I planted mine in April and left them in Wall o'Waters until they outgrew them - a month maybe? They have continued to grow and look great - staked about 3-4' high, very full, but have just barely begun setting fruit. The zucchini and peppers planted and treated the same at the same time looked yellow and sat there until a couple weeks ago. The peppers still look bad.

I set my tomato plants out a bit late, about the 1rst of June. But despite our lack of "tomato weather", they've recently kicked in and are looking very good. Most have blooms on them..haven't seen fruit yet. I believe they're growing faster than last year's plants, but attribute that to a sunnier garden space now that a large maple has been removed from my yard. Weather in July & August will be a big factor, but I'm about to start giving mine a little fertilizer.

Patrick

WSU used to recommend waiting until June. This year it has been cold. These are tropical plants, like basil they will be checked by cool nights if set out without protection before summer. 90F a joy for tomato plants.

My daughters volunteer tomatoes have been growing fast the past week or 2. I'm very late in getting my starts in, so I suspect my harvest will be low.

These ones are doing great! 47 acres under glass. My son in-law is a manager at this South Delta (British Columbia) grower.

Cheers, Barrie.
{{gwi:1081280}}

All three of my tomatoes are over the tops of their (square folding) tomato cages. About 3.5 to 4 feet high. Only the SunGold has any fruit. I ate the only ripe one on Monday. I planted them in mid-April in WallOWaters, which they outgrew by second week of May.

The peppers are still in their WallOWaters and look okay, but have not outgrown them. The one pepper that has no WOW looks much the same as it did when I planted it, only yellower.

My beans are slow to grow, but the weeds are just fine. They are going crazy. So is the parsley and chives.

Hmm, sounds like everyones are doing fine. Maybe ours are bad toms. Normally we get our starts from Flower World. And I've never bought starts with fruit already on them. Perhaps they are spending energy on ripening the fruits instaed of growing out.

Perhaps I should pinch off the fruits.

jb

I wouldn't pinch the fruits. juniorballon. We have had a terrible spring this year. Last year we had so many 80 degree days in may and june that it makes this year seem so much slower for garndening. Of course last year we also did not get to enjoy a nice september as we do in most summers, so hopefully this year in the northwest we will get a nice late summer since we didnt' really get much of a spring. I have 25 tomato plants and 50 pepper plants and it has been just the past week that the peppers starting really lookingt healthy and the blossoms started reallly goign wild on most plants. I start mine indoors and then move them out in late may or early june as 8" to 1foot tall plants.

The brandywine, 4th of july, early girl, cherokee purple and black prince are all really putting out fruit lately...now if we can stay at least 70 in the day for more than a day or two......

I planted seeds back in early May, and now my plants are about 9 to 18 inches, depending on variety. My "ground cherries" (Physalis pruinosa) are really enjoying life and are about 2.5ft tall and branching out.

My SuperSweet100 was the first to set fruit. They are turning yellowing now, so not sure how long they will take to get red???? Sweet 100s are farther behind but have fruit. Then last week I got my nose in the middle of my early girl (who had its top cruely broken off early on) and low and behold there is a tomato the size of a small plum growing on it. I am confident it's the result of the injury.
My other plants - sungold, a couple of other early girls and something that was just labeled as "heirloom" are all finally growing vigorously and flowering, but currently fruitless. Things seem to be picking up the past week or so. This is my first year growing tomatoes in the PNW and I aam keeping close tabs! :-) I want my tomatoesssssss.

'Sungold' is a good one, prolific and tasty. But late blight was murder last year. Tomato plants really like to be grown under cover here.

Don't feel bad Junior, I had a horrible time too. *not afraid to admit it* All my tomato/pepper seedling died! except 2 pepper plants, who stayed stunted until the past 2 weeks. They tried so hard to hang on, but the earth just did not warm as fast this year. I bought a couple large starts at a hardware store to replace our failed seedlings. We have always been OK putting ours out at mother's day, and cloching them... Not this year though! Don't worry, you did not lose your green thumb, just a saggy start to summer this year. And it was harder on some than others :)

40 plants grown from seed under a shop light, nearly all planted out with Walls Of Water - half were planted April 8 and the other half a month later. 2/3 of them are now 4 ft or more, very bushy, full of flowers and just now beginning to set fruit. Azoychka was first, joined by Momotaro, Snow White, Sungold and Sugary. Cherokee Purple has fruit showing. Still waiting for Brandywine Sudduth, Red Brandywine, Marianna's Peace and the rest. Jaune Flamme, which was greenhouse-raised, has 23 fruits, some very close to harvest quality. Plants in the in-ground bed are beautiful, those in the raised beds have some yellow or dead leaves at their bases. Not sure if the dead leaves are 1-too dry, 2-normal, or 3-plastic bed liners. Any thoughts?

Suze

Buying plants with fruit on them is bad. They are far less able to transplant and take off. The plants should be bought in a four pack early on and started by the grower at home. Ideal soil for tomatoes in our region is very sandy---preferrably a dark sand, that gets warm fast. You need to give them extra room--- don't crowd them as most people do.
Four feet is minimum, except for determinate Cherry types.
Crowding means shade and cool soil.
While they are very ugly, old car tires make great tomato planters. Just fill them half way up wit soil and plant a vine in each tire. Forces you to give them enough room too.
Vines at 2 feet spacing are about as bad as growing them in the shade.
As for being a 'heat loving' plant, well, not always. Tomatoes do not like it as hot as peppers or melons.
Keeping them weed free is also very important, since weedy soil is cool and shaded.
I have grown great tomatoes in Milton and it can be done, if you choose varieties earlier than 72 days.
Also, only water them in the early morning and take the time to warm the water first to about 80 degrees.

I bought tiny starters in June (sun gold). For some reason they really took off and shot up to over 8 feet tall! I had to trim them down for fear of them completely turning the pots they were in over (5 gallon). It was sad, but there's fruit (though none of it ripe yet) and blooms over the entire plant.

I don't think they took off like that for lack or excess of any nutrient or light. They are very healthy, lots of branches (didn't prune them at all...was I supposed to?), and not leggy or spindly. They just got huge. I assume the lack of RIPE fruit is due to the fact that we just haven't had a lot of warm weather.

I'm new to this, last year I just planted one plant and this year planted two, but they really went out of control. Any tips on how to deal with this? It made me reeeaaally sad to cut off so much of the plants the other day, but they were over four feet taller than the four foot cages I was using to train them and tipping over.

kiwibird,

Are your tomatoes in a greenhouse? If not, how the heck did they get to be 8' tall so early in the year?! That's about the height that mine get to by the end of summer!
Inquiring minds want to know more !!

Patrick

I planted my tomatoes in stages. The first group I bought from the 'master gardener fair', the second from a local nursery and a third from a local grower who sells at a grocery store. I have begun picking heritage tomatoes off of the 'mgf' tomatoes and they are huge healthy plants. The ones from the local grower are fruiting like crazy and grew very fast. The slowest growers are from the nursery. Next year I will buy more from the master gardeners as they have propogated the best seeds from our area. Also when I bought the plants in May they had already set them out of the greenhouse and hardened them. In addition, when buying them, they gave me 2 huge Russian plants free to test over the summer and call in and tell them how they produced. I'll be buying more plants from them next year along with the local farmer, as his plants were so cheap and great producers!

Mine are still lagging. I am pretty certain these were not good plants. Won't be buying them next year.

Thanks for all the input.
jb

JB,
Looking at your beautiful property photos on your home page, I notice you're in a wooded area with a lot of shade and dappled shade. Are your plants in full sun all day? Inadequate sunshine could be the culprit.

I have a friend whose tomatoes are up to eight feet already and he's harvesting lots of fruit. His plants were purchased from a local nursery but his secret is a south-facing white house wall that creates a fabulous microclimate. There's just no competing with that kind of a setup except to grow better kinds of tomatoes. My plants finally are setting plenty of fruit and we're harvesting Flamme regularly now, 1 or 2 daily. Worth waiting for.

Suze

Hrm. No greenhouse. Actually, just like SeattleSuze's friend, they are planted by a white stucco house wall as well. So, maybe there is something to that! I guess I wont worry too much and will have to get bigger cages for next year. And maybe a few rocks for the bottoms of the pots they are in.

Plenty of sun. We haven't had trouble in the past. Usually We've gotten our starts from Flower World and never with fruit already set. I had a feeling these were not going to do well.

jb

Woohooo....just had to report I pulled my first tomato yesterday. Ok...so its a cherry, Supersweet 100s, but a tomato none the less!! My little southern gardening self is sooooo relieved. :-)

I start my tomatoes from seed in my greenhouse, then transplant them in beds about three feet off the cement floor. They were all doing fine up until a few weeks ago, three feet tall with plenty of flowers, but the leaves keep yellowing, even though I change the soil completely each spring with Peat moss and Compost. The Tomatoes that are on the vines are mishappen, even though a lot have turned red. Thought it was from erratic watering, but the soil is nice and moist at all times. The Peppers and English Cucumbers are thriving. I live on the West Coast. Have good air circulation and plenty of sun.
Any ideas? I always plant "Early Girl".
Wish there was a Spellchecker on the Forum!!

I am guilty of tomato insanity this year thanks to the GW tomato forum and some trades. I have over 110 varieties i'm trialing this year, around 180 plants. I have to plant them 18" apart and use tunnels to extend the season, so my first batch was seeded Feb. 24 and planted out April 10 and 18, then my second batch was seeded April 22 and planted out June 18-July 3. The second bed I had to create this year by smothering lawn with newspapers, so it took me a while to dry out the ground using the tunnels, since it kept raining, then plant a few at a time. The first ones in that bed are 3+ ft tall and blooming, and the last are 12" tall (I bury the stems up to the first leaves.) So it is quite a stair-step bed. My April planted tomatoes had their first ripes on Heidi July 18, 5 days earlier than last year. So I would have to say this year has been OK except all the rain made it hard to plant. I couldn't do it without the tunnels, which keep the temps warm inside at night. I'm also getting some ripe tomatoes from some dwarf pot varieties, Lucky Leprechaun, Tiny Tim, and Totem. I plan to start more of them this fall and try to have ripe tomatoes under lights next winter.

Next year I'm going to return to a more sane level of tomato growing using the varieties I like best this year. I'm planning to actually weigh amounts I harvest from each plant and do a better comparison. I use heavy metal poles and cross pieces at each end of a bed to hold wires that I tie all the plants up to, and occasional bamboo poles to support really heavy vines, so I don't have to have stakes or cages for individual plants.

I am a total amateur, so this may be really obvious, but ...

I have 3 tomato plants. One is a smaller variety (I think roma) and the other two are larger, slicing-sized. All of the plants are doing well and are 3-4 feet tall, but my problem is with the blossoms/fruit on the two larger. (I have tons of green tomatoes on the roma.) About 1/2 inch back from the bud, the stems are collapsing and bending and the buds are drying and falling off. Does anyone know what causes this? I read somewhere that fluctuating temperatures can be the culprit. We've definitely been having that weather, but since none of the rest of you are having this problem, I don't get it.

My plants have been in the ground since April/May and some of the lower leaves show signs of being nibbled. Don't know if this provides clues for what is going on.

thx!

Mine were tiny when I planted them in may... I think they came in tiny 4" or smaller pots.

Of course, I couldn't resist and planted them too close together. But it is hard to imagine the giant monsters they will be when they start out only a few inches tall!

Mine are in a foot high raised bed, and are well over my head now. I'm 5'4" and they are at least a foot or two over my head. I don't really have any fruit yet, but I'm a bit colder (zone 7) because we live in the foothills. I have lots of flowers and i'm hoping the recent heat will have them happy in no time.

I have had an increadible harvest of spinach, potatoes, zuccini, and peas already... and it looks like my cucumbers arn't far behind. Have several good looking pumpkins from my two plants already too.

The biggest problem I've had was that I havn't had a veggie garden in so long, that I planted too much in too small a space. And foolishly then planted monster nastursiums in with them that I now am slowly ripping out...They may have already smothered all my carrots.

I lost my tomatoes to the dreaded "BLIGHT", so I gave in and bought one with fruit already on it in a large pot and put it on the back deck. We had a nasty cold wet early summer, so no more tomatoes in the vege garden for me.