I grew a couple of varieties last year - Tumbling Toms and Moneymaker (maybe also Gardeners Delight). They all grew well and put on loads of fruit but being this far north the fruit came on too late to ripen before the end of the season. I tried to start them off earlier this year but they seem to have have arrived at the same point, i.e. end of July and loads of flowers and small fruit forming. I am growing Tumbling Toms again and four bush tomatoes called Amateur. (see their picture in the post on Potting on Plants) We seem to have hit another cool and wet period which has 'stopped them' again, so I don't hold out much hope of getting the fruit ripe before they have to be ripped up. Down south they are,of course, being picked now!
Please tell me if you have any success with tomatoes outside and, if you do, is the secret in the variety, your planting routines or what.
Hi, love the blog. I've been growing tomatoes outside for a few years, all the plants produce a decent crop but as you've already said the challenge is getting them to ripen before the dreaded blight or winter gets them.
ReplyDeleteI got a great tip a couple of years ago and it seems to do the trick, buy a large bag of bananas each week from July onwards, eat a banana a day (healthy for the gardener too) and then hang the banana skins on the tomato plant branches, i believe they give off ethylene which triggers the ripening process on any surrounding fruit, (has also worked with sweet peppers and chilli peppers). It does look a bit odd but they soon dry and turn black. I started doing the banana skins a few weeks ago and nearly all the plants have ripe tomatoes on them now. Unfortunately the first signs of blight have also appeared, may battle commence :)
I planted them out as soon as the weather allowed which was very late this year. I grow the plants against a west facing garage wall in Brandlesholme, 3 plants to a 'decent size' grow bag, with 2 empty 6" plant pots sunk into the grow bags inbetween the plants for easy watering, I fill each pot once a week with tomorite/water and that seems to keep them happy. I pinch out regularly and trim about half the original foliage off. They're supported with 6 ft canes lent against the wall. In previous years, i've followed advice to cut the top off the plant above the 4th or 5th truss, as this was also supposed to encourage earlier ripening but i'm leaving them this year as i've been given the opposite advice!
Hope this info is helpful in some way. I'll upload some current photos of them and post a link so everyone can see my strange tomatobanana plants.
Thanks a million for this ... sort of ..... I'd just convinced myself I wasn't going to grow the blighters again and now it sounds like it is doable. Might try just four bush tomatoes next year and develop a liking for bananas!
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