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Posted by Kleftiwallah (U13700999) on Sunday, 11th March 2012
Is there any way in which to induce tomato plants to produce more trusses (trusses closer together) and hence more fruit ? Cheers, Tony.
No, it is all in the genetics. Though a well fed plant will be sturdier and not drawn out and thin.
Hi BaraGwenith
,
when you refer to a tomato plant being well fed - how often would you recommend feeding the plants and what with??
Many thanks
Steak and chips twice a week followed by apple pie and custard ! Cheers, Tony.
Not sticky toffee pudding???? :p
Feeding a tom for growth is a bit of a double-edged sword. A tom plant is likely to produce more fruit with less food rather than more. A tom plant producing fruit is reproducing itself, and it's more likely to reproduce itself if it feels the need. In other words, if it's struggling just that little bit. A tom plant fed to the eyeballs doesn't feel the need to reproduce itself.
For plants in the ground, I fertilise a couple of weeks after planting, then when the first trusses appear, and once more later in the season. I use a commercial tomato food, higher in K than P, both significantly higher than N. Too much N will just produce foliage. For containers, because of the leaching factor, I feed about every five weeks.
Last year my first trusses were about 3 feet up the plant! From asking on here it may be that I should have potted them into a medium sized pot before putting them into grow bags. Seems they had a bit of a growth spurt at the expense of trusses.
What is a truss on a tomato plant?
A truss is simply an inflorescence. Flowers appear where the leaves meet a stem. More of these = more tomatoes.
I will get shot down in flames for saying this, but you don't need to remove the side shoots. They will grow into strong branches each covered in flower trusses.
This way you get lots more tomatoes, but they are slightly smaller than if grown by the traditional method.
We are in the realms of Determinate and Indeterminate. Are these methods set in stone? Cheers, Tony.
I know you don't take out the side shoots on determinate varieties anyway, but you can treat indeterminates in a similar way. You end up with quite a large plant, and you have to support the heavy branches somehow, but you do get more tomatoes as the OP wants.
No, you don't need to remove the side shoots or laterals. It used to be tomato lore - a bit like Blossom End Rot being caused by calcium-deficient soil - that removing the laterals increased the crop. An Australian nursery did some testing quite a few years ago. They found that removing the laterals had minimal impact on production, and, if anything, reduced the crop. The best reason for pinching out laterals is to cut down on some of the foliage, aiding air circulation, helping against fungal problems.
And science was used to determine that BER came about as a result of the plant being unable to distribute calcium internally. The soil could be loaded with calcium but the plant couldn't use it. What science hasn't been able to determine - well, no one has - is what brings on the condition.
There was a programme about an Australian Apple grower who managed to massively increase his yield by only watering one side of an apple tree. I wonder if this would work for toms. I can feel a trial coming on this summer.
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