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Key Points
Proper spacing and pruning improve air circulation and help plants produce more fruit.
Early harvesting prevents fruit from rotting and ensures better use of your tomatoes.
Tomatoes thrive with balanced watering, calcium-rich soil, and disease prevention.
If you’re introducing a vegetable plot to your sunny yard, growing tomato plants is a popular first-time endeavor. We asked two horticulture experts what they wished they knew before growing tomatoes for the first time.
Following their advice will help you enjoy an abundant, juicy, sweet, and plump harvest to add to your summer salads.
Meet the Expert
Brenna Aegerter, is the farm adviser for the Cooperative Extension Farm at the University of California.
Joe Masabni is a professor and extension vegetable specialist at Texas A&M AgriLife Research and Extension Center.
Overwatering at Season-End Leads to Bland Fruit
How often you water tomato plants depends on your conditions and the stage of the season. If you’re starting them from seeds, they need frequent shallow watering in the beginning to keep the surface a little moist.
“Otherwise, a crust forms, and the little seedlings can’t get through that crust,” says gardening expert Brenna Aegerter.
Once the plants are established, less frequent, deep watering to keep the ground evenly moist but not soggy is best.
However, vegetable specialist Joe Masabni says excessive watering towards the end of the season can lead to the fruit having a bland flavor and mushy texture. To improve the flavor, he recommends providing a deep watering maybe once a week, even if the plant looks stressed or the soil is dry.
“By then, the deep roots of the mature plant can handle it,” he says.
Wilting Leaves Are Not Normal
Don’t assume that leaves yellowing or wilting tomato plant leaves from the bottom up as the season progresses is normal.
“That’s not true—I have plants that are green from the soil to the top all season long,” Masabni says.
He explains that wilting or yellowing leaves at the bottom of the plant are often a sign of tomato plant diseases like early blight or Verticillium wilt.
He recommends regularly spraying with an organic preventative to keep some of these diseases from damaging your plants.
“If you have a dry climate, you can maybe apply every two weeks or 10 days,” Masabni says. “But if you live in a rainy, humid area, spray more often—maybe every five or seven days.”
Tip
Various organic treatment options can help prevent diseases from developing. Even regular applications of insecticidal soap can help.
You Can Harvest Tomatoes at the Pink Stage
Harvesting tomatoes early means you don’t have to worry about not using all the fruit up before it becomes overripe.
“The research has shown that the minute the fruit is physiologically mature, meaning it is green with a little bit of pink on it, you can harvest it,” Masabni says. “The flavor and nutritional profile are the same as if you left it to turn red on the plant.”
However, always wait to pick your tomatoes once the pink appears, as fully green tomatoes won’t ripen properly once off the plant.
Proper Pruning, Suckering, and Spacing Boost Plant Yields
While tomato plants grow tall and can be bushy, Masabni says novice growers often space them too far apart. He recommends growing them two feet apart and regularly pruning the lower leaves to have more plants per space while maintaining good air circulation.
He suggests removing the first four to seven suckering branches below the first flower cluster. These are the extra shoots or branches growing from where the main stem and leafy branches meet.
They often stick out at a 45 degree angle, and suck up water and nutrients and take a long time to produce fruit, drawing energy away from the productive fruit-bearing branches.
Remove branches with no flowers lower down the plant and diseased leaves. Consider cutting the top off the plants once you are around three weeks to a month away from the end of the harvest season when nighttime humidity levels are rising.
“The humidity at night aborts the flowers,” Masabni explains. “By removing the topmost branches and leaves, the food energy that the plant is producing goes to help existing fruits to get bigger and tastier, instead of towards the youngest flowers that may never set.”
Eggshells Can Prevent Calcium Deficiencies
Tomatoes can suffer from blossom end rot, which is caused by a calcium deficiency in the soil. To prevent your carefully tended fruits from being inedible, Masabni recommends saving your eggshells.
“Dry them, grind them, and put the powdered equivalent of one eggshell per plant in the bottom of the hole you dig for your plant,” he says.
The plant roots will absorb the dissolved calcium. Alternatively, he suggests you can dissolve the eggshells in vinegar and pour this into the soil a week or two after transplanting for an instant calcium boost.
“The acidity of the vinegar isn’t a problem because when you combine the calcium carbonate from eggshells with the acetic acid from vinegar, the reaction gives you calcium acetate, which is not acidic anymore,” Masabni says.
Don’t Rotate Tomatoes With Other Nightshades
Be smart about crop rotation and companion planting for tomato plants.
Aegerter cautions against planting tomatoes alongside or after other members of the nightshade family, such as eggplant, peppers, or potatoes, as these plants are often susceptible to the same disease.
“Maybe opt to plant alongside members of the mustard or lettuce family instead,” she says. “It doesn’t mean there aren’t some diseases that cross over between families, but it’s less likely.”
Read the original article on The Spruce
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