16,949 Garden Web Discussions | Growing Tomatoes
When "bottom watering" you want to put plenty of water in the tray and allow the pots to soak for 30 minutes or so, and remove any remaining water. With some practice you get a feel for how much you need to add for the plants to get as much as they need without leaving them standing in water. (Which is not good as it can drown the roots.) Then don't water again until the pots get pretty light. One of the most common problems we see is over watering. Along with several of the other "overs".
Betsy
Just make sure you don't over do it. Let's be real, the nurseries do it. They don't get that dark green by magic. Just use a weak solution somewhere between 1/8 and 1/2 strength. I've killed smaller seedlings than that by eyeballing, and overdoing the amount. Those look well established though. I would also pot them up to about a 4" pot at least.
Another possibility, if the stakes you need are for tying up
tomato plants, is T-posts. The original poster didn't say
what the purpose is but T-posts can be found up to 8 feet
long. For those who are unfamiliar, they are what farmers
use to string barbed wire fence. The standard length, of
course is 6 feet, for a fence 4 feet high. A good farm
supply store will have them. Yes, I know, not everybody
has access to such a store but, again, just a suggestion.
I have seen 6 ft. T-posts at Lowe's, next to the cheapo
U-bent sheet metal posts. Come to think of it, those might
not be so bad if a little short. Anyway, the last time I
bought T-posts they were about $3 each.
Deb, a general Google search brings up many links but the one below starts out with someone asking the same question that you're asking so I decided to link to it.
As you can see you're asked to open the link from Purdue within the following link.
Hope that helps.
Carolyn
Here is a link that might be useful: Juglone in soil
I was given a "recipe" for blight by someone two years ago. I have not used it, but will use it this year. It is 2 tablespoons baking soda, 1 light tablespoon chlorox, and 1 tablespoon of Murphy's oil soap. This is for one gallon of water.
I also mulch heavily to keep soil borne splatter to a minimum, I pinch off any leaves w/in a foot of the ground, I irrigate by a soaker hose system, and I remove infected leaves ASAP.
hey larryw,
wondering what you use for a spreader sticker. I called one supplier and to my surprise he said that yucca extract was a good spreader but not sticker.
I looked at coco wet but a couple of the reviews I read said that it killed their plants. So what do you use?
sounds like "digdirt" nailed it. expectaions!
If your cherry tomatoes are producing well then I think your doing fine.
I love cherry tomatoes because of the sheer volume they produce, once they start going, you can walk out to the garden every day and get rewarded. Literally hundreds of tomatoes in one season.
Meanwhile, some of the larger tomato plants may only produce a dozen + tomatoes in one season.
But it sounds like your on the right path... keep trying lots of varieties each season. Keep notes on those that dissapoint and those you love.
Lordjezo, Of all the points I saw in your response, two jumped out at me:
"Then every couple of weeks I used a Miracle Gro thing that attaches to a hose and sprays on."
What are the numbers on this fertilizer? There should be 3 hyphenated numbers (should look like 10-10-10, etc.)... Odds are, the first one is too high and your pumping your garden full of excess nitrogen.
"Do the tests cost a lot of money?"
No. Well, it's relative, but I think I paid $30 for my soil test from the Penn State extension office - I tend to think that's pretty cheap. From what I've read, you add manure and fertilizer, but there are other factors to your soil besides fertilizer; Soil PH, Organic matter, etc. If you get one, there are people here who can help you understand the results (probably better off in the soil forums than here though).
As an aside, I'd like to point out, that, in my humble opinion, tomatoes are not heavy feeders. Compared to a lot of crops (corn, melons, pumpkins, etc.) tomatoes demand fairly little. If you add fertilizer before planting, that should have you set until you see the first fruit setting (tiny tomatoes showing up) and then you can add more. After that, you should resume some sort of feeding regime to give them just enough to keep them productive for the remainder of the season.
I do organic and no-till, top dressing all of my amendments (homemade compost from kitchen scraps, leaves, grass clippings, etc.), and I cover all of that with 6-8" of hay from a friends farm. When I plant, I poke through the mulch and put a little organic fertilizer in the hole at planting time. I don't fertilize them again until fruit set, and I usually do that with an water soluble organic like fish emulsion. After that, I'll do some occasional foliar feedings to give a boost here and there as needed and a soil drench every 2-3 weeks until the season ends.
Basically:
1.) Make sure you're using an appropriate (numbers appropriate) fertilizer. This is very important.
2.) Fertilize at the start of season / at planting time.
3.) Fertilize again at fruit set.
4.) Fertilize every 2-3 weeks to keep the plants productive.
If your tomatoes have completed the hardening off process and the weather is warm enough, go ahead and plant them. Just be sure you tear the peat pot off the plant if the roots have not come through it yet. Sometimes they won't and that will definitly stunt their growth and production.
If you have the time and materials and might be delayed in putting them out (cold spell on the way?) then potting them up into solo cups with drainage holes.
Good luck!
Betsy
Here is a link that might be useful: Hardening Off and Physiological Changes
"is it worth it for me to transfer them into solo cups at this point when i'll be putting them in the ground in about 10 days?"
You'll be surprised at how much root growth can occur in 10 days at this stage of the game. I'd be inclined to go this route. Why take the chance in setting them back for a month or more with cold temps? We're so anxious to get them outside a few weeks early we forget to look at the big picture. They'll have 4-5 months outside when planted after the last frost date.
Agree with Betsy - it can't hurt but may not help much either and additional nutrient sources will be needed.
The quality of compost tea all depends on the quality (diversity of components) in the compost used. Mushroom compost is not normally considered a really great source.
And what many forget when using organic fertilizers and such in containers is that their effectiveness is totally dependent on an active soil micro-herd - bacteria to convert the organic nutrients to a usable form by the plants. Active soil micro herds of bacteria just don't exist in the soil-less mixes used in containers unless you put them there.
You can go strictly organic in containers but you have to give it a regular boost of soil bacteria as well as nutrients for it to work well.
Dave
Thanks Betsy and Dave for your input. I have no intention of trying organic in my earth buckets. It is easy to make the compost tea and thought the plants might get some quicker benefit from it. I don't know enough about what products are best to use but have gained trememdous knowledge in the short time I have been viewing this forum and asking question. Oh, this forum is habit forming too. lol Thanks again!
I'm a pepper nut myself. Peppers can grow roots, but not the way tomatoes do. They usually only grow roots high when the soil is too wet and they aren't getting enough oxygen, and often above the soil line. Peppers usually don't stretch like tomatoes either. They usually stay relatively short and are usually self supporting. If you have particularly dry soil such as sand, you can plant them deeper to put roots further from the dry surface. In most cases, it's not really necessary, but it does no harm either if you want to keep your plants short and your water table isn't too high. The only thing to watch for is that some varieties of peppers grow long and touch the soil if you go too deep. You don't want that. In containers, which often works best for peppers, you won't be able to plant them much deeper in most cases.
Check the FAQ as well.
95% of the time yellowing of leaves on seedlings is due to over-watering. Cut your watering in half. You can transplant them into new, bigger containers with a mild fertilizer charge in the new mix if you can't plant them in the garden now. The yellow leaves will die and fall off but the new growth should be ok.
Dave
I don't know if this would be illegal, but perhaps your daughter could remove the seeds from one of these tomatoes, put them in a napkin or some such and bring them back home. Then at least you'd know you're getting precisely the tomato she likes so much.
I thought I'd posted this last night, but it was still in Preview.
farmerdill's link spells it Piccolini, and miesenbacher's says Picolino. This is one confused tomato!
There was nothing under Piccolini in any of the other databases I searched before.
barb, if your daughter can't find seeds in Britain, what she can do is to save seeds from a tomato and mail them to herself in America. Apparently people trade seeds that way all the time. Since the seeds are dry, it's not considered likely to spread pests or diseases. [I'm not sure what would happen if she tried to bring them through US customs.... We have a family story about how my grandmother, living in Taiwan, put a "surprise" for me in my mother's luggage: it turned out to be seeds she'd saved from a 2' Asian cucumber. I've no idea what would have happened to my parents if the Customs people had checked their luggage.]
I suggest your daughter buy some tomatoes as soon as she arrives in Britain, remove the seeds from one or two fruit, and rub off the gel. Then put the seeds on a paper towel to dry.
After a few days, wrap the seeds in a square of paper to keep them all together (if they were completely dry, I'd put them in a tiny ziplock, but they wouldn't be completely dry for a couple of weeks, and you don't want them to mold). Then place the seeds inside a letter envelope with a flat piece of bubble-wrap cut to the size of the envelope (this reduces the chance that heavy postal machines will crack the seeds). Mail the envelope to the US.
You might get something similar to the hybrid in taste ... no guarantees. Good luck.
If you want a light and fruity juice, Garden Peach is delicious and prolific.
Carla in Sac
KBX is the potato leaf version of Kellogs breakfast which is regular leaf.