Growing Great Tomatoes!

Now that you want to start growing your own food, here are some tips on growing the perfect tomato!

 

Is it too early too be thinking about your tomato plants? Not if you're the competitive tomato gardening type who wants the earliest and sweetest tomato on the block. Unfortunately, growing great tomatoes doesn't just happen. Sample some of the science experiments on sale at your grocer's this winter, if you don't believe it. Start early with some time tested tomato growing tips to insure you bragging rights this year.

 

1) Don't Crowd Seedlings

If you are starting tomatoes from seed, be sure to give the seedlings room to branch out. Close conditions inhibit their growth, so transplant them as soon as they get their first true leaves and move them into 4" pots about 2 weeks after that.

 

2) Provide Lots of Light

Tomato seedlings will need either strong, direct sunlight or 14-18 hours under grow lights. Place the young plants only a couple of inches from florescent grow lights. Plant your tomatoes outside in the sunniest part of your vegetable plot.

 

3) Put a Fan on Your Seedlings

It seems tomato plants need to move and sway in the breeze, to develop strong stems. Provide a breeze by turning a fan on them for 5-10 minutes twice a day.

 

4) Preheat the Soil in Your Garden

Tomatoes love heat. Cover the planting area with black or red plastic a couple of weeks before you intend to plant. Those extra degrees of warmth will translate into earlier tomatoes.

 

5) Bury Them

Bury tomato plants deeper than they come in the pot, all the way up to a few top leaves. Tomatoes are able to develop roots all along their stems. You can either dig a deeper hole or simply dig a shallow tunnel and lay the plant sideways. It will straighten up and grow toward the sun. Be careful not to drive your pole or cage into the stem.

 

6) Mulch Later

Mulch after the ground has had a chance to warm up. Mulching does conserve water and prevents the soil and soil born diseases from splashing up on the plants, but if you put it down too early it will also shade and therefore cool the soil. Try using plastic mulch for heat lovers like tomatoes and peppers.

 

7) Remove the Bottom Leaves

Once the tomato plants are about 3' tall, remove the leaves from the bottom 1' of stem. These are usually the first leaves to develop fungus problems. They get the least amount of sun and soil born pathogens can be unintentionally splashed up onto them. Spraying weekly with compost tea also seems to be effective at warding off fungus diseases.

 

8) Pinch and Prune More Tomatoes

Pinch and remove suckers that develop in the crotch joint of two branches. They won’t bear fruit and will take energy away from the rest of the plant. But go easy on pruning the rest of the plant. You can thin leaves to allow the sun to reach the ripening fruit, but it’s the leaves that are photosynthesizing and creating the sugars that give flavor to your tomatoes.

 

9) Water the Tomato Plants Regularly

Water deeply and regularly while the plants are developing. Irregular watering, (missing a week and trying to make up for it), leads to blossom end rot and cracking. Once the fruit begins to ripen, lessening the water will coax the plant into concentrating its sugars. Don’t withhold water so much that the plants wilt and become stressed or they will drop their blossoms and possibly their fruit.

 

10) Getting Them to Set Tomatoes

Determinate type tomatoes tend to set and ripen their fruit all at one time, making a large quantity available when you’re ready to make sauce. You can get indeterminate type tomatoes to set fruit earlier by pinching off the tips of the main stems in early summer.

Growing Your Own Food Provides Flavor, Fun and Benefits Way Beyond the Garden

Whether it is the cost of groceries these days, the economy or just the desire to grow your own, beginning and seasoned gardeners are adding fruits, vegetables and herbs to their landscape. The many benefits of edible gardening, including the enhanced flavor, increased nutrient density of the food, and the sustainability factor provide a compelling argument to “get growing!”

And according to gardening expert, TV host and author Melinda Myers, there’s always room to grow. “Whether people are gardening on a balcony or in a large backyard – there is always room for vegetables,” stated Myers. Myers said you can find the room, be successful and have fun with edibles by doing the following:

1) Include a few containers filled with herbs and vegetables to your balcony and patio garden. Not only can these edibles, mixed with flowers look good – they bring the garden right to the backdoor.

2) Keeping fresh ingredients near the space where you cook and entertain can make it convenient for you and fun for your guests. Just think what fun your guests will have picking a few fresh vegetables to place on the grill or garnish their burger. Or, how about plucking a few sprigs of mint for their ice tea or mojito.

3) Those with a bit more room may want to add a few edibles to their mixed borders. Bright Light Swiss Chard’s colorful stems can add color and interest to the garden. The bold and colorful leaves of red cabbage create a nice focal point in a container or garden. And tomatoes, eggplants and peppers can easily be mixed with annual and perennial flowers.

4) Use vegetables and herbs to help fill in the voids in new or renovated gardens. By properly spacing your trees, shrubs and perennials, you can save money on your landscape. But proper spacing of these young plants can leave lots of empty space in the garden. Fill in those voids with a few ornamental edibles.

5) Find the right place for your edibles to flourish. Shade tolerant edibles like lettuce, spinach and other leafy vegetables only need about 4 hours of sun; radishes, carrots and other root crops need about 4 to 6 hours. Try a few seeds and test the limits of your landscape.

6) Increase productivity and decrease your workload by using a low organic nitrogen slow release fertilizer, like Milorganite, in your garden or containers. Incorporating slow release fertilizer in your soil provides season long benefits with just one application. Give plants needing a nutrient boost a mid-summer fertilization with a non-burning slow release fertilizer.

7) Take a look at your favorite recipes and start planning ways to include some of the ingredients into your landscape. Try a salsa garden filled with tomatoes, a few hot peppers, onions and of course cilantro. Maybe it’s a pizza garden. Roma tomatoes, garlic, basil and oregano for the sauce. Include a few peppers, onions, and slicing tomatoes for topping. Young gardeners may like to plant these ingredients in the shape of a whole pizza pie or a slice. And though we can’t grow cheese in the garden, a ring of marigolds will add color.

8) Space challenged gardeners can grow tomatoes in containers. A 3 to 5 gallon pot is perfect for a single tomato plant skirted by a few flowers or herbs. Or, try mixing a few tomatoes in with your shrubs and flowers. No matter where they end up, planting is about the same. Carefully slide the plant out of the container. Gently loosen the roots of pot-bound transplants to encourage the roots to grow into the surrounding soil. Remove any flowers or small fruit. Plant tall leggy plants deeper to encourage a larger root system to develop along the buried stem. Dig a trench, remove the lower leaves and set the plant in the trench, carefully bending the stem upright. Cover with soil and water. Set stakes and towers in place at the time of planting. Training tomatoes off the ground keeps the fruit off the soil, reducing insect and disease problems. That means more fruit for you to enjoy.        

9) Top off a bed of homegrown greens with edible flowers such as nasturtium, fuchsia and pot marigold. Freeze a few pansy flowers in ice and add to a glass of sparkling water.

10) Flavor up your bloody Mary with a sprig of lovage. This easy-to-grow herb has hollow stems and a celery flavor. Place one or two plants in a sunny corner of a garden or one in a large pot for a vertical accent in moist well-drained soil. This perennial herb can reach 6 feet in height, grow one foot wide and is hardy to zone 4. Harvest sections of the stems, leaves and all, as needed. Use as a straw in your bloody Mary for a little home-grown celery flavoring.