getting my first tomato flowers.
Do you guys subscribe to removing lower branches or nah from tomatoes. I usually leave them but pinch off fruit thats too low down.
Also my peppers are all fruiting when only like 6 inches high, would you pick these off? Ive never grown hot peppers
I aggressively prune my tomatoes once flowers start appearing. They’ve been pruned twice already. I get rid of leaves and leave suckers. This is what works for me to maximize fruit production and minimize disease so they fruit until frost. I think tomato pruning can be a very polarizing topic and I’m sure many people here will disagree with my approach. It might be fun to experiment and see what works for you and your varieties, prune some removing leaves, others removing suckers etc..
In general, cross pollinating does not affect the fruit which was cross pollinated, but will affect the seeds of that fruit. For example a red delicious apple needs to be pollinated by another apple variety, but its fruit this year will still be that old familiar red delicious.
I suspect peppers are very much the same. I grow poblano peppers in my GH. The shape and characteristics of the peppers changes with the seasons. In winter, the peppers are smaller and hotter, almost like jalapenos; come spring they return to their usual shape and heat levels, same plants.
One of the biggest factors in heat levels in peppers is stress levels. Drought will make peppers hotter. As will other stressors, like insect pressure, cold, etc. And yes it can make sweet peppers hotter too.
The folks who got a yellow banana pepper instead of a sweet bell just got a mislabeled plant from the nursery. Cross pollination did not do that.
This has been my experience, others will hopefully chime in…
Steve’s answer is one I agree with.
The only pruning my tomatoes get is when the bottom leaves are in contact with the ground. My garden is mulched with newspaper for a base and several inches of weed free straw on top of that. Soil borne disease moves easily from soil to plant through contact. Mulching helps but can still be a problem. So far as taking off the early blossoms, I remove them if the plants has not been established sufficiently to support reproduction (fruiting, i.e. tomato growth) I like to wait until the plant is at least half grown so roots are established. Lots of folks have different ideas. This year I have several that have already flowered, so a couple get pinched and a couple will be allowed early blossoming just to see what happens.
I absolutely do not prune any leaves or suckers other than those on the bottom touching the ground. Plants need all the green parts they can get. Removing plant parts will not increase production and only adds stress.
I stop pruning once they get to a size where they can hold fruit. Since tomatoes around here always have some sort of bacteria or fungus (or worm) killing the leaves, they tend to not have alot of lower leaves anyways.
Pepino is coming along. It finally developed some stripes. It is much bigger than the fruit I originally bought and tried. It has also finally set a second fruit. No fruit on the Tzimbalo yet though.
Finally got around to starting the groundcherries. Sunberry (Physalis minima), Ayacucho Cape Gooseberry (Physalis peruviana), Queen of Malinalco (Physalis sp. Tomatillo type), Sierra Leone Groundcherry (Physalis grisea), Japanese Physaliastrum (Physaliastrum chamaesarachoides), Walter’s Groundcherry (Physalis walteri) and Coastal Groundcherry (Physalis angustifolia). I am hoping to get some additional genetics for Walter’s and Coastal from seed as all of mine are from rhizomes at the moment, and they seem to have pollination issues. They are so good though, more firm than other groundcherries but strong apricot taste. A little bitter though.
I’m doing a New Mexican Green Chile trial this year for northern Colorado.
NuMex Heritage 6-4
NuMex Sandia Select
Española Improved
Espanola Select
Isleta Pueblo Long
CSU Mosco (aka. Pueblo Chile)
NuMex Odyssey
Rio Grande 21
Heritage Big Jim
Highlander F1
Alpine Poblano
Anaheim "Special Strain” (PI 586666 - Year 1962)
And landraces:
Chimayó (3 strains)
Zia Pueblo
San Felipe Pueblo
Velarde
Abiquiu
Picuris Pueblo
Taos Pueblo
Mora / Tafoya
Vadito
Mora / Walatowa
Cañoncito
Santo Domingo
Jemez Pueblo
Cochiti Pueblo
Quatro Milpas
Chamisal
Cimarron
Chile Negro
So far the biggest standouts are Canoncito for earliest precocious flowering and Alpine Poblano for huge early growth, compared to all the other varieties. But it is still early.
Tomatoes:
Moonglow (best tomato I’ve ever eaten)
Uluru Ochre
NatureSweet Twilights Dark Cherry
Solanum cheesmaniae (hybrid of solanum cheesmaniae sold by terrior seeds/underwoods garden (who refuse to post my review saying it is a hybrid))
Stupice is loaded, I think I counted ~20 this morning all on the bottom half and the top half is also loaded with flowers. It’s like someone drew a line across this plant.
Purple pepper flower. I took all the labels off of my pepper plants (the fruit all look different, so I’ll figure it out eventually), but I really wish I knew which one this is. Ironically, its none of my purple peppers, none of those have flowers like that.
Currant tomatoes are brilliant for low-maintenance growing. They basically look after themselves once established and the yield is ridiculous for the space. The only downside is they split at the slightest hint of rain so you have to pick them fast when they’re ripe.
First cherry tomatoes. I ate the ripe one. Not that sweet. Hopefully they get better or the plant goes. This is in an unheated greenhouse.
You all seem way ahead of me! I held off planting because of the 40’s nights, and I also probably didn’t add enough fertilizer to my plants so they’re a little shorter, but I’m happy I got everything I wanted to in the ground.
I planted:
Zima F1? (seed saved from @Professor_Porcupine )
Lemon sugar F1? (Seed saved from Rutgers tomato festival)
Tutti Frutti Stuffin F1 (Seed saved from Rutgers tomato festival)
Sun…bunch?..gold?..gold select? F1 (seed saved from last year garden or Rutgers tomato festival. I don’t trust my records)
TY yellow mimi
Husk ground cherry (from library)
Aunt Molly’s ground cherry (from library, terrible germination rate BUT I got 1!)
Chinese ground cherries
Amish paste (from library, might be mislabeled… I need to make a paper map next time as well as take a picture with the labels!)
Pink Brandywine (from library)
San marzano (from library)
Mortgage lifter (from extension sale, 2 for a buck!)
Black krim (from extension)
Purple Cherokee (from library)
Red brandywine (from extension)
Woodstock F1 (seed saved from Rutgers tomato festival)
Mystery from a neighbor
Mystery from last year (sungold or sweet 100)
A few thoughts:
I didn’t save gumdrop black- maybe next time! Highlighted ones were my favorites.
So, a few questions which could help improve for next year:
i save seed from any tomato or pepper i get that tasted particularly good, like the best one from the plant. i only have one or two hybrid i do that with but they have all been just like the mother tomato so far. I’m sure eventually one of those will be different but it hasn’t happened yet. 90% of what i plant are open pollinated or heirloom though
my tomatoes are still pretty short like a foot tall at most but some have flowers or fruit already. i did start very early this year, i don’t direct sow, but i have matts wild cherry tomato that volunteers ever year somehow and that’s about 6 inches tall, more like your plants, right now.
I do 100% of my seeding outside and carrots are the only thing I sow in ground, just about everything is a transplant. I tried this for tomatoes one or two years, but I’ve given up. For me, at my scale and with my responsibilities it wasn’t worth the fuss. It absolutely worked, but I live in a warmer climate than most on here. Even still I was carting them inside at night to get reasonable plants.
Could probably have started them later and left them entirely outside, but then you’re trading off season length
RIP aunt Molly’s ground cherry. We hardly knew yee. You were the only one to germinate and I had such high hopes. If nothing else, know that though you have passed, I will send a dozen slugs with you to the great beyond.
Anyone have slug tips? I guess there was enough space for the slug to slip in. I’m open to beer traps and will report back if anyone has a good design
I haven’t used it yet, but for 2 years have had copper mesh on hand to wrap around the base if plants of slugs become a big problem. It looks to work really well. You have few enough that it’s reasonable to do. Also since you have bottles around them, you could DE at the edge of each bottle. I normally don’t have many slugs but the 6 days of wet rain has made them pretty noticeable and I have to get out there with the DE
On another note, I’m annoyed that after all the wet, my sungolds have signs of blight all over them. I’ve never seen blight this early and I’m suspicious. That includes last year where it rained near daily for April and may- virtually no blight. They’re right next to (and I mean intertwined/touching) my blush and they’re clean. For the 3 prior years, I grew Sungold from different seed source, but ran out this year and ordered these seeds from Burpee. I don’t at all trust them now and reordered from the prior source for next year. Forecast claims it will be dry for a few days; I will be aggressively pruning tomorrow and see if this is a fluke or if these burpee plants are trash.
Food-grade DE is a great solution! Thank you!
Just thought I’d share this article.
I’ve had a miserable time with tomatoes in the last 10 years due to being stubborn. This year, I purchased Serenade for fusarium wilt and mancozeb for blight. Last year I harvested about 12 tomatoes from 20 plants….it was that bad. This year, I have massive plants with fruit set and the plants are flawless. The fusarium is largely due to me to paying attention to the soil PH and allowing to become too acidic.
