Tomatoes again...what's the best method..

[alcina]

Oh wow! I have heard of upside down planting before, but I particularly liked the link to the one using 2 litre plastic bottles:
http://mslworks.com/Cripes/?page_id=47
http://mslworks.com/Cripes/?page_id=27

I thought that upside down planting required bush tomatoes, but this guy implies that the cordon vine variety (such as my Gardener's Delight seedlings...) should be used.

I have a glue gun...and a couple of 2 litre bottles...and my tomato seedlings are growing up nicely....and I have a few too many seedlings to plant normally....rubs hands with excited glee!

Alcina

[wulf]

The idea also appealed to me... although so far I've only got one of my tomato seeds just beginning to germinate! If you get a good set of tomatoes going this way, please post some pictures!

Wulf

[shiney]

Now that's a possibility to grow them upside down. Only way to find out if it works is to give it a bash!

Thanks for those links.

[nem]

i'm definately going to try growing some upside down tomatoes!

[Muddypause]

I particularly liked the link to the one using 2 litre plastic bottles:
http://mslworks.com/Cripes/?page_id=47
http://mslworks.com/Cripes/?page_id=27

That's quite an amusing idea, but I can't help feeling he's missing a trick there. Rather than try and transplant a tomato plant into the upside-down-inside-out-bottle thing by threading the roots through the neck, place the bottle over the plant pot that the seedling is growing in, so that it grows through the hole. When it's big enough, invert it and remove the pot, leaving the root ball in place, and top up with soil.

[The Chili Monster]

The landlord of my local grows toms in hanging baskets out in the beer garden. Got lots of lovely, juicy cherry toms which he'd put out on the bar. He won the local Best Beer Garden award!

[alcina]

Rather than try and transplant a tomato plant into the upside-down-inside-out-bottle thing by threading the roots through the neck, place the bottle over the plant pot that the seedling is growing in, so that it grows through the hole. When it's big enough, invert it and remove the pot, leaving the root ball in place, and top up with soil.

Hey...way to go Muddypause! As I'm rather late with all my plantings this year my toms are only at the second leaf stage...they'll fit easily at the moment...

Alcina

[Cheezy]

Hi Shiney,

Last year I grew the plum bush tom. Roma. It's a classic variety.

I used large plastic pots about 45 cm wide (Plastic so to keep moisture in)

The bush was about 70 to 80 cm high and say 50 cm wide. Placed on south facing "patio", and I got a lot of tomatoes.(say 30 per bush)

The only critism I would say is they all seem to ripen at the SAME time so you have an istant glut, and in the previous year when it was wetter I got blight bad on this variety.

They're Franchi seeds bought from:

http://www.seedsofitaly.co.uk ( a great site with loads of great veg)

for £1.49 you get 450 seeds!, I'm on my third year on the same packet, and they are still viable.

C

[Millymollymandy]

Cheezy - I am interested to note you grew the same variety, in pots, and had blight one year and not the next. However you had blight from rain. I thought it lived in the soil?

I had blight on all three varieties of tomatoes that I grew last year, during a drought. The ones planted in the veg patch were first affected. The ones in pots were dotted around the house and garden and the ones the furthest away from the veg patch were the last to succumb to the blight, by which time I had at least harvested a decent amount.

This year due to going on hols at the 'wrong' time I've only got 6 plants that I bought from a garden centre (variety Premio) and they will be going in pots, as far away from veg patch as possible!

I'm getting really peed off with the tomato disasters I've had in recent years, first due to drought and heatwave in 2003 and then blight and drought in 2005 (in rented for a short spell in 2004 so no gardening).

[Cheezy]

Milly,

The tomato, and potato blight (since both toms and pots are related) are a fungal infection, usually brought on by moist damp conditions.

What can happen is if you have had a dry period, this can stress the plant and make it more suseptable to all kinds of diesase, so then you get a rain shower and it's off. So long as you remove all traces of leaves, tubers,toms and seed you should be OK next season. If you see it starting on the plants I have found Bordeux mixture (looks like copper sulphate to me) does stop any further spread, as long as you remove the effected toms,leaves etc.

Just checked to see if I was talking a load of s***e, heres what the rhs have to say:

http://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profiles08 ... blight.asp

As it happens I grew the toms two seasons ago in a raised bed...blight, but last season I grew all either in bags or pots. Still showed signs of blight, but stopped any spread, and the Roma in pots showed non what so ever.

[Millymollymandy]

Ta for that link. It does say that the spores can stay in the soil to infect the next year. I had no problems with the spuds luckily but I will stick to growing my toms in pots for the time being.

We've got plenty of Bordeaux mix so I may be using that before I see any signs of blight, just in case!

[gunners71uk]

shiny i germinated from seed gardeners delight chucked them in a pot with compost once germinated stuck them in my cold attic room voila have put them into pots last week then i give a few away most go in my tried and tested method of florist buckets which you can pick up at a florist 4 for a pound, then i put wet news paper in 3 or 4 sheets.liningthe bucket then some organic 6x or chicken dried pellets or blood fish bone mixed with compost or grow bags works for me .
regards gunners

[shiney]

Thanks Gunners and cheezy.

Roma are the cheapo seeds that I have sown. (they were part of the 5 packets of seeds for a quid bargain I sniffed out the other day) The seeds are all germinating which is great!

I'll have a go at anything that will give me plenty of toms in a small area.

[gunners71uk]

someone is messing around

[steve64]

I saw some one with 100+ toms from 2 plants last year!
It was a home made earthbox. Here’s a link
http://www.users.qwest.net/~user15805/bobs_box.html
Great for small gardens!