Understanding the different types of seeds will help you pick the right tomato varieties for your garden. Be prepared to encounter dozens, if not hundreds, of tempting varieties. To learn more about the many awesome tomato varieties available to grow in your garden, check out Epic Tomatoes , the award-winning book by Craig LeHoullier.
But, with so many varieties to choose from, how do you pare down your list and decide what to grow? Consider these three questions:. The growth habits of tomatoes are broken down into two categories: determinate and indeterminate.
As you flip through seed catalogs, notice that tomatoes are categorized by how long they take to mature — early, mid-, and late-season. In short-season or coastal gardens, opt for fast-maturing, early tomatoes, like Moskovich 60 days , Northern Lights 55 days , or Sun Gold 57 days.
There are so many different types of tomatoes to grow : slicing, cherry, paste, cocktail, and grape, for example. I like to make several batches of sauce, but most of our tomatoes are enjoyed fresh from the garden in sandwiches and salads. Therefore I plant a mixture of types, including those for sauce, some super-sweet cherry or grape varieties, and beefy heirlooms for slicing. Growing tomatoes from seed takes about six to eight weeks from sowing to transplanting.
Starting seeds indoors too early results in leggy, overgrown seedlings. I aim to transplant my seedlings into the garden about a week after my last expected spring frost date. Find out the last frost date for your region and count backwards by six to eight weeks. I start a LOT of seeds each spring and want to be able to use my growing space efficiently.
Therefore, I sow my seeds in plastic cell packs placed in trays. You can also use plastic pots or recycled clean yogurt containers, milk cartons, and so on. Give your tomatoes the right start with a lightweight, well-draining growing medium like Pro-Mix Seed Starting Mix. Moisten the mix before filling pots or cell packs to avoid uneven wetting.
Sow them about one-quarter inch deep, covering lightly with moistened potting mix. Sturdy, healthy seedlings need plenty of light.
Too little light results in legginess where the seedlings reach and stretch, eventually flopping over. The ideal place to start seeds is under a grow light, where you control the amount of light. My grow lights are inexpensive, four-foot shop lights hung with chains on a wooden shelf.
As the plants grow, I can move my lights up so that they are always just a few inches from the foliage of my tomato plants. I leave the lights turned on for sixteen hours a day, and have a timer that turns them on and off. You can use a sunny window to start tomato seeds, but due to low light conditions in late winter, expect some stretching.
If you plan on making seed starting an annual event, consider investing in a grow light, like this fluorescent fixture or a SunBlaster.
Overwatering is one of the quickest ways to kill delicate seedlings, so keep an eye on soil moisture. It should be slightly moist, but not soaking wet. Once seeds are sown, use a clear plastic dome or a sheet of plastic wrap overtop of the trays and containers to maintain moisture.
Once germination occurs, remove all covers so that air can circulate. As indicated in my previous step, air circulation is important when growing healthy tomato plants.
Having moving air also toughens up the stems and foliage of the seedlings. Like determinate tomato plants, indeterminate plants will produce the first harvest within 80 days of planting. However, these plants will feature blossoms and fruit in various stages of development throughout the growing season, producing a continuous yield after the first tomatoes have ripened. Some tomatoes have been bred to produce plants early in the season.
For gardeners in moderate coastal climates, lacking a full growing season of heat and sunshine, these are the only tomato plants that will reliably produce fruits. Some early season tomato plants produce ripe tomatoes in as little as 45 days. Depending on the circumstances, some young tomato plants may start producing blossoms or even tomatoes while still in the nursery.
What sorts of open pollination tomatoes would you recommend? They only have two varieties here, so I plan to get while I am in the USA… Neither variety has good size or production. I am a first time Gardner after retiring.
Gosh, I learned so much from this article and the comments of your readers. I have blossom rot on my first 2 tomatoes so I will get those crushed egg shells to help. Should I trust the moisture meter? Early season tomatoes often suffer blossom end rot; usually, because the soil has not warmed and the plant has trouble drawing up all the nutrients. Get a good tomato food at the garden center—one that contains calcium and magnesium; this should help. A 5-gallon container is likely too small for a full-size indeterminate vining tomato —but the right size for a determinate tomato.
As you tomatoes grow you will need to ensure that the upper growth and fruit do not tip your 5-gallon containers. Seven or gallon containers would be a better choice for indeterminate tomatoes. Hi, I started off by planting tomato seeds in small pots and polybags.
They grew well. Once they reached a height of about 6 inches I transplanted into the ground taking care not to damage the roots. But few days after transplantting all wilted and died. Could it be due to too much water?
There are several reasons a seedling can fail: too much or too little water, day temperatures too hot—sun too intense, night temperatures too chilly, too much nitrogen in the soil—these are the most likely. You have to be a bit of detective to figure these things out.
Plants are easily stressed when they are young. Next time pot them up into gallon and then two-gallon containers before setting them in the garden. That way the roots will be well established. Tomatoes can be transplanted to the garden about two weeks after the last frost; seedlings after that time can be moved with then are 4 to 6 inches tall. You can water tomatoes and seedlings with tap water unless you suspect there are additives in the water system that would be detrimental to plants.
Please am an undergraduate student doing my project on Tomato. I have planted the seed last two days but still confuse on how to water it, please help me sir. Get the best gardening tips straight into your inbox! Email Address:. Join our gardening family to receive the latest tips. Search Search for: Search. How to Grow Tomatoes: Grow tomatoes on stakes or in cages for easy harvest. Facebook 0 Tweet 0 Pin 0. Leave a Reply Cancel reply Your email address will not be published.
Vote Up 0 0 Vote Down 0. Thank you for the information. I really want to start a tomato growing project on a large scale. It doesn't slow the growth, only changes the form it takes. So that isn't the solution to having started them way too early. For a June plant out right now would be the time to start them. You can either transplant them up into somewhat larger containers which will slow them briefly and then transplant them yet again in a couple of weeks or let them continue as is and take cuttings from them to root for the plants you'll plant in the garden and pitch the starter plants.
I'm lost on when to get my garden plants, or start to grow them. Bare root tomato plants. Tomato plant leaves turning white. Tomato plant issues If you started them 2 weeks ago, then it will be about 6 weeks till end of May. That is the most common tomato seeds starting time. Some people even start as early as 8 weeks before plant out date. So I would let them grow and not to worry.
Under 70F. Dependining on the media type, pot size.. It would be very obvious to seed. Good Luck! If you can't handle the size I'd transplant them as Dave said which might them back a week. Suspend the nitrogen fertilizer for a while, too similar to Sey's thought. Could they be grown in a cooler place? Another thing to do that is not as drastic as taking cuttings is every other day working from the bottom up to cleanly trim one bottom leaf petiole off the stem until only the smaller ones are at the top, but doing it gradually.
Hope that gives you more ideas. Another idea, if you have any yellow bulbs, swap them out for blue bulbs K in their place. If some plants are too high, you can raise the lower ones or they will get even more leggy, but keep the lights as close as possible so plants feel less pressure to "reach" on leggy tippie-toes.
PS I think you could cut back on the lights if the place is cool and dry enough and you have a room to put them in that is demonstrably pitch black in darkness but I don't know if the plant would still get taller in that environment. So that's an experiment you're probably not able to do.
If you can get that temp down, down, down. My Mom had the best situation, keeping plants under lights at 60 degrees. Best I can do is about Keeping the lights close and moved some into a window large tall window.. I just reported some back into the same pots, but removed some of the root and added more soil less mix so they are planted deeper..
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