16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes

Thai is ok for plants to wilt a little bit. Even inground established plants do witl in a bright warm sunny day. With the seedlings, you do it a couple of hours a day at first and keep extending it. That is what HARDENING OFF IS. In a way, it is like humans getting a tan. You don't lay down on the sands for hours the first day ; Do it a bit at a time and use some sun screen lotion. Of, course the plants are tougher than we are.

Put them out in the evening when it's still warm but not sunny if they're wilting. Yes, a little bit of wilting will occur but unlike humans (who may burn but then peel and recover from sunburn), a serious case of sunscald can kill a pepper or tomato seedling. Build up slowly, first getting used to heat and then sun.

See above for pot sizes.

I am definitely looking for a small cherry/grape size fruit. I referenced the romas just as a comparison standard for meaty:juicy ratio.

Then look for Sweet Hearts, Sugary, Sprite, Juliet, Rosalita, Grape or Elfin. Selected Plants probably has several of them and Bonnie's Plants has Sprite and Juliet I know.

Dave

I have an issue with winter turning straight to summer. Once the temps get too hot, the flowers fail to set. My planting date is 2 weeks ahead of yours.

What I do is plant tomatoes with wall o waters in mid-March to mid-April. I start them in Feb. I plant deeply. I plant about 55 plants and usually some start producing before the heat sets in. Usually, a few produce through the heat and then take off in the fall.

To Dave:
Thanks for all advice. Them 80 gal tubs were not too deep. They are for sure wider then they are tall. I guess your observation about tall pot makes sense since tomato roots not really growing deep but tend to spread wide.
50 years! I wish I could pick your brains some about your nursery expertise in things other then tomato too.

To austinnhanasmom:
Hm... I think your situation is a little different. For me mid-April ground is still frozen. Actually I start my tomato just early to mid April, other way they get too tall and root bound. Our last frost date is early June.

I plant lots of different tomatoes. I would not want more than a couple of Black and Brown Boar plants. It is a small, black striped tomato. If you like to try a variety of shapes and sizes, it is a good one. Not all my tomatoes are successful. Some have tomatoes early and quit others come on later. This little tomato I had from some of the first tomatoes until the end of the season. It tastes good enough. I don't do taste tests or ratings. If something tastes like a store tomato, I don't eat it. Celebrity is one I don't grow any more - tough skin and taste not great. I like to slice this one and put it on a cracker with some green onion, salt and pepper. I would not cut up a big beautiful Wes for me for a snack, so I pick a Pale Perfect Purple or Black and Brown Boar. Sometimes I have tomatoes for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Wes was my best heart last year. The other hearts quit setting fruit after it got hot.

We went on vacation to the Hill Country once. I went to the wild flower place and had German food at a restaurant near there - didn't know what to order. You may get hotter there and have better soil. I have rocks with thin soil. Any tomato I plant in my garden has to have an improved spot. I am an old lady and I enjoy Susan Wittig Albert mysteries - no sex or violence except somebody dies in every book. Her themes are all herbs like rue etc.

For me most productive:

Jaune Coeur de Pigeon - yellow pear tomato. From one plant I more toms than from 3 other hybrids.

Large Yellow Amish - orange beefsteak tomato. It was loaded with huge 2 lb tomatoes.

Thank you for correcting my error, Carolyn! Sometimes I don't remember details well on the phone! :(

It sounds like a great variety!

-Bruce

Thank you for good wishes! I am looking forward to new season.
Carolyn, timing you describe is what traditionally done in this area too. We aim our Chicagoland plant swap for Memorial day weekend as this is when people are planting outside. There is regularly a bout of really bad weather around May 15, it was as late as May 18 for couple of seasons. My own plants go into WOW around May 1 and do well reliably, thus I am able to push the envelope a bit.

I have had better luck with black and brown boar than with green zebra. Black and Brown Boar is a salad sized striped dark tomato. It was very productive here.

Here is a link that might be useful: black and brown boar

Well, now after some reading I understand the whole early, mid, late thing. I could kick myself lol. All my toms will come mid season and I would've like to have as near to a steady stream as possible. Good thing I wanted to can some of these lol. The good news is that now I know for the next planting.

~Viv
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Well, that is NOT what EARLY, MID, LATE season means.
It just means about STARTING time of ripe tomatoes.
An EARLY can continue fruiting till the end of season . So does MID and LATE..
However, Some DETERMINANT varieties might produce for a short time. BUT not all EARLY and MID season varieties are determinants.
Tomato is not like BEAN, for example, To produce just one flush and then expire. Most tomatoes continuously produce, given that they are taken care of properly.

Indeterminate tomato plants can get quite big. Mine were
around 12' tall last year. Six fit up the cage and six feed
back down the cage.

I train my plants to 4 main leaders and put one on each
upright. I still get more production than we can eat and
end up giving away lots of tomatoes. I don't worry about
the loss of production....what would I do with more????

Check out my PVC tomato cages for a possible support
system.

Be sure to buy bush green beans and not pole beans.
Pole beans also grow 8-10 feet tall.

Also, by planting your lettuce in the shade of the tomatoes,
you could extend you lettuce season.

Here is a link that might be useful: Tomato cage plans

I would suggest taking the sod out from under the bed first. Then till the heck out of it. Depending on your area, and clay content I would advise to add in a lot of builder's sand, and till it in as well. then add the amendments,and final step the bed itself. I did this myself this year. Last year I had uneven draining, and it wreaked havoc on my tomato plants when the roots hit the clay. They will root deeper than many think they will.

If the tilling, and sand are not an option I would do a few inches of pea gravel on the bottom, then the bed itself with the amended garden soil. Since the soil will be heavily amended you can space the tomatoes a little bit closer than the labeled spacing. Though I would advise not going closer than 6 inches closer than plant label spacing.

I grew a Julia child last year. Fantastic taste, low production. I also had brandywine that was very productive for me. My other brandywine from a different seed source was not as productive. Go figure. I saved seed form the productive plants but I did not bag blossomos so hopefully they are pure. I will probably know shortly after sprouting because they were grown away from any other potatoe leaf type. I have two garden plots, one in my yard and a community garden. I grew these in the community garden and no one else had potato leaf plants. So if the seedlings are potatoe leaf then they are pure.

As I have posted several times already...Estlers Mortgage Lifter is my favorite big pink. More round than beefsteak shaped but very tasty and I get them up to 37 oz so far weighed on a Paula Deen scales. I sucker my plants to about 4 branches and stake with 6 ft stakes. They are medium producers(not as many per plant as say Cherokee Purple) but the plants are tall, sturdy, thick stemmed and easy to grow.

There are two places offering Mr. Brown for 2014.

Please see the link below.

Carolyn

Here is a link that might be useful: Mr. Brown

Thank you. I'm sorry Carolyn. Larry's tomato is Mr. Brown's not Mr. Brown. I was confused about the name.

That is quite the introduction to GW. I would like to email you so questions...but you do not link one....

I am new to GW but not new to the industry of Horticulture. I think you are now able to send me an email of questions.

Tomatoes are annuals. From the time you plant them outside , in a container till they practically expire (due to cold or frost) is about 5 months in most places. And root bounding should not be a big concern.
Having said above, I believe that they do not need a huge container. Even a 5 gallon bucket is big enough. Soil itself is just a medium. What the plants need are: Moisture and Nutrients. As long as you provide those to the plant REGULARLY and PROPERLY, that is all they care for.
Most pot/container and in ground spacing is for the TOP consideration and head room than for root requirements. Just look at fruit trees like cherries. They are spaced mostly because the need head room, IF YOU WANT TO HARVEST FRUITS OFF OF THEM. I have seen towering, oaks, maples and other trees growing in clumps and share the nutrients in a common root space. If the soil is rich and they get enough moisture, they all will be just fine. The same is true about garden veggies. Even more so true b/c garden veggies are mostly annuals and thus have a short life.

The commercial farmers provide a lot of spacing btween tomato plants, NOT BECAUSE it is required for the plants sake, but for maintenance and harvesting in a mechanized environment. But in a limited space in my backyard I dont do it that way. Then some have developed the concept of "Square Foot" gardening which is aimed at utilizing the garden space to its fullest. Planting in container goes even further in optimal use of space and soil. If one enjoys the luxury of space, soil, container space, that is perfectly fine too.

Very informative, thanks

And if you do import stuff, make sure it's well incorporated
into your existing soil. A spading fork is an excellent tool
for this sort of thing. Or a rototiller if it's that large an area.

If you don't get them well mixed, you could end up with a
boundary layer between the two types of soil. That's not
a good thing. It can cause problems with water pooling
and bad root penetration.

I don't know your location, but here in SoCal there's a
product called Kellogg's AMEND. Its supposedly aimed
at clay soil. I used a lot of it (well incorporated with the
native soil of course) and my tomatoes grow like
wildfire.

Plant-based compost may be better than animal manure where the soil is high in salts. Salt can build up over years of planting. If you have a defined bed at least a little above grade, salt may accumulate where the soil level is the highest (you can remove some of it). Try not to make the highest soil level where the plants are.

I'm going to a tomato grafting seminar put on by NCSU next week. This thread is very interesting to me as I too recoil from the rootstock seed costs. I had already decided to try Celebrity, Sweet Chelsea and Big Beef for rootstock and thinking about Florida Highbush as an alternative or additional - just to see what happens... and b/c I have them. Cherokee Purple, Angelo's Red and Isis Candy are going to be my first attempts after the class.

Matching rootstocks with scions is somewhat like picking parents for hybrids - some work very well together and others don't.

How well a match does is predicated on what one wants/needs to accomplish.

I see grafts as:

• another potential management tool especially for commercial growers

• a marketing angle for growers and garden centers to increase profits

Didn't watch the video but Cary frequently points out in these talks that resistance for verticillium is almost useless now (even in lines not grafted) as almost all verticillium samples assayed now are race2.

However there is one line currently that is resistant to vert race2 but it has been locked up in a utility patent (I did hear of a processing line for west coast production now available with V2 when in Corvallis).