Quote:Left to its own devices, a vigorous indeterminate tomato plant can easily cover a 4- by 4-foot area with as many as 10 stems, each 3 to 5 feet long. By season's end, it will be an unsightly, impenetrable, disease-wracked tangle.

They were spying on my tomato plant last year, weren't they? Because that's exactly what it was, only there were three of them crammed into that 4 x 4 foot area. We got tomatoes out of it all, but I suspected it could be better.

Thanks so much for the link, Donn. My tummy and tastebuds thank you as well. :-)

I pruned Yello Pear with an electic hedge clippers. It didn't help ;-O

On the link below, if you scroll down below "Tip" you will find links to regional extensions offering advice. Toms fair differently in regions, what works on LI may not work in Idaho or SoCal, so look at the links that are for your particular area...some of the info will be the same, but there may be some tips to help you grow toms where you are.

Here is a link that might be useful: WS Toms

"..a vigorous indeterminate tomato plant.."

A couple of those I sowed qualify in spades.

'Black Cherry' just would stop growing stems and fruit. I didn't prune, but I trained them so they'd stay within reach, and they built a solid wall which blocked airflow and sun to everything behind them. We ate them constantly, gave away bushels, and still only used half of them. This year, they go in the back of the patch, and they get pruned.

When a fellow on the Tomato Forum offered seeds for 'Pasture Cherry' he described it as covering his garage in a season.

Donn and trudi, you both make me lol and the kids give me the oddest looks. Yes, mom's a loser. Oh well.

Trudi, I read the "Transplanting tomatoes" FAQ. Do you let them grow until the leaves touch the bottle, and then dig 'em up, cut off the lower 2-3 sets of leaves, and rebury them deeper for the improved root system, or as wintersown tomatoes do they not need them? I ask because it just says they're ready to grow, and it could go either way. (Let's face it, some days I just need *extra* pictures drawn for me). ;-) Thank you!

Hmm - my tomatoes are lamb's quarters, really. LOL

Rolf ;-) (which is how I pronounce your name)

By the time the seedlings get so big that their leaves touch the bottle I just yank out the bottle...I don't replant deeper. When you transplant your tom seedlings so young you'll be surprised by their root systems. WS toms definitely have long roots. Because their root system is so good youdon't have to reset the stems below ground level, WS toms are fine on their own.

T

I have one Box Car Willie sprout, no sign of Sungold. Was at Whole Food today and saw some organic Sungold plants for sale. They were 12-15" tall and bushy.

Sigh :(

Thanks, Troo-dee-dee ;-)

drippy, :-[ I feel your pain. I have one chat noir scabiosa seedling that came up out of three containers, and it does not look anything like the two other kinds of scabiosa... I think the container was impregnated by... aliens.

Oh my gosh, I just got up and as I'm reading Troo-dee-dee ;-) , the Troo-dee-dee-dee ;-) bird is outside singing my name.

I've got 4 sprouts of magnum beefsteak. Thats only one of 5 different varieties.
Alberta

Another week of cool rainy weather predicted here...sigh...that will take us into May already. Good thing it's a good lupine & delph year; it's not looking like a good tomato year so far.

:(

Can someone answer a question...we sowed a number of different tomato seeds but nothing has sprouted yet. Last year I am sure I had a lot of sprouts by now. I really don't want to have to buy tomato plants because the ws seedlings performed so great last year. Is it too late to just sow more seed? Will they be really late to produce?

Thanks
PM2

It depends.

Tomatoes run from 50 to 100 days, transplant to mature fruit. There are indeterminate 'maters which will start to ripen fruit in less than 2 months, and continue producing until the first fall frost.

I just sowed mine the other day, and I expect I'll have way too many Tomatoes, just like last year.

I FINALLY found a sprout in one of my tomato jugs that actually looks like a tomato sprout and not a weed!! yay!!

Barbi

Yeah, I think I have a real one now, too, in Stump of the World. But the 4 Big Rainbow, 2 Ildi, and 1 Balconi Red are lamb's quarters.

Generally, my datura & tomatoes germinate at approximately the same time, and I haven't seen any datura yet.

Five of my milk jugs have tomato srpouts in them. Seems all this nice weather and sun shine more are showing up. Day 3 of 70 degree weather. They are a good 2 weeks late but it was bitter cold ( 28 degree nights) for most of April here. Expect most of them will sprout this week of the 12 containers.

They are smaller then the ones at Wally world but then they are all heirlooms that I cant buy at any place local either.

ML

Finally! I've got some sprouting, Persimmon from Renee's Garden seeds is the first to sprout.

Well, I have two Tom sprouts. They aren't from my seeds, though. A neighbor just dropped off a couple started indoors by his friend. A 'German Pink' and a 'Matina.' They're pretty small, just 5-6" but healthy looking. I grew 'German Pink' last year, and it was excellent. I never heard of 'Matina' but it sounds like a great variety, potato leaved, 58 days and supposedly tasty fruit.

I think I'll pot them up for a few weeks before I put them out.

Matina is a fine cropper, it makes loads of red saladette-type (2") toms, it can crap out by the end of summer but by that time you've had enough of them ;-)

The people on the growing from seed forum say it's too late to start toms by seed, not enough growing time to get a harvest. Since all of us are getting late sprouts, will the grow in time? I'm worried I'm gonna have a bunch of plants, but no tomatoes. I'm half tempted to go buy some plants to make sure.

When I lived in zone 5, we didn't plant Tom seedlings until Memorial Day. We had great crops. Just go with early to mid-season varieties, and you have plenty of time. Sow them now, and you'll have viable seedlings by Memorial Day.

Yahoo! Something's sprouting in my containers today. I was getting so frustrated I was about to try putting one of my ws styrofoam cups in my car's cup holder to see if they would germinate there! I think I have baby Japanese Black Triefel, Patio Orange and Wapsipinicon Peach. If they aren't baby weeds...

mandyb

The Japanese Tomato is a very pretty one. It's shaped like a spinning top and has a trio of colors ranging between green/maroon/brick. If I recall right it has green gel around the seeds. Tasty too!

First sprouts! 8 days since I sowed them.

'Black Cherry'
'Green Grape'
'Pasture Cherry'

I have one tomato plant that has some yellow blossoms on it! I'm very excited.

It was my first sprout during an unusual warm spell I believe in February. I put it in it's own fairly large pot, and covered with a soda bottle for a while. I did end up bringing it and a few others in for almost a week when we had that stretch of temps in the teens and twenties in April. It looked really funny at first that tiny plant in that big pot, but now it's probably 1 1/2 ft. tall at least.

My other toms are not that far along, but they are coming along. I would never have thought I could have grown my own tomato plants, especially ones sowed outside in the winter. This has been so fun!

I have many varieties sprouting now and have set some into "layout" in the garden...they're still in their germination bottles and have to be planted, but I can see where they'll be and tweka the arrangement before planting.

I'm doing about a dozen varieites this year...not as many as usual but I need a break to rebuild the soil and grow more flowers, so this year I'll have less toms...but they'll be quite yum I am sure.

Jeepers most of mine have spouted and tonight we have a freeze warning. So I gathered up all the tomato seed jugs and put them in a unheated hay trailer for tonight. Normally feel it is safe to plant out around 5/8 but this year they were so long to sprout dont think that will happen this week.

I did repot up a few in tall plastic cups. For a strange reason feel that a few repottings give you faster tomatoes.

ML

Quick question... If you do the tom seedling planted, w/ the bottle over top, it says to leave the bottle on until the leaves touch it. Won't it fry on these 75+ degree days? Or just make sure there's adequate ventilation and they'll be ok?

The lid is off. First instruction is to throw away the bottle cap.

Here is a link that might be useful: Transplanting Tomatoes

I gathered that. I was just wondering because when we first started getting the warm spells, everyone was cautioning the newbies to take the tops off their containers (and not the cap top) so the seedlings didn't cook in the sun. Or are tomatoes a different subject because they like it warm?

Kek, I'm certainly no expert, as this is my first year, but I left the bottles on for quite some time, until they were too big, which they currently are. High temps didn't seem to bother mine, they just seemed to grow faster that way. You could also put a coule more holes or slits in the bottle as well if you're worried. Of course, I don't know your current temps. I think the warmest it got when I had the bottles on was in the high 70's.

Kek, I never EVER leave the caps on bottles, and I also never EVER fully remove the tops fro containers...I don't like windblow seeds and I don't like wind wicking away soil moisture.

Other people may do it their way, but I do it MY way.

I'm not trying to start some major discussion or conflict of personal ws ways. Below is a link to one of the few posts that came up when the weather started warming up. In my case, anything unsprouted (which are only about 4-6 containers :) ) still has their lids on. My lids have been off most of my sprouted containers for a while now, everything is fine. I was just curious if the "baking sprouts" caution applied to the transplanting ws toms that trudy described. Especially since we've hit 80 today.
(Oh another little note, when I wrote above not the cap top, I was trying to explain that I wasn't talking about those, they were never on.)

Here is a link that might be useful: don't bake sprouts

I had germination this weekend! Among the sprouted are my 2 tomato varieties - cherokee purple and momotaro. All 3 of the cherokee purple seeds sprouted, and 2 of the 3 momotaro did!

Germination for me was also 8 days after planting...

should I have the containers uncovered now? I just have big holes in the plastic...

No conflict, I was dead on serious about us all doing it our own ways...that's what WS is all about.

If the lids are off the bottles you don't have to worry about the air inside overheating. Their shape works as a flu and rapidly vents off warmed air.

If you have lids on flats of seeds you can simply increase the width of the slits.

Thanks trudi that clears some up for me!! You guys wanna hear something funny? I went out and planted my 1st two tom containers, using the water bottle over top method. Each had 3 sprouts that survived the cold snap. I have new sprouts in the containers I sowed later if these dont make it. Funny thing is after all was said and done, I was checking for dryness in the rest of my containers. I picked one up and thought, wait a min, is this the container I had toms in? Went and pulled my sheet out and sure enough, I thought I planted 3 yellow pear seedlings, but instead planted sweet william!!! I thought they didn't quite look right! To make it worse, that container had more sprouts in it, but they didn't look like toms so I assumed they were weeds, but now that I know that I had the sweet william out, they were indead those seedlings that just emerged! Oh well.

Have you ever grown yellow pear before? I like them a lot, they're quite mellow and juicy, some folks think they're pale flavored and watery, but that (to me) is what makes then so quenching--they're one of my fave garden snacks; they almost never make it into the house. Like most small-fruited toms their plants grow very large. Yellow Pear goes beyond very large to freakin' huge ;-O Pruning doesn't seem to make much effect because a few days later and they look bigger than before you pruned them. I had grown mine in year-old lasagna beds, the soil was so rich that the plants went nuts and grew to tremendous proportions. My best advice is to go light on feedings, or get a ladder and a hedge clippers for trimming them back to size.

T

I've eaten yellow pears, absolutly loved them, never grown, or even seen a plant though. I've been recently noticing people mentioning how big they get. I'm starting to get a little worried. Thinking maybe, I'll just place one here or there in our yard to act as temperory trees! So how big do you think they'll get in my short growing season? I have a tom/pepper bed prepared, but I'm starting to think it won't be big enough, and maybe should plant yellow pear somewhere by itself. I'm also starting to think I shouldn't plant as many as I was thinking. Heck, I have 5 growing indoors, plus 2 ws containers! I was thinking of planting 5-6, but maybe 1 would be enough?

I have 7 tomato plants right now. I'm almost glad some didn't survive, because that's really more than I need. Last year I had two tomato plants from a nursery, and that supplied me with as many tomatoes as I needed. I'm gonna give a plant or two away I think.

I'm going to keep some in pots, and plant a couple in the garden up some A-frame trellises. I am considering planting golden jubilee, chadwick cherry, or early girl up the a-frame trellis. Anybody know about the size/growng habit of these three?

Not a great year for tomatoes here - I sowed at least 2 dozen varieties, and have a total of 4 sprouts. Others may come up yet, but at this late date, I'm wondering if they'll produce. This is not usual for me, though - last year I had scads of wintersown tomato plants germinate in April. It always is a better year for some things than others for me - I am going to have the world's biggest lupine garden, I think! :)

I don't have any tomato sprouts yet. Last year, I had many tomato sprouts in mid April. I sowed another batch today just in case those never sprout. I think I'll be buying seedlings at the store this year.

It is still a very good year for other seedlings. I have a ton of annuals and perennials growing very well.

Those of you who don't have sprouts-- if any of you live northside of Indy, give me a holler, I have tom sprouts coming out of my ears. I tried counting them this evening and stopped at 100. All 11 varieties sprouted for me - cherokee purple, bloody butcher, persimmon, brandy boy, better boy, jetstar, sungold, black cherry, super sweet 100, red pear & stupice. Now what on earth am I going to do? I have space in the vege bed for 12-15 only. Sigh. Why did I sow so many seeds?

mamimo I had that problem the first year and mailed seedlings all over the usa for folks. Some went from the east coast to the west coast. Had over 36 different types and a good 600 sprouts. Winter sowing was so much fun and shocking to say the least.

Right now repotting up my seedlings to give them some extra room and to give some away again this year. I pawned off tons that year to friends and had a box of seedlings where every I went.

If I only winter sowed one type of seed it would be tomatos. For the reason to get varietys cant be found in my area.

ML

mlcom
600?!! LOL, I feel better now about my 100+. Planted some, shared some, DH is going to bring some to work too. A quick guesstimate says I still have over 50. If these are not gone by June, I'll offer them on freecycle. Yes, toms are such fun to sow and grow. And the catalogs and tomato forums are always full of suggestions of different varieties to try! Luckily my family love them too, eat them like candy. Except I don't have enough space in the vege bed for all of them. I'll be good/disciplined next year *like real...*

Are tomato and/or pepper seeds *typically* good for longer than a year? I wintersowed several kinds but kept a reserve of most. Some have come up, but many have not yet and I'm not counting on them now.

I don't want to try again at this point (I have flowers blooming in their original wintersown containers, I'm that far behind already) so wonder if the tom/pepper seeds can wait for me to try again next year.

Thanks in advance.
Terri
:-)

Oh yes, they cn both last for many years--maybe five or more and still retain high germination percentage, it starts to slip down every year from there but as long as the seeds are stored well they will be mostly viable.

Here is a link that might be useful: Seed Storage

Well I can say the Thai pepper seeds I sowed on April 17th have had about 90% germination from saved commercial seeds I've had since 2003 :D
I plan on potting up my Tumbling Tom into 12" azalea type baskets (I hope that's deep enough?), Oregon Spring into a 3 or 5 gal containers (have both) and Sweetie will go directly into the garden all by Friday. Also plan on putting the indoor sown peppers that have been outside 24-7 for the last 20 days into containers this year too....gotta save room for the Okra :D

Vera

Just want to say that I checked the second batch of toms I put out and I have sprouters :-)
Still nothing in the first bunch I sowed in a bin the wind flipped over...I have no idea where any seeds are in those (if they didn't get blown away).

Linda

Linda,

It's a shame when a flat is flipped over or spills. What I've done with these is to prepare some ground and scatter the flat soil over the surface and rake it in. Keep it moist, give the area a drink every couple of days. This gives seeds which may be to deep in the flat an opportunity to germinate. You may get a few seedlings from it. Give it a try.

T