I am helping my mom start a small tomato garden and am wondering what some good tips for beginners could be. What things do beginners often not know that can make a big difference in their ability to grow tomatoes?
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Answers ( 1 )
To get the best tomatoes, you need to plant properly, keep the fruits off the ground, and prune them.
According to this page, there are a few basic steps for planting tomato plants:
Dig a hole twice the diameter and depth of the tomato root ball. Place a small handful of all-purpose organic fertilizer or compost into the hole. Plant the tomato transplant up to its two top-most set of leaves. Bury the stem in the ground, leaving at least two sets of leaves poking out. Roots will form along the buried stem.
After you transplant, you have to decide which trellising method to use Staking or Caging:
1. Staking: Drive a wooden or metal stake into the ground next to the tomato transplant. Fasten the main trunk of the tomato to the stake with plastic ties.
2. Caging: Insert a three-ringed metal cage into the soil around your tomato transplant. Keep branches inside the cage as the plant grows.
To keep tomato plants vigorous, remove extra side branches when they are 3 to 4 inches long, remove them by pinching them out or by cutting them back to the main stem with scissors. Side-dress your tomato plants with a complete organic fertilizer, such as 5-5-5. Apply the first side-dressing when the tomatoes are golf-ball sized, and then side-dress every three weeks. Use fertilizers with lower rates of nitrogen; higher rates cause tomato plants to sport lots of dark green leaves and produce few tomatoes. Tomatoes need 1 inch of water a week, but they may need more in areas with hot, dry, windy summers.