- Is every tomato variety suitable for growing outdoors?
- Outdoor tomatoes: an overview of the best varieties
- Growing outdoor tomatoes
- Support Free Range Tomatoes
- Rain cover: yes or no?
- Cut outdoor tomatoes
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In the open air and without rain protection, these plants defy even the most adverse weather conditions. Here you can find out everything about the robust outdoor tomatoes and the best varieties.
You can hardly keep tomato plants in a species-appropriate way: Planted directly in the ground, they are exposed to sun, rain and wind, endure cool temperatures at night and defend themselves against diseases and pests. Grown naturally, they develop an incomparable taste. But are all tomatoes suitable for this type of cultivation? Learn all about strains and growing outdoors.
Is every tomato variety suitable for growing outdoors?
Certain strains are suitable for outdoor cultivation because of their characteristics and robustness, sometimes even without rain protection. Compared to other varieties, outdoor tomatoes are particularly resistant to diseases such as tomato late blight and brown blight. In addition, they often have a cut-resistant shell that hardly bursts open even when it rains. Lastly, outdoor tomatoes are fairly insensitive to fluctuating temperatures between day and night outside the greenhouse. Many other varieties will hardly fruit in these conditions, and with a little rain they will burst open and then begin to rot.
Tip: For more information on detecting and preventing tomato damage, see our special article.
Outdoor tomatoes: an overview of the best varieties
Not all tomato varieties are suitable for outdoor cultivation. Here we present a selection of the best outdoor varieties.
- 'Black Plum' is a dark red to brownish plum tomato with a spicy and aromatic taste and a good yield. It is cut-resistant and is perfect for fresh consumption. All in all a very robust variety with few stingy shoots.
- 'Blue Pitts' offers a play of colors of blue-violet-pink ripening cocktail tomatoes from the breeder of the famous 'Green Zebra', the American Tom Wagner. It requires quite a lot of heat for the sweet and juicy aroma. But it is very robust and the fruits burst in theOutdoor hardly open.
- 'De Berao' red, pink, yellow & black: The complete color spectrum of 'De Berao' is robust and high-yielding outdoors with medium-sized, oval fruits and a fruity-spicy aroma. They can also reach up to 3 meters and therefore need to be supported. Overall extremely robust and long-lasting.
- 'Earl of Edgecombe' is originally from New Zealand. Outdoors, the plant bears many medium-sized, round, bright orange fruits with a fruity-sweet, spicy taste throughout the summer. Branches only a little, overall very easy to care for and robust. ‚
- 'Fonarik' is a deep orange bottle tomato and bears juicy, spicy-fruity elongated fruits as early as July. The plant is robust and only develops a few stinging shoots, so it is easy to care for. Particularly suitable for processing and as a treat straight from the plant.
- 'Lily of the valley' has oval-round, medium-sized, deep red fruits and a pleasant, tomato-like taste. All in all quite tolerant to brown rot and earlier, good yield.
- 'Rote Murmel' is the counterpart to the 'Golden Currant', a red wild tomato that forms a profusion of small round fruits every year. In short, a perfect sweet tomato that is not exhausted!
- 'Sparta' already has a very good reputation as a versatile sliced tomato in salads and on bread. The red, round fruits also bear reliably outdoors. Particularly tolerant of inclement weather.
- 'Pigeon Heart'/ 'Coeur de Pigeon' forms long trusses of heart-shaped, crunchy-sweet red date tomatoes, particularly suitable for snacking directly on. She reliably produces early and long yields from early July to mid-October.
- 'Golden Currant' produces masses of small yellow fruits all season long, which are perfect for snacking on. As a wild tomato, it is extremely resistant to brown rot and does not even need to be pinched.
Growing outdoor tomatoes
If you want to grow tomatoes outdoors, the choice of variety is crucial. But also the sowing and later care influence the harvest and the taste. Below we have summarized the most important measures with a focus on outdoor tomatoes.
When to sow tomato seeds?
In order to be able to harvest tomatoes from your own garden for a long time, you should start sowing at the end of February to mid-March. This is the only way for the plant to have enough time to grow and aproduce high yield. Even beginners can sow without any problems, you only need a few things:
- High Quality Seeds
- Cultivation soil
- Cultivation pots ( alternatively: egg carton)
- Tomato/vegetable fertilizer (for the later growth phase), for example our Plantura organic tomato fertiliser
- Planting stake (for tying up the plants later)
Tomato seeds are best placed 1 cm deep and the soil pressed down a little. Since the potting soil is low in nutrients, root formation in the young seedlings is stimulated. As soon as the first, but at the latest when the second correct pair of leaves forms, prick out the seedlings. Here you put the tomato seedlings in a larger pot. You can find detailed instructions for sowing tomatoes and for transplanting and planting tomatoes in our special articles.
Planting outdoor tomatoes
In mid-May it can get very cold again during the Ice Saints, which is why outdoor tomatoes should definitely only be moved outdoors after these critical days. The soil temperature is also very important here and should be around 15 °C so that the roots are not damaged. It is planted directly into the garden soil, as deep as possible so that support is only needed later and many roots can still form on the stem. Here you remove the bottom leaves and leave only the top four. The roots are already deep in the ground and can still absorb water even when it is dry. Then it has to be poured on vigorously.
Tip: In order to give the tomatoes an optimal start outdoors, you can work a high-quality and peat-free organic soil such as our Plantura organic tomato & vegetable soil into the soil . This is pre-fertilized and provides your tomatoes with all the nutrients they need for the first few months.
Support Free Range Tomatoes
Most tomatoes, with the exception of the small vine tomatoes, will require support as they grow. Sticks made of bamboo, wood or metal, to which the plants are tied, are recommended for supporting the tomatoes. However, if a rain canopy is available, string can also be wrapped around the plants and attached to a roof brace at the top. Even strong gusts of wind cannot harm the tomatoes. In our special article you will find out everything about supporting tomatoes and which materials are best suited for this.
Rain cover: yes or no?
Basic is a rain coveralways useful for tomato plants. The tomato originally comes from the rather dry, warm Andean regions of South America and also prefers this special climate. In addition, fungal diseases love the moisture and spread faster with the spray water and in the wet plants. The risk of fruit bursting is also much lower under one roof because you control the water supply to the plants yourself.
Cut outdoor tomatoes
Most outdoor strains are already quite tolerant of pathogens. Plants that are growing too fast should still be thinned out a bit. Especially if there is no tomato roof, the plant needs good ventilation. Depending on the type and growth, the stinging shoots in the leaf axils are removed here. Not with the wild tomatoes, however, because they are still bearing masses of fruit on the side shoots. Finally, in late summer and early autumn, you should remove panicles of flowers and fruits that have no chance of ripening.
You can read about what else you should consider when growing tomatoes in our special article on the typical mistakes when growing tomatoes.