If you're trying to squeeze in a quick crop of something between now and fall tomato-planting time around July 1st, that's only about 8 weeks away which isn't much time for a crop to go from seed to harvest. It would be easier to do that with cool-season crops like radishes, baby greens, cilantro and other cool-season herbs if it were the cool-season. With warm-season crops, there's not much that you could start now that would be finished by July 1st.

Most warm season plants started from seed now would just start producing shortly before it was time for you to set out your fall tomatoes.

Some of the bush beans can begin producing at 40-something days (seed of Contender bush bean is often easy to find, and it begins producing for me about 40-45 days after it is planted although its DTM is 49 days.) There is a southern pea called Six Week Pinkeye Purplehull that really does give you your first harvest about six weeks after it sprouts, but that would work for you only if you had the seed right now, and even then it is likely you'd only be getting your first bean or pea harvest around tomato-planting time and most bush beans and southern peas will produce a harvest for 3 to 6 weeks once they start producing. Remember that bean or southern pea seed planted now would still take up to a week to germinate, so if you plant a 49-day bean now, you might be picking beans in about 56 or 57 days from the first day you plant the seeds.

What I probably would do in similar circumstances would be that I'd go ahead and plant bush beans or bush southern peas (and I'd likely choose beans because many bush southern peas will try to send out runners and become vines even though they are described as bush forms) in that bed. Then, when it is time to plant fall tomatoes, if the beans or peas were still producing well, I'd just pull out 3 or 4 plants in an area where I wanted to plant each fall tomato plant, and 'insert' the fall tomatoes into the middle of the bean bed. That way, the fall tomatoes could start putting down their roots and growing as the beans were finishing up. Just think of the bean or pea plants as a living mulch for the fall tomatoes, which isn't a bad idea because the plants will shade the ground and keep it cooler which benefits the young tomato plants. Then, keep harvesting your bush beans for another 2 to 4 weeks. When they are through producing, you can cut off the bean plants at the ground level and leave their roots in the ground so that pulling them up doesn't disturb the tomato roots. If the bean plants are healthy and don't have spider mites, just place them on top of the soil around the tomato plants as mulch. As they decompose, they'll improve the soil. You could put more mulch over the top of them if you don't like the look of the plants lying on the ground. However, if the bean plants are badly diseased or have spider mites, I'd cut them off at the ground level and compost them or otherwise dispose of them.

What I do for succession plants is that I have a plan and a schedule in my mind for each bed. Since I know, for example, when my broccoli, potatoes, sugar snap peas or onions will mature, I start bush southern peas in paper cups with the bottoms cut out about 10 -14 days before my expected harvest time for the cool season crops. Then, I harvest and clear out a bed in the morning on harvest day, add compost and Espoma organic plant food to the soil in the afternoon, rototill it in with my mini-cultivator, and transplant the plants, cup and all to avoid transplant shock, in the afternoon (if temps are milder) or in the evening (if temps are very hot). So, what was a bed of broccoli on June 1st, for example, could be a bed of pinkeye purplehull peas on June 2nd or even on the afternoon or evening of June 1st. Starting the plants in cups gets me production a couple of weeks earlier than if I direct-seeded in the ground and had to wait for the plants to sprout...not to mention that at the height of summer it sometimes is hard enough to keep the soil wet enough for seeds to sprout. If you use a plantable pot, like the paper cups I use, you have built-in cutworm protection in the form of the paper cup too.

I always have flats and flats and flats of tiny seedlings coming along in May and June to replace cool season crops as they come out of the beds, and I believe that is one reason I get such heavy production from the garden...because no bed really has any downtime to speak of. In July, I'm starting seedlings of fall crops that will replace whatever I planted in May and June once those plants are finishing up producing in August. It is an endless cycle and once you figure out which plants you need to have ready to pop into the beds at which part of the summer, you can do it without giving it much thought.

Another option might be if you could find healty transplants of yellow summer squash or zucchini or cukes right now, if you put them into the ground during the next couple of days, they should begin producing pretty quick and give you some harvest before it is time to transplant your fall tomatoes.

Another option would be to plant a few herbs now in that area that are good companion plants for tomatoes (I like to plant borage and basil with tomatoes). Just leave an empty spot where each tomato plant will go and put down cardboard in that spot with mulch on top of it to keep weeds from popping up. Plant your herbs now and let them get started, and then in late June or early July, plant your fall tomatoes into the spots reserved for them.

Dawn

Dawn next year I need some kind of copy of your schedule. This year I don't have the energy or ambition to keep up with non-stop production and replanting (the fence wiped me out), but next year I'd like my garden to start being WAY more productive!

Jo

Very good info! This is probably a "duh, captain obvious" question, but why do people plant Fall tomatoes?

I've only grown up to four tomato plants at a time before this year, but they have produced right up until the first frost. Are new plants 'fresher,' i.e. more productive than spring plants?

Thanks so much for the info., Dawn. You should really write a book, or to save yourself time, you could compile all of your long, remarkably helpful GW posts into a book. It just so happens that I have some willing baby basils that will be perfect to anchor that spot. I already went crazy with the squash! I have 9 plants in the ground so far (3 patty pans, 5 assorted zukes, and 1 zuchetta). But, I love squash so eating it all... if the dreaded squash vine borers don't get there first...shouldn't be much of a problem. But I was looking for a place for my basil and I've already planted a ton of beans (Yoeme purple string, Contender Bush, and Hopi Black Pinto), so this works out good.

Thanks!

Piscesfish, You're welcome.

Mia, Some years the tomato plants set out in spring will produce well until frost. Other years, they get hit so hard by various pests, weather issues and diseases that they pretty much run out of energy and don't do very well from about mid-July onward. That doesn't mean they die. It means that maybe they start looking a little ragged and producing more slowly or they stall and just sit there.

The decision about whether to plant new plants for fall can be a difficult one to make.

When tomato plants are beautiful, healthy and loaded with fruit and flowers in late June, it is hard to believe that they sometimes will look like crap by the end of July, but it does happen.

Fresh plants, set out any time between late June and mid-July, are not all tired and worn out from fighing the heat, pests and diseases and often will set a much bigger crop of fruit for fall. They also can tolerate the July and August heat much better because they are younger and more robust.

A very easy way to get new tomato plants for fall is to take cuttings from your spring plants, stick the cuttings in 4" pots of potting soil and root the cuttings. In a week or two, you'll have new plants ready to go into the ground.

You also can start new plants directly in the ground by layering. Just take a long branch from an existing plant, leave it attached to the existing plant, and use a U-shaped piece of wire to hold it down to the ground. (I use the U-shaped ground staples used to hold down landscape fabric.) Pile a couple of inches of soil on top of that branch where it is pinned down to the earth, but leave the growing tip of it exposed. Wherever the soil and plant meet, roots will form. Once your layered branch is well-rooted (in a couple of weeks), you can cut it off to separate it from the mother plant. Then, harvest all the ripe tomatoes, pull out the old plant, and your new baby plant will grow and produce for the fall.

Both cuttings and layering work best if the plants are healthy and disease-free.

You also can raise new plants from seed. It is fine to start seeds for fall tomatoes anytime between now and the first of June. If you raise them outside (I raise mine on the front porch in morning sun and afternoon shade and move them out into full sun when they are about 3 weeks old), they'll grow fast and be ready to go into the ground in late June or early July.

Or, you can purchase plants at a few stores and nurseries for fall, but you have to be sure you're buying fresh, new, healthy green plants and not overly tired leftover spring plants that never sold.

Planting a second crop for fall allows you to grow twice as many varieties each year if you like experimenting with the different varieties. Or, one way I do it sometimes is to plant mostly slicing types and cherries in spring, and then plant more determinates and paste types in fall. That way I can make some salsa in spring/summer from the slicers, and dehydrate hundreds (Well, really it is thousands) of bite-sized tomatoes for winter during my first crop. Then with the fall crop, I have a lot more paste-type tomatoes at the same time I have lots of peppers, and I make a gazillion jars of salsa as well as some tomato sauce.

Another way I sometimes do it is that I plant the toughest plants I know of that can take a lot of abuse in late June in a drought year. Often, the droughts here in southern OK are so severe that it is almost impossible to keep tomato plants alive. The soil gets so dry and parched that water rolls off the soil surface and runs downhill instead of soaking up the soil. In a year like that I like to plant some of the very old Livingston tomato varieties because some years they have produced very well for me in severe to extreme drought with mo natural rainfall and only very minimal irrigation. They don't seem to be garden diva's like some other varieties. Some of my favorite Livingston tomatoes for dry summers are Magnus, Paragon, Stone, Dwarf Stone, Favorite and Perfection. In the drought of 2005 they produced amazingly well considering I only wanted them once every two weeks and no rain at all was falling that summer.

Finally, sometimes you can revitalize your existing indeterminate tomatoes by pruning the entire plants back by 50% and feeding and watering them well. You'd want to do this by mid-July. If they are healthy enough, they'll put out lots of new growth and will be flowering and setting new fruit very quickly.

Because heat can affect pollination/fertilization, some plants have been bred to set fruit better in the heat. Some folks plant those types for fall. I don't.

If your plants seem fine in June, you may not want
to replant for fall, but most years my beautiful June plants are sad-looking by August 1st and I start wishing then that I had set out new plants in early July.

Dawn