other to compare. Hope all of you are enjoying the process as much as we are here!
In the past I have planted 1 tomato (better boys) one per each sq ft in a 4x4 sq ft raised bed next to a 4 x5 trelis. I then pruned each plant to one vine. I got less tomatos per plant but more tomatos per linear ft. It was a wall of solid tomatos...I got this method from the sq ft garden gook. I'm not smart enough to dream this stuff up
by myself.
Congrats Johns, you built a nice set up for your toms !
I admired all the stuff you guys build for your toms and spent my winter months dreaming about your various ways.
Finally, as I have two left hands and a job that keeps me too busy for my taste, I decided to let my plants do as they like.
I guess it'll end up with crawling toms on boxes.
And more mockery and hypocrite smiles from my neighbors.
Well never mind, anyway I sucked so much from the start that the 50 ones which survived out of 210 seeds have gone through a real darwinian selection ;-)
I assume those 50 ones are pretty life loving toms who can take care of themselves alone.
But I'll never stop admiring your dexterity !
Francoise ... I could post a close up that shows how I sometimes miss a nail with a hammer by a country mile ;-)
(The important joints are screwed, but the feet are nailed on.)
This post was edited by johns.coastal.patio on Mon, Jun 2, 14 at 11:12
Yes I got my info from the same thread. It is a brief pictorial timeline, nevertheless very useful. I have no idea about its accuracy though. But I just take its numbers as ball park figures. Obviously a small fruiting or cherry tomato is not going to act like a beef steak.
.
Since they were planted more than 2 weeks ago then it sounds as if they are on track and behaving normally. So no I don't see any reason why they would need to be replaced.
If you feel it is stressing the plant for some reason then you can always pinch off the blooms but usually, once transplanted, there is no need to remove any blooms that develop. If the plant can't support them then they don't set fruit and the plant drops them. Which is common with the first flush of blooms.
Dave
If these cherries are indeterminates, their normal growth pattern is for 3 leaves (compound leaves), followed by a truss of blossoms. That pattern repeats until frost.
And of course a new branch is likely to appear in the angle between each leaf and stem.
Determinate and semi-determinate varieties follow other growth patterns.
My soil is roughly 1/3 compost, 1/3 peat moss, and 1/3 vermiculite in a 14-16" raised bed. The native clay soils here are the reason for that. Good location and at least 8-10 hours of sun per day. The plants are green though I did lose one. I am under the assumption a critter found it because the soil looked disturbed and not much was left other than the roots. The rest appear to be taking their sweet old time. Temps at night have been 50s and maybe lower. I love the way everyone wants to help here! So cool for a newbie like me to learn!
Edit: Is there a simple fix I can do to keep temps up over my plants overnight? Like using gallon jugs that are halved or something? Temps here at night are looking to stay about 60 for the next ten days.
This post was edited by ApacheRosePea00 on Sun, Jun 1, 14 at 19:25
Looks like Downy Mildew in the second pic. Probably other issues too but would need more info. Container size, mix, nutrients, etc.
Is all the damage only on the lower, older leaves or new growth too? Strip off all the affected leaves, bag and dispose of them and spray with a good fungicide to see if you can get ahead of it. If it has an unaffected, healthy growing tip I'd take a cutting and root it so you have a replacement ready to go.
Good luck.
Dave
Good idea about a backup, didn't even think about that.I pinch off the yellow leaves and leave them on the soil so guess that's not a good idea, I'll remove. Thanks.
Yes, new growth look good - green, no curling, healthy looking though not as large of foliage as the bottom. But the curling and yellowing sure are catching up fast.
Container is 5 gal (or 4.75 if I did the math right), I know it's a bit too small. I saw someone's Gardener's Delight in a 5 gal pot and it did well but I know many factors can affect.
Mix is Kellogg's organic potting mix (specifically Patio Plus). I didn't add anything else other than Jobe's fertilizer (4-4-4) when I first transplanted it from the 4x4 container @ purchase to the 4.75 gal container, that was 6+ weeks ago.
Wonder if I will kill this plant after all. Man, I thought I was doing well.
I don't see anything wrong with the plant in the photo other than putting that tiny cage on it was a waste of time and effort as it is already outgrowing it. But as others have said a day or two of partial shade after transplanting is usually all that is needed for the plant to recover.
If it is a Big Boy it is going to need something far more substantial and 4x taller than that for support, but I have to say that plant was very likely mis-labeled. Based on the photo, Its growth pattern and node lengths certainly don't look like a Big Boy. It has the appearance and growth patterns of a determinate variety, not an indeterminate.
Dave
Can you post few pictures ? Like they say a picture can say thousand words.
What you have described in your first paragraph, does not necessarily equal to over supply of Nitrogen in case of tomatoes. And about peppers it needs more info. Peppers have some what different fertilizing needs and perhaps less than what tomatoes require and also they need more balanced fertilizer.
You wrote:
"""I put one bag of manure and one bag of commercial garden topsoil in each 4X4 raised bed. After about a month I added Espoma garden fertilizer according to the directions. I did the same last year. """
I am not familiar with the analysis of ESPOMA and don't know how much did you apply BUT a bag (1 cu-ft ?) of manure mixed in in a 4'x4' bed is not going to cause over fertilizing.
With regard to BER: Can you tell us what varieties are being affected ? I would pitch any and every single one as soon as I find them. Luckily it is an early season problem. I use dolomitic lime as Calcium source also use MG Shake n Feed which also has Calcium and Magnesium. I believe eggshell is a myth. Your tomatoes will be gone way before eggshells break down and converted into Ca++ ions.
my tomatoes plant start drying out and all the leaves dried and burned crispy, I just fertilized them couple a days ago. how can I save them?
Kasey - rather than tacking on a new question to a 4 year old post about different issues could you start a new post please with your questions?
It is less confusing to the readers and you'll get better information related to your situation that way. Plus the answers will get emailed to you rather than to the OP that posted this 4 years ago.
Thanks.
Dave