coolrobby2003

I just heard the other day that if you pluck off all the leaves off all the brances xcept for one on a tomatoe plant-the tomatoes on that one branch will be G I A N T -is this true?

CoryS

I for one have no idea but with all the tomato starts we have, I'm willing to try that with one or two. Thanks much for the information.

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Abnshrek

Well I wouldn't try that one. :^)

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CookieCows

I've heard of trimming the branches back to just the ones coming off of one main stalk. We're planning on trying that out this year and tying them up instead of having them in a cage. Our goal is to avoid the tomato jungle more so than larger fruit.

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sandy0225

I read that on a website somewhere. But really it doesn't make sense except in the short term. The reason being is if all the leaves get damaged on a plant, it starts thinking about survival of the next generation--and if it has fruit it would try to ripen them asap to set seeds for the next generation. If the plant had a lot of energy in its system, then it would probably set big fruit. But I would think just the one time because it would use all its energy to do that.
Since plants usually use leaves to produce their energy, it stands to reason that for the long term plantings, you wouldn't want to do that. But it actually might help in the fall to ripen those last few that maybe wouldn't ripen otherwise.
In a hot sunny climate, you'd probably get sunscorch on your fruit, though.
Pruning your tomatoes to a central leader will increase fruit size, and decrease overall number of fruit on each plant, so it's a good idea for market type slicers, but not a good idea for cherry types or medium sizes because you want a higher number of overall fruit.
From a market perspective.
The variety of the tomato (for large slicers) and the pruning (for large slicers)along with water and fertilizer and growing conditions really determines the size of the fruit.

Florida weave is a great way to grow your tomatoes, link below
CSU Specialty Crops Program - Trellising Systems

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Sandy Burrell



Northern Tropics Greenhouse
1501 East Fuson Road
Muncie, IN 47302
www.northerntropics.com


specializing in bananas, heirloom tomatoes and water gardening plants~
check out our new online store at our website!

sunfish

Abnshrek

My neighbor did a mastergardeners tour this past weekend. They had a demonstration on how to grow better tomatoes. They said to cut off the leaves that don't have blooms on them (i guess to provide the plant shade or the tomatoes). What you cut off as well is every branch 3 inches from the bottom of the plant where it meets the dirt. Who knows that's all I know from a Master gardener's lips. :^)

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sandy0225

For our market garden, we prune to a single leader so that the tomatoes get bigger. If you mulch under your tomatoes with leaves, or straw or plastic or whatever, then you don't have to cut off the bottom leaves. That person on the tour is trying to keep diseases off the plants by picking off any leaves that would contact soil or get splash when it rains, lots of the diseases start by water splashing off the soil onto the bottom leaves, then it progresses upward. So if you see any kind of disease on the bottom leaves, you want to pick them off and use a fungicide asap on the rest of the plant.
Kellogg's Breakfast (orange), Omars Lebanese (pink-red), Delicious (red), and Pineapple (yellow with red streaks) Aunt Ruby's German Green are also some varieties that get huge. We had a pineapple tomato off an unpruned plant last year that weighed 1 lb 12 ounces. I saved seeds off that one and mixed it in my seeds for this year. We didn't pick any of the leaves or other blooms or even prune that plant because we were growing it mostly for seed. So they really have potential to get huge!

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Sandy Burrell



Northern Tropics Greenhouse
1501 East Fuson Road
Muncie, IN 47302
www.northerntropics.com


specializing in bananas, heirloom tomatoes and water gardening plants~
check out our new online store at our website!