Apologies in advance for the long winded post!
So this past summer, I had great success growing a pink Brandywine in a 10 gallon fabric grow bag. I only grew one because for whatever reason, I had issues with germination with this particular tomato, but good luck with the one that did take hold and make it to adulthood. I should also add that the fabric pot was on the dirt and when I tore the plants down at the end of the season, the roots grew out of the bottom of the pot and into the ground, which was pretty neat. The weather was also very cooperative where I am(Springfield, MA) with hardly any rain allowing for sunny warm days and almost total control of the watering, with no intense thunderstorms knocking my plants around. The result was a couple dozen very nice tomatoes, and considering how notorious Brandywine is for lack of production, it was quite good and my wife absolutely loved the taste.
That being said, I figured I’d try my luck at an indoor grow this winter, purely as an experiment. Since I’ve harvested an over abundance of my wife’s “medication” lately, I have the grow tent unoccupied for the winter and want to grow something. I want to test not only how Brandywine in particular will grow with an indoor setup, but how it will do on purely “Jack’s 3-2-1” nutrients. My grow setup is a 3’x3’x6’ grow tent with 2x Viparspectra P2000 lights. One a 200w and the other a newer 250w version. I have a ventilation fan on the upper portion of the tent, and an intake vent on the lower, with an AC infinity oscillating fan on the “natural wind” setting. I started two seeds with a mycorrhizal inoculate in a 1ish gallon pot using used coast of Maine stonington blend soil, and wet it with full strength Jack’s. Germination took about 4-5 days under a dome with grow lights on 40% to provide warmth. Dome came off at first signs of germination, I cut the weaker of the two seedlings, and I’ve been watering with full strength Jack’s ever since. As of today, it’s been 1.5-2 weeks since germination.
I’m wondering if growing indoors during the cold season will help the plant resist diseases longer than being in the normal outdoor growing season environment. Plus I’m curious how full strength Jack’s will turn out. There are a lot of variables here, but it should be a fun and interesting experiment regardless. Best case we get tasty brandywines during the off season, worse case it’s a fun experiment. I’ll try to update this regularly and also when I reach the usual milestones… hopefully I’ll remember to manually pollinate when the time comes😅 Oh, and I plan to support the plant with tomato hooks.
The first picture is from today, second is from Sunday, third is from this past Thursday. I’d say the growth rate has been faster than my start this spring, which did use the same setup minus the Jack’s. Last picture is of the general setup.
If anyone has any suggestions, tips, or feedback feel free to fire away! Happy growing!
by Special-Ad-3180
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