Tomato Growing 2024

Main tomatoes sown 13.03. Staying in the greenhouse from 12.04. I cover with regular freece - 2 layers - for nights. T went down to +4c during some nights under the fleece.
I don't want to move them in bigger pots, instead would like to plant out this weekend.

 

Mine is 6x8 too I got it from my neighbour. Me and my husband moved it by ourselves. I cut the finger, when washing glass panes, didn't have a fingerprint to unlock my phone for a while

 

Please don't worry @Debs64 . As the others are saying, plants on sale are grown in more cosseted conditions so they'll be further on.
If you're in a much warmer part of the country, you can sow earlier, but it isn't sensible here, so mine are sown around mid to end of March, and are only a couple of inches- and that's pretty standard for the time of year now, as we no longer have the heating on anything like as much as we did in previous years.
The house is therefore cooler, so growth is slower. I've just pricked mine out into individual pots an hour or so ago. They'll be grown undercover anyway as night time temps can be dodgy here, even through July.
I'd agree that your porch might be too cold at night, but warm through the day if it's sunny, and that's where you have to juggle a bit. It's overnight temps that are the most influential, so they need to be in reasonably high single figs to avoid stalling, and ideally into double figures consistently to create good growth. My house isn't consistently warm enough at night to boost serious growth early on, so they'll be a bit later getting to flowering stage, but that's how it is, and they catch up eventually. I'm certainly not spending money having heating for them.
Others may disagree about that, or already have heated greenhouses for other plants and therefore don't mind the extra expense, and that's fine if it suits the situation. Everyone is different.

For a few tomato plants, it has to work for you, and your conditions, so work with what you have to get the best result, and enjoy it

 

I have moved plants into dining room and tired not to worry. I don’t rely on these plants for food really so maybe I am being daft. Hoping the slightly warmer temperatures will help them grow into larger plants soon. Fingers crossed. Thanks for all the advice and encouragement everyone.

 

My tomatoes are just coming up, sown about 10 days ago in the greenhouse. I used to always panic and despair looking at GC and social media plants so far ahead of mine but have learnt that they will soon romp away and I’ll be enjoying a lovely homegrown crop. Ok, mine are much later than many and exactly when will be weather dependant but it will happen.

 

Well, Iast week, I did my usual trick of giving up on my ungerminated seeds and doing a last-minute sowing for replacements.... only for the original seeds to pop up a couple of days later. Guess who'll be giving away surplus plants again this year.

 

Just went out and potted on my cordon tomatoes, the bush ones aren't quite big enough to move yet. Still moving them all in at night and out to the greenhouse during the day. Also just ordered some big fabric pots to try growing them in this year, quite a few people seem to swear by them. And might try a spare Goldkrone as a double-leader, as an experiment!

 

My experiment with using a fresh squeezed tomato didn’t work well. Just 1 survived and it grew incredibly slow. I bought now 2 tomato plants at my favourite organic farm shop, which I just repotted into a slightly bigger pot with leave mulch. Let’s hope they survive.

 

I was still picking tomatoes in December last year - there are advantages in being late ...

 

I'd ideally want an extended harvesting period. I tried to sow early, mid and late varieties this season. Let's see how it goes. I'm still learning. I learnt that 6×8 greenhouse is more a roof above tomatoes and protection from the winds, it heats and cools down along with outside. During the summer I take out 4 glass panes from the sides for greenhouse for it not to overheat.

 

I don't think I will sow them as early next year as it seems mother nature has muddled the order of the months up. March was nice and warm and they grew quickly but the last few weeks here have been dull and really cold. The plants still look healthy but growth has really stalled. I'm hoping as I planted them deeper that it's just forming a nice root system and they will romp away.

 

That's why it isn't worth sowing any earlier than around mid to late March here @Thevictorian, and it's also why we mainly grow undercover anyway. The temps and climate aren't consistent enough for a reliable harvest.
We often used to get daytime highs in the low teens during July, when you'd want them to be in the high teens to low twenties. Too high a temp can be difficult for toms too, especially if it's prolonged.
I'm sure yours will pick up again. The joys eh?