TOMATO GROWING THREAD 2020

I planted my toms out into unheated greenhouse on Friday last week. The lowest t registered in the greenhouse night before was 4.5deg C, this night 9.4deg C. I cover plants with white membrane over night, and put candle (maybe not much use from 1 candle in 6 x 8f greenhouse, but anyway did it ) . So far all good. 2 more nights to go I believe.

 

I've got over 200 tomatoes in my greenhouse, and on Monday checked the calor gas cylinder as it was forecast to go down to 0 deg C overnight, found it was almost empty to quickly got another from a nearby agriculural machinery business (where I buy stuff like rotovators, chainsaws, brushcutters, etc.) and it cost me cost me about £15 more than the place near MK where I normally get it, but important to keep them in business.

I even moved all my spuds indoors into a spare bedroom.

Heavy frost on Tuesday morning which many wouldn't have seen as the early sun soon got rid of it.

All tomatoes going into unheated polytunnels at the weekend if forecasts hold.

 

I just realized that mine too are fruiting, the tomatilloes too I think! First time I ever seen fruits forming this early on my tomatoes (but I remember photos of very early tomatoes here on the forum).
The ones I put outside already are not, I guess because they did not like the cold, despite keeping them covered at night.
But I think on Friday I will plant them all and hope for the the weather to stay reasonably warm.

 

Ohh.. I did not think spuds would suffer from it., silly me.
I left the pots out (the plants did not come out yet), so perhaps I might have lost them.

 

That's the same as with my edge of village plot, and my garden at home is a couple of degrees lower than the local town, so a total of up to 5 deg C less than where the forecasters base their published min temps. Catches loads of people out every year.

Looking good. I'm only just getting my first flower buds, but I didn't get around to sowing until later than normal this year.

Which variety is it with the tomatoes on?

 

Sutton calls them Lizzano, not sure if they also go under other names though
Tomato Seeds - F1 Lizzano at Suttons Seeds

They are bush tomatoes, quite robust and productive, and did well two years in a row, so I keep growing them.
However I realized I cheated, the two fruiting already are not from seed. I bought them as plugs, already grafted from Suttons along with the seeds.
They came on the 7th April and they were already 2 inches tall, so perhaps 3 weeks old already at the time?
I checked and my Lizzano's from seed are not quite there yet, just flowers, and they were sown in the last week of March.

The last photo is from a Tomatillo actually. Last year they were quite late at flowering and extremely late at fruiting, but the new ones seem to develop faster. But same seeds, same potting soil, same windows too.. Not sure why, mysteries of gardening.

 

Thanks. They did not come out yet, so I scraped the soil and spotted one , no sign of blackening and I added more soil hoping it protects them a bit from the cold.

I have nowhere to put them, but I found some old bubble wrap and covered the posts with that, better than nothing I hope.

 

That's great news, thanks John!

 

So much space, they must love it.
Mine always end up a bit cramped.
Are they all grafted?

 

I would have got a double row each side in there, plus a load of Red Alerts in 10L pots to be put outside in early June.