Wow, that is early. I just planted some Sweet 100s in containers about a week or so ago, and they don't have any tomatoes on them yet. I'm not sure if that's normal for that variety or if there's something I need to do to help them along.

Our blueberry bush and ever-bearing strawberries have tons of green fruit on them, so it'll probably be another week or two before we can pick any. The raspberries have a longer way to go. They're just now flowering, so...maybe a month or so?

Oooh, that hurts! ;-)

Diane

Okiedawn, I picked a big handfull of the tiny tims yesterday.

The plants were stunted as i left them in the starter cells too long. So the plants are rather small and not overly loaded. But still a ripe tomato is welcome anyway.

I still do not have any other tomatoes in the ground yet, so the harvest from them will be later. With this crazy weather we are having, i'm wondering if i'll ever get my garden finished.

I have some corn coming up in spots. After the 3" rain we had last week with the storm, i was affraid it all washed away. I'm not complaining about the rain, we needed it more then i need the corn.

Missed the strom last night, as it went just south of me. I could see it on the other side of the Potato Hills, heading towards Albion.

Guess we have another round of storms possible thursday.

My patio tomato seeds i planted have not come up yet for the turvy.

I have a mouse in my greenhouse that has got to go. it has nipped the tops off of cantaloupe and new tomato seedlings. I'm officially declaring war.

Heather,

In general, here in Oklahoma, tomato plants cannot go into the ground until late, late March at the earliest, and fruit generally isn't harvested until late May at the very earliest. Many people don't put tomatoes in the ground until April (because of late cold nights) and don't harvest until June or July. That is normal for our part of the country, so the ones you just planted should give you fruit, more or less, about 2 months from now.

I go to extraordinary lengths to get early (and late) tomatoes because they are one of my favorite foods. I consider it a bad tomato year if I don't get to harvest and eat tomatoes from April through November or December.

Because I adore home-grown tomatoes, I buy 8 tomato plants in 5" peat pots in Dallas in mid-Feb. of every year, put them in 2 to 4-gallon pots and carry them outside during the day and inside every night so I can begin harvesting in April if all goes well. You have to religiously put them inside at night and keep them inside on cold days because if you forget even once and leave them outside, they'll die on a cold night. These plants must be cutting-raised by the wholesaler because they're only about 8-12" tall when I buy them, but the main stem is at least as big around as my little finger. Some years they have blossoms when I buy them, but this year they didn't. I think they began blooming about a week after I bought them and potted them up.

Diane, I am sorry. I know it hurts. Try to look at it this way: every day that passes, you are getting closer to being able to put your plants in the ground and, once you do, you'll have tomatoes in no time.

I expect you're going to have a greenhouse again before too much time passes and then you can grow a few earlies in pots if you want to, you know. You certainly have the child slave labor available to carry pots out in the morning and in at night!

Busy1, I was listening to the progress of that storm on the TV (and radio after we left the house) yesterday and hoping it was missing you.

I understand exactly how you feel about the crazy weather interfering with planting. I feel exactly the same way. It has been depressing to have to struggle just to keep the far-too-large tomato transplants alive in their cups while battling high heat and high winds. I have carried those flats from one place to another pretty much every hour when I was at home, trying to keep them out of the worst of the winds, and have been watering them three times a day. It has been harder on days I've been away from the house on fire dept. stuff for hours and hours at a time because I wasn't here to water them or move them out of the wind. On those days, they've had some wind damage and gotten too dry and wilted, but there's not much I could do. I couldn't leave a fire to come home and move my tomato plants! I was beginning to think I'd never get them into the ground. I feel a bit better today since the weather is changing, but now the race is on to beat the forecasted rain.

Between the time spent out at fires lately, and the much-too-hot temps and much-too-high wind, I was wondering if I would be able to get anything else planted at all and thinking that if the drought continued, it wouldn't matter because nothing would grow anyway.

I watered on Monday to try to offset the high wind and high heat, so my ground is pretty moist, but I don't think it is too wet to plant. Or, at least it won't be by late afternoon. It is pretty wet this morning.

My early corn is up and growing well, knock on wood. I hope to plant the other two varieties today or tomorrow. I'm going to plant the first beans today as well.

Good luck with the mouse war. I have had either field mice or voles or woods mice or something eating the extra lettuce I put in the ground. They completely demolished about half of it (the half of the rows nearest the gate) and didn't touch the other half. It's okay, though, if aggravating, because the lettuce for us to eat is in a 10' long cattle feed trough that sits about 2' above the ground where nothing but us can harvest it and eat it. The trough is outside the garden fence, so I have it covered with deer netting to keep the birds, rabbits and deer out of it. The in-the-ground lettuce was just plants that wouldn't fit in the cattle trough, which is overfilled as it is. I figured that if I had something in the ground for the tiny wild things to sneak in and eat, maybe they'd leave the peas and corn plants alone, and so far they have. With a good garden fence in place, the larger wildlife is fenced out, but you can't keep field mice and voles out.

I have melon seedlings about ready to go into the ground, but will wait for all this cooler, rainier weather to pass before I put them in the ground since they like the heat.

My potatoes, broccoli, cabbage, onions, and leeks seem to be growing exceptionally well, so apparently the heat and wind didn't bother them much. I have been watering regularly because we've only had about 3.5" this whole year. The tomato plants that have been in the ground a couple of weeks are doing great and are covered in blooms and fruit, but the ones I transplanted only last week have struggled more because of the wind and heat. I expect they'll be happier now that the weather is more typical.

Dawn

Dawn, I am happy for you and oh so jealous. The first time I read about how you accomplish this, I decided to do it the following year. So far, it's just a dream. It's just not one of those things I'm going to be able to squeeze in my schedule. So it's a bittersweet thing. Happy for you, sad for me. I just don't have the heart to wish the little ones grown.....

Yeah, it's nice having them in containers so that I can move them around whenever the wind shifts or picks up. Mine have been sitting on our back patio to shelter them from the wind, but I'm pretty sure they're not getting enough sunlight there. Just this morning I moved them to the south side of the house since our wind is northeasterly today. When it shifts back to the south I'll put them in a sunny spot north of the house and keep doing this dance all spring long until the wind dies down. :)

Wow Dawn, you have tomatoes already, what a great idea to start early in large pots. I will try next year if I get chance. How about preserving cuttings from fall plants for Feb planting? -Chandra

Seedmama, I know it is bittersweet news for you. If it is any consolation, when my son was young like your kids, I only grew six tomato plants a year. Partly that was because a largely shady yard made it impossible to have any more than that, and partly because I had no time between working and all of our then-young-son's activities. Now that he is grown up and out on his own, I have oodles more free time....and that is bittersweet for me because I miss seeing him and spending more time with him now that he's flown the nest and has his own life in another state.

Heather, Growing tomato plants in containers, even if just a few of them, has changed my life....or at least my behavior as a gardener. Before I started growing a few in containers, I always, always, always pushed very hard to get them into the ground early (often too early) and then had to struggle to protect them from recurring freezing nights, late frost or late cold spells. Now that I am virtually guaranteed an early harvest from the container plants, I can relax and plant the in-ground plants a bit later. I've only had to cover up my in-ground tomato plants once or twice since they went into the ground, which isn't bad...and on one of those two nights we stayed much warmer than forecast so I could have taken a chance and not covered them and they would have been fine.

Out here in the country in fairly wide-open spaces, I have had trouble protecting anything from the abnormally-strong winds of the last week or so, but at least with container plants I can over-react and carry them into the house if I think the wind gusts exceeding 50 mph will be too strong for them. I only did that on one day, and I'm not sorry I did it either.

Sometimes I wonder if the wind is going to calm down. I'm not complaining though. We have to have wind for wind-pollinated plants, although I do think the wind has been a tiny bit exreme at times lately.

Chandra, I'd garden year-round if I could, but since I can't, I just try to stretch the tomato season as far as possible. You can do it with peppers too, but since they don't tolerate cold weather as well, it is easier to 'stretch' their season by digging up a few favorite pepper plants in the fall and pot them up and bring them inside and outside in the same way.

While I was outside shortly before noon, I picked 4 more cherry tomatoes, bringing today's total to 7.

Dawn

Awesome!!!

I don't get it. I just do not get what I am doing wrong. My plants (now healthy) are small. No where near being ready to go outside. I started the seed on February 27th, they are under grow lights, and are healthy, green, nice looking 4 week old seedlings. Except they are not 4 weeks old....they are 7 WEEKS OLD! I swear, I think I stunted their growth when I potted them up. Anyway, now I am jealous! ;) Rant over :)

Dawn - I too am jealous (and inspired) of your ripe tomatoes! Just this week I planted out about a third of my seedlings at the community garden which is just across the street and down a couple houses from our new (old) house. We haven't moved yet, but I had to get those plants in the ground! And, I just love having that garden so close! The neighbors probably think I'm a crazy lady, trundling my garden cart full of garden supplies down the street, but I don't really care!
I have lots of green strawberries, but no ripe ones yet. We've been eating all the lettuce & spinach we want, though!

I'm so happy that the weather is warming, although today was a bit on the cool side.

Happy gardening!

Taira, the explanation is really quite simple: Dawn is an alien. You should see her plants next to everyone else's at the swap. It's downright humiliating, I tell you. The only rational explanation is that she uses her alien technology growth ray gun on them.

Diane

Taira,

Are you feeding them? If they are hungry, they won't grow. I give mine liquid seaweed once a week when they are young. Once they are about 2 months old, if they are still in paper cups and not in the ground, I am watering them twice a day to keep them happy and that tends to leach out nutrients, so I give them a water-soluable fertilizer at half-strength.

Also, they probably would love to have some sunlight. I moved my plants out into the sun to begin hardening off when they were 2 or 3 weeks old. They grew incredibly fast once they were up to about a half-day of sun.

Diane, Would you stop spilling all my secrets! Geesh! Now everyone will want an alien technology growth ray gun of their own, and those guns are not yet available to the public! The last thing we want to do is release this special alien technology before it is perfected.

Dawn

@owiebrain...LOL!
@dawn I thought you people said not to feed them! LOL I kid, I kid. But seriously, I should prob do that...

Congrats, Dawn, on your tomatos! I bet they taste delish despite having thick skins, right?

I broke down and bought the "blue stuff" to feed mine with and they are growing in leaps and bounds since then. I noticed a significant change in the regular "blue stuff", though, that used to be MG's 20-20-20, designated as their "general, all-purpose fert". It is now 24-8-16, which is the exact 3-1-2 ratio that Al Tapla says is the best NPK ratio to use. It also has a few other minor nutrients in it as well. So that was a big change to me. I've been giving them about a 1/3 solution every other time I water, and they are responding so well. This would work well as a foliar spray, too. I somehow misplaced my Ladybug John's, so resorted to the MG because I am blasted determined to find the Ladybug before I buy more to replace it.

I am so excited to see we will get some rain finally because we need it, and I need to stay down for a few days since I injured the back......again. Grrrrr! Getting old ain't for sissies, as we all know. But having to stay put during active gardening season is just the absolute PITS!

Once again, congrats and enjoy those early maters with all of us in mind!

Susan

Chandra, I forgot to say that you can start new plants from cuttings taken from your spring plants as long as the spring plants are healthy. A gentleman who used to post here took cuttings from the same plant and kept taking new cuttings every year to overwinter. The last time he mentioned it a couple of years ago, he'd been taking cuttings from the same original plant and its' babies for about 3 years.

Taira, Um, I think we have discussed not overfeeding them and not feeding them while they are very small. : ) You certainly can feed them, especially if they are in a starter mix that does not contain any fertilizers.

Susanlynne, I hate misplacing stuff too, and it seems like I never find whatever I misplaced until I have bought a replacement. I agree that getting older is not for sissies!

We got slammed by a Severe T-storm last night around 10:30 p.m. There was lots and lots of noise and fury....hours of lightning before and after the actual rainstorm hit, lots of thunder, very hard winds, about 1 minute's worth of small hail and a whole 1/2" of rain. From the sound and the fury of the raging T-storm, you would have expected inches and inches of rain. I'm not complaining though because any rain is better than no rain.

We expect more rain here today and I know y'all have a good chance of rain as well. I hope everyone gets some rain.

Dawn

Hello all, what is the blue stuff and ladybug fertilizer? This is only my 3rd year of trying to grow tomatoes so I need all the help I can get! I am one of those with the big topsy turvy on the stand. I know, I know not a true grower but it's what I can do and they really do grow well in it. I have them in a mix of miracle grow and mushroom compost. Thanks, Julie.

Julie,

The term "the blue stuff" refers to water soluable fertilizer that you buy in a powdered form, dissolve in water, and use to water your plants. There are many brands available....two common ones are Miracle Grow and Peter's. For tomatoes, Miracle Grow has a special Tomato Formula.

Ladybug is an organic line of garden amendments and fertilizers based in the hill country of Texas, so Ladybug fertilizer is slower release than a water-soluable fertilizer as described above. Ladybug also has very cute packaging.

We aren't going to harass you for growing in Topsy-Turvys, and I consider anyone who is growing anything at all to be a true grower too, whether they're growing in the ground, in containers of any kind, hydroponically, under a light indoors, etc.

Because you have to water a Topsy Turvy often, if I were you, I'd likely use one form or another of water soluable fertilizer every day or every other day, but would dilute it to 1/4 the recommended strength since I was using it so often. The reason is that, in climates like ours where you have to water so often, the constant watering leaches nutrients out of the growing medium and you have to provide extra nutrition to make up for all the leaching. In general, I prefer organic slow-release fertilizers, but often they release too slowly to be your plants' only source of nutrition in containers that are watered daily. So, if it were me, I'd likely alternate between 2 or 3 or 4 fertilizers. I'd probably alternate between a Miracle Grow Tomato Food type product and a liquid seaweed, liquid fish emulsion or compost tea type product.

Good luck with your Topsy Turvy tomatoes.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: Lady Bug

The one I use is John's Recipe, Dawn. It is faster acting than the slow release one, with lots of micronutrients in it. Can be used as a foliar feed or soil drench. I got mine at Horn's, and it is kind of expensive. For a quart, $12.95. But a little goes a long way. I alternate with Espoma's Tomato Tone.

I would love to be able to get the 8-2-4 slow release as well, but I haven't found anyone that carries it locally.

Susan

Here is a link that might be useful: Ladybug John's Recipe

I see Ladybug products at places in Texas, but haven't seen them here....of course, I'm in the vast shopping wasteland of southern OK which means if I want anything like Ladybug or Espoma products, I generally have to drive to the D-FW metroplex to find them.

In addition to the 2 blue water products Dawn mentioned I use Fertilome and Jack's Classic. After I pot up the seedlings and even after transplant up till they set first fruit I have used blue water or a fish seaweed in the past. I like the 9-59-8 Fertilome product as it promotes excellent root growth and blooming. I like the middle number (P) as high as I can get it during this time. The MG blooming/rooting formula has 30 something number and also works well. Jack's Classic is the original Peter's formula from the Peter's family who sold it too Scott's and bought it back. MG is a Scott's product. Scott's sold the Peter's name to the Spectrum company. You will see Peters Spectrum products. When the Peter's family bought back their product from Scott's they didn't get the name as it had been sold. So they now use Jack's Classic. I use it some as it is the one the best greenhouses and nurseries around here use and sell. I also like the MG products. So basically I use what I have or can get easily when I need one. I don't care for the Schultz products and the Peter's Spectrum products. Again a personal choice from my own experience. Blue water products are good when you need quick help. But like mentioned there are other choices like fish/seaweed products. I feel that many of them are good also. I don't like the fish smell in my utility room is one reason I don't use it more. Jay

Diane, Would you stop spilling all my secrets! Geesh! Now everyone will want an alien technology growth ray gun of their own, and those guns are not yet available to the public!

To be serious, I was pleasantly surprised yesterday morning to find the first truss of 6 buds on one of the 4th of July plants then again to find buds on one of the Superfantastic plants today. All 32 tomato plants (4 hybrid varieties and 4 heirloom varieties) are doing great with sturdy pencil size or bigger stems and 8" tall bushy plants. This year a week before I transplanted, I moved my buckets over a foot and filled with nice fluffy clean rototilled dirt and filled each bucket full with water.(I bet some of you didn't know there was such a thing as 'Clean Dirt') A week later on Sat. the 8th when I transplanted, I used my smaller transplants as the local weathermen were forecasting wind gusts up to 50 MPH for the next day, (which thankfully didn't happen) I was pleased to find the dirt was moist all the way to the bottom of the buckets, not mud but moist and perfect for planting. They were kept moist for the first 3 days and didn't get a real drink (1/2 gallon) until last Sunday morning and then again this past Thursday night. If we get lucky tomorrow and actually get a 1/2" of rain or more, I'll probably cut back on watering to once a week until we start getting temps in the mid 90's or higher.

Keith