Tomato Growing 2024

Anyone growing tomatillos this year? Similar requirements to bush tomatoes but they don't get blight outside which is nice. Bit of an acquired taste though if you've not had them before. I grew them a few years ago and got a great harvest outside, I've got four plants this year which I will pick the two strongest to go out.

 

I sowed quite a few but none came up :( might have some seeds extra but its a little late

 

You need two plants for decent pollination!

 

We are at our caravan for the long weekend.
Went home to water everything in the greenhouse today (it's only 9 miles away)
Good job we did.
By next bank holiday, they'll be in quadgrows. The wicks have arrived.

 

@JWK mine are more like 12mm - that's small!

 

Thanks @fairygirl, just picked up your post. Funnily enough I put an online order in to B&Q this morning for more compost (they've got a bit of a special on 50L for £5 provided you buy 3 bags), and I've ordered 6 of those buckets, hopefully they can be used with the growbag watering pots I've bought last year. I'm thinking I'll drill a few drainage holes in them, about an inch or so up the side rather than drilling underneath, in the hope that inch will act as a little reservoir.

Finally finished organising the toms, potting up 6 of the strongest seedlings in each variety. Afraid the weaker ones have been discarded (sorry ). I'll probably have quite a few to pass on to a good cause.

All the toms have been raised outside in clear storge boxes, so they're pretty hard. They've had no creature comforts at all, so they're a little behind, but it'll be interesting to see at the end of the season if their life expectancy is longer.

 

I think I grew them a long time ago, like larger versions of Cape gooseberry but didn't taste anything like them, never bothered again.

 

Bloody Butcher getting its early fruit on.

 

Can anyone help me here please...
I am setting up a simple DIY watering system using 1 L bottles
By making about 4 holes at the bottom of the bottle / burying it about 15cm / filling with water/ and by loosening/ tightening the cap at the top I can alter the drip rate to keep the roots happy.
My question is "How may drips a second should I allow -OR- will it be trial and error keeping an eye on tomato leaves to see if they are wilting?
Just a rough idea will be helpful - "thank you "

 

I grew some outdoors a few years ago, we had a massive crop from them but none of us really liked the flavour so I haven't grown them again.

 

Thanks John, My plants are in air pots , so if they get more water than needed while trialing, it will just come out of the holes in pots. I will test one bottle out first and go with 500ml and see where that leaves me.
The pots are 5 x 9L for bush toms & 3 x 20L - for 2 cordon and a cucumber so some will need more than others. I'll just have to be watchful

 

I removed the last of the lettuce and endives and spread about 3 inches homemade compost that looked very rich and covered with a thin layer of coco coir as I had excess, then got the greenhouse planted up. 2x sungold, 1 banan krasnyi, 1 nagina f1, 1 Ruthje, 1 sevryuga and 1 purple Cherokee. Last year I crammed in 11 in the same space which was a bit silly.

Got the garlic to come out in about 3 weeks and the rocket too. Then I'll plant some basils closer to the windows and maybe a couple of marigolds on the edge of the path.

I've still got the other greenhouse with 8 large pots in it. Thinking 2 melons, 2 aubergine, 3 dwarf purple Cherokee tiger striped toms and maybe one pot with a couple of chilli's in it.

Then there's still the outside plants I've got, more nagina f1, fantasio f1 and rote murmel which is a wild currant tomato. I'll pot these up this week sometime and put them out in a couple more weeks.

 

With these irrigation systems how do you ensure that the water is dampening all the compost in the pot.
I'm just wondering, especially with the peat free type composts that when you water it can just run straight out the bottom of the pot, so just really watering a small amount of the compost.