Tomato Growing 2025

Sowed all mine only about 4 of each .

Craig Ella
Kellogg breakfast
Rosado
Zlatava
Tomatoberry

oh and a couple of Manx marvel will have there own mini greenhouse

Spruce

 

This looks good. the problem is with where I live we have no sunlight on garden except one tiny spot that the sun finds when its moving on...we are surrounded by trees in shade and only have a small area that is a garden so growing tomato's is very hard to do..luckily we know someone who grows then in huge plants in the green house so we never run short in season.

 

Hi Tea Rose, it must be a bit disappointing not to be able to grow tomatoes, but how lovely that you are surrounded by trees . That must be lovely!

 

I like trees but have holidayed in cabins/lodges in the past and they always seem to build them under trees, I find it very depressing to live under big trees with no real sunlight getting through.

 

I'm also increasingly shaded by neighbours' trees and can't persuade them to lower them. Quite depressing, but I'm looking to move anyway as we're getting on in age and would like somewhere with less perilous stairs!

 

Went for a cycle at the falls of Clyde yesterday and so stopped by a few of the many garden centres down that way. All had the same toms from the same supplier. Standard Ailsa Craig, moneymaker, super sweet, Alicante, Shirley and one or two others. Bit depressing for anyone who wants to try new varieties! They were probably two weeks further on than mine

 

Chastity bags on!

 

Hi @eatenbyweasels I assume the bags are because you save your own seed? Do you just do one truss per variety?

 

Yes, it's to isolate a truss for seed saving. One truss per variety is usually enough. If it's a scarce or important (to me) variety I do a "back-up" truss later on because some varieties turn out to have very few seeds. Pink Princess and Ambrosia Giant come to mind, along with the "dwarf" Bloody Butcher in the above photo.

 

Oh, no! Just found half a dozen of my first-leaf tinies toppled over. Never had damping off with toms before. Currently cleaning and sterilizing all equipment and wondering if I should sow a replacement batch.

 

I’ve only just sown mine. I find they come up really quickly at this time of year, so time for a fresh sowing to catch up?

 

I wasn't sure I wanted the hassle of starting again, but I gave in. And, of course, ended up sowing far more seeds than I needed to replace the lost ones.

 

Experience of poor germination one year always leads to over sowing the following year and, of course, all the little B****rs germinate

 

During the initial 2020 lockdown I found some ten year old tomato seed in the garage so I sowed the whole packet of twenty in a single pot, hoping for at least one. Wouldn't you know every last one of them germinated.

 

I found a tiny pale coloured spider on the brim of one of my 3 inch pots this evening which disappeared as quickly as it came ... now I'm wondering if my toms might have caught something, so will be checking on them as soon as I wake up tomorrow

I've even whispered " grow you little buggers and don't let me down" ... after all the king of England talks to his plants, so why not me