This is my third attempt to grow tomatoes. I first planted one tomato plant in a pot at our first apartment in Orem. I don't think I ended up with any ripe fruit, and one of the neighbors thought it made a good ashtray. My second attempt was in McCall. We got two tiny tomatoes from four plants (I think there were four). The growing season there just isn't very long. So here we are with my third attempt. I planted 12 tomato plants, six cherry and six yellow pear. I may have gone a little overboard this time. I only had four pots when I set to planting them, so I put four plants into my biggest pot and one into each of the others. The five remaining plants had to wait until I could scrounge up some five gallon buckets. A day or two after I planted, it was windy and I hadn't staked the plants yet. I lost two of the cherry tomato plants. I had to plant some of the yellow pears into large yogurt containers until I finally got some buckets. (I called around and went to some local delis and they gave me the buckets. This was easier in theory than in practice, I got two buckets from one place and weeks later got one more from another.) The two plants that shared the final bucket had it pretty rough. One of them broke off at the main branch with just the two lowest branches left. I planted it anyway and now it's doing great! The other was all twisted because of the wind. Getting it staked was a little tricky, but you wouldn't know now because it is also doing great. These three pictures were taken when I got them all planted in April. By then there were already small tomatoes growing, and lots of buds too.
A few weeks later I took these pics to document the growth.
The pictures below are from today. My first almost ripe tomatos! I'm a little worried that the yellow pear plants won't ripen before it gets too hot, but I'm crossing my fingers that they will. Apparently tomato plants can go dormant in the the really hot months and then come back in the fall. I really hope that happens, at least with some of the plants. I do want to plant some other veggies in the fall. I'm really excited about my success and hope to build on it little by little.
I'm doing it! I'm actually growing tomatoes!
I'm doing it! I'm actually growing tomatoes!
This experience has made me miss California and wish I had picked up more gardening knowledge from my mom when we had an amazing garden.
4 comments:
oh good i love tomatoes...
I am soooo proud of you. I haven't even attempted to grow anything here. I, too, grew up with an enormous garden. I'd even say it was probably bigger than the house I live in right now. One of the very few cons of living in McCall..... hmphhh. Maybe I'll get brave eventually and try something... Thanks for the inspiration! Can't wait to see you in 10-ish days or sooo!
Once it gets over 90, tomatoes stop setting fruit. You can mist them with water to help keep the cooler, and mulch them. We have that problem here in Las Vegas with the heat. If the plants have set fruit before it gets too hot, those fruits will still ripen for you; you just won't get more.
Last year I had three plants make it through the summer (the others died). It doesn't get below 90 until October, and then my plants started setting fruit again. One did really well; the others were just okay. We had a late frost (a month late; the norm is mid November), so I harvested tomatoes 10 days before Christmas!
Before you get your first frost (like right before it's supposed to freeze) go out and pick all of your tomatoes--even the green ones. You can ripen them indoors and have tomatoes for another 6 weeks.
We normally don't have tomatoes and lettuce at the same time, but in December and January, we did! We have lettuce now, but it's getting so hot that it won't last much longer. Our tomatoes are looking good and I hope we'll have lots this year. I planted more plants than ever.
Grow, Grow those yummy vegetables. Our Prophet Kimball was the one I remember who said, Plant your Gardens. Your Tomato's are beautiful.
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