16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes

I've been using the bamboo double trellis method for years. Though different climates and weather conditions require finding the best solution. Try freecycle or CraigsList in your area for cheap materials. A woman in NJ right now is in need of help with her bamboo that has taken over...just mentions to bring a shovel and please take what you want.

I have ordered my bamboo only twice in 15yrs. I trellis just like the picture linked, but in two long rows, one for toms and one for beans. I need 50. You would only need 25 for 16 plants. My garden gets high winds in an open field so i need the support. I use velcro ties. Mulched with straw it is attractive and low maintenance. I grow a thick patch of carrots down the middle for a nice late fall treat.

Lots of ideas on this site for free trellis plans...
http://free.woodworking-plans.org/tomato-trellis-designs.html

Here is a link that might be useful: bamboo

CHEAP cages are just that ;CHEAP and waste of money.

After reading about the REWire sheet (40" x84") here, today I went to HD and bought ont , $7.20 +tx.
I cut of about 14" from it(endin like 40" x 70") and made a nice sturdy cage . I also cut off the last horizontal wires(ground side) so the vertial one could be stuck into ground.
After doing that, it felt pretty stable bur I also fastened it to a stake. At $8.00 bucks, this is far superior even to the so-called Heavy Duty cages sold at big box stores.

But with this one, you have to be handy and willing to do some fun work. A big bundl of the same material is sold for about $105. and probably you can make more than 20 cages from it. In this case, you cam make them slightly conic (like paper cups) so that they can be inserted into each other for ease of storage .

Perhaps the only draw back of this (to some) is that it is about 4 1/2 ft tall. But to me that is ok. After 4.5 ft , I will let my toms to cascade. they will never reach the ground.

homegardenpa...that looks just like my open area where i grow zuks, melon, fall squash, pumpkins...
I lay down a thick run of newspaper, then hay. I do get a seeding clump or six but not at all like actually weeding. It is also a good soft protective bed for the fruit. We tend to have more rain than drought here in the NEast. Mulch needs seem to be regional and what is available.
My tomatoes are in a raised bed and i use straw. It is expensive here but clean and only need one bale. It is a large compressed bag sold like peat. Straw is the dried stalks of cereal plants, like wheat. ItâÂÂs a by-product of harvest. If any seeds remain on the stalks, itâÂÂs by accident. Therefore, straw is nutritionally void, and is not animal feed. However, that lack of seeds makes it a fine mulch. The expense is that it is free of pesticides.

Wood chips don't work in my garden. They might for some. I do use a dump load to path the way to the compost piles. Free here by handing off my address to the road crew when trimming tree branches from power lines. I'll have a big pile within an hour or two. No more mud in the back yard as i have it about one and a half foot thick now. I tried it once around the perimeter of my garden and was good for a year but soon started to break down and was hard to keep up with the weed growth.
Hay bales are usually fresh and sweet smelling green and used for feed and can be expensive. Lesser quality hay bales from a later harvest are dry and useless and i suppose for animal bedding. Both can be full of seed so i keep it out of my raised beds. Once again a regional thing...dry crispy hay bales are free here.

Another free/cheap mulch shredded newsprint /paper

Tottally agreeing with Dave and Jimster and now with Seysonn too I just wanted to add that under the best of conditions there have been a few varieties I tread carefully with. Red Zebra and Marzano types, especially Super Marzano, have been problem varieties. Granted that the problem almost always goes away with time but the agrivation can be frustrating. This year I'm giving Pozzano a try as a sauce variety less prone to BER. Likely I'll not see any BER on other sauce types this year to compare.

Consistent watering is important in preventing BER. Larger tomatoes such as beefsteak are more likely to get it than tiny tomatoes because of the structure of the tomato.

Here is a link that might be useful: Blossom end rot

Gunnar, good idea to check the med ones and I just did.

The one I know best is Medovaya Kaplya and I've linked to that one below. While Tania says yellow, fruits do ripen up to a kind of golden/orange.

The other one that's from Russia is described as being an orange heart, and here's the link to that one:

http://t.tatianastomatobase.com:88/wiki/Medovyi_Spas

And I haven't grown that one.

The other"med"ones are the wrong color.

Carolyn

Here is a link that might be useful: Medovaya Kaplya

ABlindHog - have you considered planting earlier under protection to extend your season. It works for many of us in the warmer climates, even warmer than mine, that have to 'beat the heat'. With something as simple as WOWs you can gain 2-3 weeks earlier planting times which gets you good fruit set on many varieties. And with a small low tunnel even more time is gained.

Plus keep in mind that even on those days that reach 100 degrees it isn't that hot early in the morning so some blossom flicking and cage rattling in the early AM can also help with fruit set even through the hot summer.

I just hate to see anyone stuck growing only the early (60 day DTM) varieties.

Dave

Check the moisture level before waiting to water, it may be dry.

Was the plant root bound before transplanting? In a very small container? Perhaps got a bit dry before transplanting?

Or just jealous of its sibling that went into the ground?

Yeah, I know I'm being silly, but I think if you maintain proper moisture in the growing medium and feed that baby appropriately, it will do just fine.

Betsy

Betsy , the plant may have been root bound ? Not sure since this is my first time ever growing from seed. I did see the roots around the soil when I did the transplant. But I also transplanted the healthy looking one twice and its thriving. I will check the moisture later and post back.

I can't tell for sure from just one leaf. Take a picture of the plant and post it pls. Just fyi, it looks to me like Tomato Spotted Wilt virus, but need to see an entire plant to be sure.

DarJones

Jean, definitely not aphids.

Fusion, I'm hoping its not spotted wilt virus! I looked up photos and it certainly looks like it! I'm going to take samples to my extension office soon. I didnt take a photo of the entire plant because only small sections are showing symptoms that you can't see unless closely examining.

I live up north, and I just transplanted my tomatoes in the garden this past weekend.

As you live in a much warmer area with a longer growing season, you should be just fine.

Plant it deeply, mulch it, and water as needed.

In fact, smaller plants seem to do better for me, and Sungold grows like crazy.

Loomis, the original poster was concerned about the summer heat wave she gets in her area. Their summer heat often causes vegetable production to shut down, especially tomatoes, for a good two months out of their summer. The plants can also get beaten up and wilty, and need to be watered tons despite producing no fruit, not a good thing in a dry state.

Some of these hot climate states actually have 2 short growing seasons. First one goes from early spring to early summer, the second starts in very late summer to late fall.

This post was edited by sjetski on Tue, May 21, 13 at 22:33

I didn't mean to ruffle any feathers.

Oh you didn't. Not at all. Sorry if it came across that way. I just didn't want to confuse the issues - or make it even more confusing than I already had.

So my try at clarifying it likely only did what I was trying not to do. Typical for me. Apologies.

Dave

Generally when I plant tomatoes, I strip off the bottom leaves, dig a deep hole and add pulverized eggshells or bone meal at the bottom of the hole. Tomatoes love calcium and the eggshells provide this and help to prevent blossom end rot.

Planting the tomatoes deeply will allow roots to form along the buried stem and will lessen the need for watering.

Perhaps the stress of transplanting may make the leaves yellow for a short while, but they should soon become robust again.

If not give them a shot of an organic fertilizer such as liquid fish emulsion or some similar product.

Have patience while they adjust to their new environment and they should do well.

Comparing different varieties for growth rates is very mis-leading and basically pointless. Just as the fruit produced is different so are the growth patterns.

The size of the plant is determined by its genetics in addition to the growing conditions. So IF you insure they are both given the same growing conditions then it is the genetics of the variety that make the difference. CP never reaches 9 feet, maybe 6 feet. It is normally a smaller plant than BW even at full growth.

Dave

well i live in your neck of the woods and my cherokee purple plant has done the same thing. it and mr stripey are the weakest looking varieties in my garden.

As a Biologist, I do not understand the need of Organic Gardeners to use ONLY Organic fertilizer. While it makes sense to use organic compost, plants can use ONLY inorganic materials for nutrients. Any organic material must be broken down to inorganic materials before the plants can use it. The refusal of many to use inorganic fertilizer in the first place does not make any sense.

I agree with Bugdoc,

To me the "Organic Issue" is mor of an environmental issue than botany and biology, food and heath. Here I am only referring to fertilizers, not hormones fed into chicken , cows amd pigs.

The environmental side issue of inorganic ferti;lizedrs is claimed to be that they leach and get into streams and ground water. I am not in position to make an assessment of this but I thing the biggest hazard come from the chemical industry than my tiny garden spot, using less than one pound of , say ,phosphorous a year. How much of it is going to get int the ground water ?

I am not knocking the environmentalist. they are entitled to their lif style just like religious belief. But I think that use of inorganic fertilizers in agriculture, has made a big contribution to feeding the hungry in the world. And as far as the cabbage is concerned, it does not matter where that nitrogen atom (or its compound) comes from.

But I am concerned with the chemicals that are used as sprays on fruits and vegetables, to some extent. This is the area that I like to be organicd.

With the established garden, probably you can just plant and let its roots grab the soil first and then fertilize as neede.
But with a new raised bed or flat bed.. that has just been filled with purchased material(soil, compost..) it would be safe to fertilize lightly at transplant time.(my case this year). I do not fully understand the merrits of BOTTOM OF HOLE fertilizing. I figure the surface fertilizing eventually will go down anyway. But with the B-of-H methos, it might get leached before the plant gets to it. This of course will depend on the amount of watering( an/or rain fall)

I do not fully understand the merrits of BOTTOM OF HOLE fertilizing.

Just as with all the "magical cures" for BER that many insist on using, it is more for the gardener's benefit than for the plants.

Sorry, I couldn't resist. :-)

Dave

Dave,

Yes, some of it does. Other leaves turned uniformly dark
yellow. And overnight. The day before they looked
perfectly healthy, then overnight - bright yellow orange.
I have no pictures of this because I treated with fungicide
right away and stripped off the most affected leaves.

Also, I think significant the fact that I had another shelf of
plants three feet below these ones that appeared to be
unaffected. One day later though I see the first signs of
the same thing. They have gotten "fungicided" this
morning.

Then of course there is the "yellow printer ink" running off.

Maybe it will never be identified but I will probably know
the end result pretty soon. The fungicide - copper soap
and spreader-sticker seems to be helping.

Thanks again for all your help.

Here's my latest scenario;

1) I think it's pretty definitely a fungus. Which one is uncertain
but according to Dave's reference it could be powdery
mildew or something similar.

2) The indoor location is unusual for that but not impossible.
The area is a back basement. It is not wet and there have
been no other occurrences of mold or mildew. That doesn't
mean it can't happen, especially with the enticing object of
tomato plants, soil and water in a confined area.

3) There is a duct with a register nearby but not very well
located. Consequently, with respect to air circulation,
it is a bit of a dead end. Add moisture and a steady
temperature in the low 70s and it looks as if I may have
created the ideal incubator for some sort of mildew organism.

4) I have used some external soil in there for repotting and
so on. As well, I have entered the area several times a day,
sometimes after working outside in the garden. So, spores
could have come in on clothing or skin.

5) The original occurrence was confined to a single shelf
with an area about 2' by 4'. a dozen plants there might
make an ideal breeding ground for a mildew.

6) The confined area and minimal circulation would have
allowed for a normal pathogen life cycle followed by a
sudden "bloom" of infection and spores. this could account
for the extreme and sudden (overnight) yellowing (oranging)
(sic.) of some leaves while a few others have a more
characterisitc appearance of infection.

Hi Dave, i fed them Tomato tone. That is usually the only thing i use. Do you recommend anything else? They have been planted for 1 week. The banana peppers have brown spots on the leaves, but the new growth does look good.
Of the 15 tomato plants i have, only 3 of them look to be crappy looking, all the other 12 look great, so that is why the concern.

For some reason when i catch those brown bacterial spots on my peppers, i have trouble beating them back, and i've used every chemical under the sun. Some work better, some don't. It isn't the worst thing they can catch, but it is contagious btw.

For more generic plant varieties, i would just yank them out, then buy more and plant those instead, it's early enough in the season. If it's a rare type of plant, then i'll baby it and spray it down with one or two different solutions.

Those May temperature fluctuations + cold rain will get you every time. This is why i prefer to plant out later than normal, instead of trying to beat mother nature ;)

Keep the leaves as dry as you can, but seriously consider yanking a few of the worst, and replant.