For the Gardeners-Tomato Question

fureverywhere

fureverywhere

beloved friend who will always be with us in spiri
Location
Northern NJ, USA
I don't know the variety but this year I have a tomato plant that's trying to sprout bushels. Usually I just get a few plants for the season and grow them in big pots. But this one I'd like to put in the ground and keep. My question is where to put it.

Spot A is against a wire fence with fairly full sun
Spot B is a different fence with part sun
Spot C is a former flower bed that is more part shade than sun

I also wonder how you anchor full tomato plants. They have cages around them right now. I guess if they go above cage height you use stakes right? Any suggestions are welcome:D
 

Full sun, full sun, no other place for it fureverywhere! Absolutely and you can tie it to that wire fence you mentioned or weave your branches in and through it.

And make sure you pinch out those new little shoots that come out of the crooks of the older branches. When I grew tomatoes, I even made a point of cutting off about half of each 'branchlet' of leaves. That way you are getting maximum air circulation to prevent mould and it's actually surprising how much foliage you can get rid of to make sure that maximum energy goes to growing the fruit. Too often people use those cages, don't prune nearly enough and the plant gets so overgrown it's hard to see the fruit and there isn't much of that either and the centre of the tomato bush gets a lot of dead and rotting leaves.

Also, tomatoes are heavy feeders so don't be stingy with the fertilizer.

Now maybe you already know all of that so if you did, I apologize if I covered old info for you, but just in case....:rolleyes:.

(And after all of that, you'll end up with a lovely shelf full of ripening greenish fruits and when you go to check them two days later, you'll notice that the darn things are starting to get that horrid blight!!!!!!:mad:
My mom has grown a garden every year for a few decades so one year I asked her, "what do you do to get rid of that awful blight that just showed up on my ripening tomatoes?" and she said to me "I quit growing tomatoes". So good luck!)
 
No really I welcome all the info I can find. My gardening lessons came from my Dad who never grew edibles and trial and error. I'm still figuring this out. Another question, do blueberries have growing seasons? There was fruit when I planted the three but not now. But yeah the tomatoes I'll go with full sun.
 

fureverywhere said:
But yeah the tomatoes I'll go with full sun.
Click to expand...

Yup...Full Sun for tomatoes. Mine are really growing this year....I initially put them in wire cages, but they quickly outgrew that, so I've created a "fence" around the plants with some long sticks and fishing line. I just planted Grape tomatoes this year...that is our "summer candy"...and I've already picked several dozen, and have probably a 100 or more that are green, with more buds forming. I may be passing a lot to the neighbors or the old folks home in town, as I don't think we can eat this many....and I only put 5 plants in this year.
 
Any advice for the pups? I go out with them now. But a barrier to say this is Mami's plant and pee somewhere else?
 
fureverywhere said:
Any advice for the pups? I go out with them now. But a barrier to say this is Mami's plant and pee somewhere else?
Click to expand...

Try a Squirt gun. If your dogs want to pee on your plants, give them a quick shot of cool water with a squirt gun. It won't hurt them a bit...will just "surprise" them, and if you do it often enough, they will soon learn to tend to business elsewhere.
 
Blueberries do have their own season BUT there are early and late varieties and you have to plant each in pairs of two different varieties. Was that confusing? So let's say you have early variety A, you plant it in proximity with early variety B. And then you can also plant a late variety R with another late variety S. I think there's also a mid season for them. Then you'll have an extended season of blueberries.

And you must plant them in differing pairs like this because that is the only way the flowers get pollinated so that you get any berries at all. A single bush by itself won't produce.
We had about 12 different bushes that were just beginning to produce when we moved.
 
If a squirt gun doesn't work (my dog would love that game), you can put a short chicken wire fence around the plant. Not too close to the plant, but in my theory, the dog would not go to the extra effort of jumping over the fence just to pee on the tomatoes. If my theory works, the chicken wire would not have to form an extra sturdy fence ... just some cheap chicken wire and a few cheap stakes to hold it up and to the ground.

To allegedly avoid blight, don't plant tomatoes near potatoes or bell peppers, rotate your crops every year (no blight lovers in the same place another blight lover has been). There are also sprays you can apply that will allegedly help keep blight away. Will all that work? Maybe. I plant so many tomatoes every year that my friends jokingly refer to me as a tomato farmer. This year, I am planting none because I have had blight hit the past two crops. I have instead embarked on a plan to remove blight spores from the soil. High heat (like hot summer dry weather) will eventually kill them ... but deep freezes do not. Then next year, I am going to put hoop houses over my beds to avoid airborne spores infecting my plants.

It is easier to buy tomatoes from a farmer than to deal with blight, but I love growing tomatoes. Here's hoping your plants remain blight free!
 
What the heck is this blight thing? I've seen that elsewhere. The happy tomato is now between a lilac and blueberry bush. It appears to have a bushel of tomatoes sprouting. I'm using Neem oil for chewed leaves.
 
Blight is a disease that usually shows up just when your tomato is beginning to turn red and ripe! Big blacky, browny splotches that spread and disfigure the fruit. Irritating as all get out because you put all the love into your plants, it gives you lovely promises of nourishment and future spaghetti sauces and then, disappointment. And I've heard also the recommendation that Wheaton gave about putting them in different locations. Good luck.
 
I tend to let my tomato plants grow and branch as they choose. I have never had a problem with blight.. My tomatoes may be smaller than the pinched and pruned plants, but they make up for it in number.. more than we could ever eat between the two of us.. and I only plant 2 tomato plants a year.
 
This year we just had one "free range" tomato plant. Just planted in the garden, full sun, with no cage or anything. It has grown really well, no blight, lots of tomatoes. We've never had a tomato plant do this well for us before. I wish I could remember what kind is was.
 
Hazy Davey said:
This year we just had one "free range" tomato plant. Just planted in the garden, full sun, with no cage or anything. It has grown really well, no blight, lots of tomatoes. We've never had a tomato plant do this well for us before. I wish I could remember what kind is was.
Click to expand...

I usually plant one heirloom (this year Belgium Giant) and one "Better Boy".. Full sun.. I do stake them though.. Using a whole bunch of stakes placed as the vines grow.. One plant can cover 6 or 7 feet ... I like to keep my 'maters off the ground.. my dogs would pee on them.
 
My husband loved gardening and especially planting tomatoes, we have very good soil here for tomatoes, I planted two tomato plants this year, but made the mistake of not planting in full sun.
 
I put it in the front yard so I don't have to worry about dog pee. But this just must be the year for tomatoes. There's cherry ones still potted and blooming. The one I transplanted to the ground must have twelve little greenies...never saw anything like it.
 
Something else I'm puzzled by is where to cut back. The plant in the ground has bunches of tomatoes forming at ground level. The Cherry ones are just sprouting happily on their own. This trimming back thing I need some help with.
 

You must log in or register to reply here.

Back
Top