Grafted tomato

I've just bought a couple of grafted tomato plants - wouldn't have bought them at the original extortionate price but they were being sold off as they were beginning to look a bit bedraggled. The blurb says that grafted plants are stronger, more vigorous and produce more fruit. True ... or advertising puff? Has anyone any experience of growing them?

 

Hi

I grew one as a experiment last year performed the same amount but croped earlier and slightly longer variety was Alicante others may have had better results but I grow in huge pots in the greenhouse as mine is all paved (no border ) so may help more then with disease etc in the soil.

To be honest adding up what it cost xtra compared to the 6 in a tray I bought I havnt bothered again

Spruce

 

Thanks Spruce. That confirms what I suspected!

 

I think Gardeners World last year did a trial and the grafted ones performed marginally better.

I think:

If you grow in greenhouse borders (soil) then a grafted plant may provide protection from follow-on-crop diseases. It would be a lot more cost effective to pay for grafted plant, rather than change the soil - unless you are Fit and have Time

You could graft your own. Seed is available for the "root" ...

Grafting may lead to some other fringe benefits - closer trusses, for example, would mean more trussed before the plant hits the greenhouse roof. Or less susceptible to Wet/Dry at the roots ...

But I would have thought most ?? gardeners growing Toms in a greenhouse would be capable of raising the plants from seed, and compared to that a grafted plant is extortionate. For those buying plants anyway the extra cost of grafted is probably easily offset against the value of the crop at Supermarket, neigh Organic, prices.

 

Those are probably the 2 most important bits of info I've picked up:

1) Can't bury anything grafted below a graft so lose benefit of burying stems to get extra roots/vigour. (see P.S.)

2) 25p'ish per rootstock seed seems very little expense for not having to replace greenhouse/poly tunnel soil borders.

P.S. Perhaps if the 'guidelines' about sowing rootstock seeds and grafted variety seeds at the same time were ignored, so the rootstock toms were well in advance and had much longer stems suitable for burying, the height of the graft wouldn't be a problem.

 

Guys have any of you ever crafted aubergine on tomato? My grandfather used to craft aubergine on tomato to speed up the production , same story with peppers .
when I was young at school we crafted a tomato on potatoes .
even managed to find a picture on internet.

 

Hi John

That is very industrious of you. I'm impressed! Mine are all a variety called 'Orangino', which I've never grown and know nothing about. (You know what garden centres are like - it's a bit like being in a sweetie shop, particularly when you see the magic words 'reduced to clear'.) To be honest, I don't have the space to be a serious grower but I was just curious ...

 

Consider that all that was appen in Italy years ago , the idea was simple , the aubergine will take 6/7 months to mature , while tomato in Italy are ready in 3 months , they used this sort of crafting just to speed up the aubergine and had something to do with the dry situation as well , the tomato on potataes was just a school project....
At this point i was thinking if is possible to crafting plant like pepino melon or tomatoes tree on normal tomato ....or even melons on pumpkins, but that is a different matter.
my grandfather stopped to grow tomatoes and converted all in tabacco , more money i suppose .....today all the land around is just building and palms.

 

Yes i remeber that clearly .....it was the aubergine top on tomatoes base , same with pepper.
Yes the tomato on potatoes dasn`t really worth , the tomatoes will taste bad and the potatoes will be small .

 

see how much didn`t update myself......just went on an italian web to find a picture and look at this .........aubergine crafted on tomato tree = you have an aubergine tree.