16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes

That is totally normal.

I agree with edweather, totally normal. Wouldn't worry about it.

I use Miracle Grow Tomato food. 18-18-21 It aslo has copper, manganese, iron and zinc.

You would want to dilute it to no more than 1/4 strength for peppers as they are less tolerant of excess N than tomato plants unless you happened to want giant bushy plants but only a few peppers. :)

But then that strength is also considered very strong for tomatoes too if used full strength. If used in one of their hose end sprayers it is automatically diluted by the sprayer but if mixing it in sprinkling cans or buckets for watering you will need to do the dilutions yourself by cutting the amount per gallon in half or less.

If you explore the many tomato fertilizers available you'll find that most of them are much lower dosage. It is easy to overdose with such strong fertilizers so generally speaking it is better to feed more frequently with well diluted lower doses than only once or twice with very high doses.

Dave

It is quite possible, I think. Find a cherry type that grows long vines. Most cherries do. You can even grow mix color fruiting.

Another thing. Plant them in containers at about chest height level (~4ft from ground). This way you can easily water/maintain them an they will reach the roof much sooner and then continue to run on it.
But one thing to realize that tomatoes are annuals in your zone. You have to start from scratch every year.

I am planting for quality and taste first then growth. I will have 3 boxes with a combination of two in a box. It will be Parks Nectar, Sungold and Sweet Baby Girl. I am considering elevating the boxes. I also have a box with two Sweet Millions and a pot with one Napa Grape. It's too cold to mess around outside right now so will wait a couple of days till it warms up to do some measuring and planning. I've grown tomatoes at various times but never knew much about it except to stick them in the ground.
Several years ago I planted tomatoes in a neighbor ladies garden and kept them well watered and I think she kept them fed. I buried a large fish in between two rows and the tomato plant next to it got over 10 ft tall. All my tomatoes were good but that one was quite a bit taller that the rest. I have no idea what variety they were but not knowing any better I thought that was the norm. I have a picture standing on a step ladder measuring the plant and a picture of her and I holding very large tomatoes. Doing a lot of research on the web. It's a learning process as you have to learn a certain amount so that you can begin to weed out the nonsense. That applies to all subjects. I have also gotten interested in flowers this year and I had some left over Geraniums so I decided I would harvest as many starts from them as possible. 40 so far. I thought it was very easy to start Geraniums but I would check on the web for advice anyway. It was actually comical the advice people were giving. I used a root starter on all clippings and put some in water, some in pots and some stuck in potatoes that I stuck in pots. I ran across a video done by a large production green house where one person might do 4000 plants a day. They simply cut a start, stripped all the leaves but one on top, dipped it in root starter and stuck them in seed starting trays. Nothing serious in my life-just enjoying my last childhood. LOL

This post was edited by growmor on Wed, Apr 30, 14 at 11:44

Yep, that's it. Thanks, and what a relief that my tomatoes aren't in danger.

If you look close at the end of the trail, you can see the criter. If there is a hole in the leaf at the end of the trail, the critter has already pupated and "left the nest".

My two cents: Water them well, making sure to remove excess water after. Do NOT add any more fertilizer. Allow them some time to try to recover from the inconsistent care before you add any other stress.

Good Luck and Good Gardening

ZachS, actually I used the anti-grav machine for a while, but got tired of drying my clothes on the line; they usually end up frozen here in MN. So instead, I've created a mini-star (easily done by initiating a small nuclear reaction inside a gazing ball) and set it below the plants to balance out the light of the sun. Probably too much heat, though...

Dave, yeah, I'm using that's basically mixture I'm using for everything, except more recent batches it's been peat moss (3), perlite (2), miracle-gro organic garden soil (3) + a bit of garden lime & Espoma garden-tone. I cover seeds in soil block divot with vermiculite because I read some positive studies on improved germination rates when seeds were therewith covered (no matter the soil type). Anyway, this is near the basic recipe that came with my soil blocker from Johnny's, similar to the one used by Elliot Coleman I believe. (Oh, also in recent batches, I've been throwing a very small amount of EM1 in, too, just to make sure the beneficial microorganisms outnumber the wicked ones.)

Why do you say highly problematic? Because it's not soiless and thus damping off diseases are more likely? Thus far, all the seedlings apart from the tomatoes appear fairly healthy: cabbages, morning glories, artichokes, potatoes (TPS), asparagus, peppers (pic), hyssop... But perhaps I've just been lucky so far.

lindalana and edweather, I'd use soiless to avoid disease, but I don't want to have to worry about having to fertilize at random times and I don't know how well soil blocks would hold together with a soiless mix. It Would be easier to buy a pre-mixed substrate, but I have more time than money at present and it's cheaper for me to just mix it myself (especially with the 2000~4000 seedlings I have). Plus it really only takes a few minutes. I get about 8 cu ft. (dry mix) for $27. Btw, I cover the seeds with vermiculite, so they have very little resistance pushing up.

2 cu ft perlite: $17
3 cu ft peat moss: $10
3 cu ft compost: free
garden lime: negligible
organic fert: $2

gardener_mary, thanks for the change. Perhaps I'll just water as you suggest and test a bit of fertilizer on a few of the seedlings in another tray. We'll see who looks happier after a week.

Cheers for the advice everyone!

Seysonn....plants don't have intelligence ..
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"intelligence" by conventional definition as if it just belongs to humans. But it has a UNIVERSAL meaning.The thing is that humans are the most intelligent in the animals kingdom. There is different kind of intelligence in the plants kingdom. That is why/how they survive. This subject belong to Natural Philosophy.

I think plants are way smarter than people. At least they're still in The Garden :-)

Here in Georgia we have fortunately not been hit quite as hard as states West of us, though we had some pretty bad thunderstorms this morning. I hope those in areas hardest hit are okay and my prayers are with them. We're just keeping an eye on the weather here because it's not supposed to be over yet and those storms are supposed to head straight our way!

Grace

I saw that NC got hit hard. We're moving there this summer. To the far southeastern part of the state. I'm glad I'm already used to tornadoes, having lived in parts of OK for 13 years. That looked like a monster that hit NC,too.

Can't offer you any comparative measurements as my tomato plants can't even be planted out yet here. So they are all just 8-10" tall transplants living in the greenhouses.

You have several distinct advantages in your climate that most of us in the rest of the country envy on a regular basis. Let's compare notes long about end of July. :)

Dave

I'm actually trying the tomatoes in a place where they say "don't try" or "needs 12 hours direct sun." I have learned that heat matters too though, and the west wall behind the tomatoes has helped in a cool overcast April.

It was mostly 60's and 70's and then BOOM.

Santa Ana winds today and we blasted up to 97 in the sun.

(I found a reference that said tomatoes should "double" in 12 to 15 days. I am at the slow end of that, with about 15. I feel good about that though, given the coastal zone.)

It poisons the soil if you put too much on, that's what it does. Otherwise the idea is that it will improve production. But as stated you don't know if it will help your production or not without at least first having an idea how much phosphorus is in your soil already.

My simplified opinion that few areas do really need phosphate, the problem is in what is in the soil exist in such form that does not release easily into plants so by introducing compost and manure we help phosphate to be released as a plant food. And overabundance can be harmful.
Soil test to be done so areas can be identified that are naturally low in P. Another thing to remember it is not only P that might be a problem but other minerals as well as they have relationship where one wonôt work without another.

Wow!

OK, first, it would help if you talked about "soil magnetism", in more detail. We need to understand your thoughts on that better. I know what magnetism is in general but not how it connects to plant growth. But "the soil is magnetic"? I have some trouble understanding that.

My understanding on phloem and xylem is pretty standard, but a bit different from you. I don't have any problem with water and sugars moving around a tree through xylem and phloem, but I'm not seeing where "Magnetism" is involved.

"Clay with the clay attracting"? You lost me there.

Well, anyway, I have 6 healthy grafted heirloom tomatoes (2 Cherokee Purple, 2 Brandywine, 1 Striped German, and 1 Aunt Gerties Gold). I put them under the lights 2 days ago and they are responding well. All have several healthy leaves on the scions. I will cut the silicon collars off tomorrow. They live or die on their own after that.

If they don't, I have more than enough heirloom seedlings to plant as usual and 2 Big Beef hybrids as back ups.

As a first try at grafting, I think it went well. 25% of the grafts worked. I learned a few things and can sure do it better next time. And I will do this again with what I learned this time.

No...I actually add about 1/3 part of cactus mix. It helps the standard potting mix to drain better. You might consider more perlite as well. Drainage is a really big issue.

I use free city mulch from Los Angeles, made from shredded and (partially?) composted yard waste.

http://www.lacitysan.org/srpcd/mulch_giveaway.htm

It does have a small amount of plastic particles mixed in (due to people putting these things into their green recycling bins) but they are easily enough to pick out. But they are free and work pretty well for the tomato garden.

Can't see the controversy either. You were expecting what on the label? I have grown thousands of plants of this variety and sell plants as well but when I sell plants I just put the name only on the tag. Sure the plants will grow more than 40" tall but if you cage plants and your cages are 36" tall than the plant weight will limit height. Mine typically grow 7-8 ft on stringline and my average size of the beefsteak fruits is a consistant 9 oz., some getting bigger on occasion. I could talk for hours telling you the merits of this variety and to put it all on a label would probably do disrespect to the consumer. This AAS selection winner (1993) is well worth the effort in many aspects: yield, flavor, disease resistance just to name a few. I call it my "Work Horse" tomato.

Looked at BB plants today at my fav greenhouse. The labe said Big Beef but it also had two sets of numbers suggesting spacing between rows and plants...24-40. Coul that be what you mean?

Oh forgot to mention, nice plants cetompkins :D Look nice and strong.

Cetompkins... looks like you used Plant Growth Regulators on those things. They look like little rocks!

OK, sorry, did not see any punctuation after 'did not fertilize.' I read it, 'did not fertilize after a few days under the grow lights.'

i cant believe it but all my tomato plants look amazing already! all the leaves have uncurled, they have a nice bright green and they are just beautiful!

i left a few things in paper and peat pots and sure enough they are sooo dry compared to everything in plastic.

you guys are great on here!