Tomato plants can produce real splendor with the right tips. You'll soon be harvesting perfect tomatoes with these tips.
Tomatoes (Solanum lycopersicum) can be found in every kitchen and also in every good vegetable garden. As one of the most diverse vegetables, the tomato holds a place at the top of the popularity scale. However, the cultivation does not always go smoothly, and the frustration increases with every failed season. That's why we've put together the most important steps towards the perfect tomato for you here.
Caring for tomatoes is very easy with the right tricks. With the following 10 tips, you can look forward to a rich harvest of sweet fruits from your own garden.
Tomato tip 10: the right variety
You should be very careful when choosing a variety. One of the main reasons for total crop failures is late blight in tomatoes, caused by the pathogen Phytophthora infestans. Although the disease cannot be completely prevented by choosing resistant and robust varieties, but quite likely to be avoided. Also, organic strains are more suitable for the garden than high-yielding strains developed for conventional greenhouses with conditions that are always controlled. By choosing more robust varieties, a reliable harvest and better fruit quality can be guaranteed. You can find our 60 best tomato varieties here.
Tomato tip 9: Sort out and prick out
If you don't grow your tomatoes yourself, but buy plants that have been grown earlier, you should pay particular attention to the condition of the plants. Loose root balls, mottled leaves or stunted growth are not only signs of poor quality, but also affect the yield. Even those who prefer their young plants themselves should pay attention to these criteria and sort out weak seedlings. These often die when moving into the garden and bear little or no fruit. In addition, they are more susceptible to diseases and can therefore also he althy plantsinfect. For pricking out after sowing, the first sorting is the right time, as well as later just before planting in the garden. Find out more about pricking tomatoes in our special article.
Tomato tip 8: Raise offspring
In the case of tomato varieties that are firm to seeds, towards the end of the season you can easily collect and dry a few seeds for next year. So the idea of growing your own seedlings instead of buying them makes sense. Small seedlings quickly develop from the seeds in seed soil on the windowsill. However, you should be careful not to give the tomatoes too little space. If the tomatoes grow too close together, they shoot up in the fight for the sparse sunlight, they "grow", form thinner stalks and set fewer fruits. The same applies to seedlings sown too early, which have to share space on the windowsill even in later stages of growth. Therefore, the seedlings should be sown at the end of February to mid-March at the earliest.
Tip: Growing vegetables is particularly easy with a growing set like the Plantura vegetable set. In addition to tomato seeds, you will also find four other interesting types of vegetables, as well as all the materials you need for vegetable sowing.
Tomato tip 7: The first days in the garden
Young tomatoes should first get used to the conditions in the garden in order to later grow optimally. So you can best place the plants in the pot outside for a few days and let them acclimate. If possible, the site should be protected against both rain and excessive sunlight to avoid burns on the young foliage. If there is no greenhouse, the seedlings should not come into the garden until mid-May. The young plants now look forward to a warm, sunny spot with good ventilation and a nutrient-rich, permeable substrate, such as our Plantura tomato and vegetable soil. Here you can bury the tomato five to ten centimeters deeper than it was in the pot, but remove the bottom leaves. This creates additional roots that give the plant more stability and a better supply of nutrients. There should be a distance of 60 cm between the plants so that they have enough space and sunlight. For potted plants, the pot should hold 20 liters of soil.
Tomato tip 6: fertilizer is a must
In the growth phase, before the first flowers, you should start with regular fertilization. Initially, the plant needs a lot of nitrogen, but as soon as flowering begins, the need for potassium increases rapidly. A proven fertilizer is therefore our Potassium-containing Plantura organic tomato fertilizer with organic long-term effect. This provides the tomato plants with long-term nutrients and also promotes he althy and active soil life. The Plantura organic tomato fertilizer is gentle on people, pets and garden animals because it does not contain any chemicals. Alternatively, three to five liters of compost per square meter can be used as fertilizer. But homemade nettle manure is also a good choice for tomatoes.
Tip: Often in the middle of the tomato season, brown-black spots and indentations form at the bottom of the still growing fruit, and the fruit can quickly become inedible. In order to avoid this so-called fruit and blossom end rot, care must be taken to ensure an adequate supply of calcium. You can simply add a little stone flour or lime to the nettle liquid manure.
Fertilize tomatoes organically: instructions & dosages
- Before planting: Work 70 - 150 g/m² of our Plantura organic tomato fertilizer into the top soil layers
- Water the soil and freshly planted tomato plants well so that the granulate can be easily loosened
- After 2 months you should fertilize again with 50 - 80 g per plant
- A little fertilization about 3 to 4 weeks before the harvest supports the plants optimally
You can also find more information about fertilizing tomatoes here in our special article.
Tomato tip 5: More aroma, less speed
In the past, removing the tops and leaves from tomato plants was often advertised so that the tomatoes ripen and redden as quickly as possible in the sun. Today, however, we know that a tomato that grows so quickly has much less aroma and flavor. The best tomatoes, on the other hand, grow in the light shade of leaves and are much more aromatic due to their slow growth. For this reason, the tomatoes should not be defoliated or de-tipped and instead only the first leaves should be removed up to the point where the fruit shoots. In late summer, the inflorescences on the shoot tips can also be removed.
Tomato tip 4: A house for tomatoes
In a greenhouse or polytunnel, your tomatoes are much better protected against harmful environmental influences such as rain, hail or strong sunshine. This means that the seedlings can be planted about a month before the tomatoes growing outside. The environmental conditions are also much more uniform, which can lead to a higher yield, especially with more sensitive varieties. Due to the closed sides, there is also less transmission of leaf rot and brown rot, which is transmitted by wind, among other things. However, you should air it regularly and pay attention to the humidity. If this is too high, the risk of a fungal infection increases. The greenhouse should also have good ventilation options to avoid strong, stagnant heat in summer.
Click here for more information on growing tomatoes in a greenhouse or polytunnel.
Tomato Tip 3: Climbing Aids
Because the tomatoes, with the exception of the bush tomato and cocktail tomato, are grown with a single shoot, they need a climbing aid to prevent them from buckling under the weight of their fruit. Spiral rods made of stainless steel or aluminum have proven useful, as have tents made of bamboo poles or cords that can be loosely wrapped around the plant and attached to the gutter, for example. What is particularly practical about the options presented is that they are easy to clean and disinfect or, in the case of the cords, can also be renewed every year. In this way, stubborn fungal spores from the previous year can be destroyed. Furthermore, large-fruited beefsteak tomatoes and tomatoes should be pinched out regularly. The side shoots that develop in the side axils are broken off. Otherwise, the tomato would quickly turn into an impenetrable thicket that favors fungal infections and bear smaller, less ripening fruits. Especially with cocktail and wild tomatoes, however, the side shoots quickly produce flowers and fruits themselves, so the large lower stinging shoots can be retained as separate shoots.
Tomato Tip 2: Water it properly!
Proper watering of a tomato is essential to avoid disease. Not correctpoured when water splashes on the leaves or even poured from above over the whole plant. This significantly increases the risk of fungal infections, especially if the moisture persists for a long period of time and the heavy watering causes soil to splash onto the leaves from below. Instead, it is always poured below, i.e. directly on the ground. Tomatoes should be watered regularly, even several times a day on hot days. You should never wait until the soil has dried out, otherwise the fresh tomatoes can burst open on the plant. If the temperatures and the soil are even cooler, the tomato does well if it is watered with lukewarm water instead of cold.
Tomato tip 1: Busy helpers
Tomato blossoms are largely pollinated by their own pollen. This works especially well if the open buds are lightly shaken in the morning. However, since tomatoes have quite tightly packed pollen, shaking is not always enough to release all of the pollen. Especially in greenhouses, pollinating insects such as bumblebees and bees improve the fruit setting of the tomato and are therefore also regularly used in nurseries. The flying insects shake up the pollen, collect some of it and distribute it on the various flowers. The following applies: the more, the better. If flowers are pollinated several times, it has been shown that larger fruits develop. So if you want lots of big tomatoes, you can help the hard-working helpers with open greenhouse windows and insect hotels. Beekeepers are also happy when they are offered a pitch for their colony in a large vegetable garden and often make the small pollinators available voluntarily. By the way, you can see that a bumblebee has visited the flower by the small, darker colored bite marks on the scars.
So that you can be sure of harvesting your perfect tomatoes, here are five additional typical mistakes you should avoid when growing tomatoes.