Container Gardening

If you’re interested in growing cherry tomatoes in containers, you’re in luck: as a class, they’re among the easier tomato varieties to grow.  However, depending on your particular taste or the kind of container you have, you can choose from among many varieties.

The first question to ask is what kind of container you want.  There are three real choices: hanging baskets, small containers, or full-sized tomato planters.  If you want a full-sized tomato planter, you can choose from among the many full-sized varieties on offer.  If you want something smaller, a little more research is required.

Hanging Baskets

To plant cherry tomatoes  in a hanging basket, you need a variety that thrives with shallow roots and does not grow very tall.  Tomatoes with long trailing vines will spill attractively from the basket.

Florida Basket: Produces red fruit around an inch in diameter, in slightly elongated globes.  Determinate.

Floragold Basket: Cherry-sized round tomatoes, gold in color when ripe.  Determinate.

Anmore Dewdrop: Cherry-sized round tomatoes, red when ripe.  Prolific fruiter.  Determinate, but will have a second crop once the first is harvested.

Micro Tom: Itty-bitty plant, which will fit even in a 4-inch pot.  Can be planted a few to a basket.  Round red fruit, smaller than a penny.  Determinate.

Small Pots

Most basket tomato varieties will also work in small pots.  If you choose, however, you can use a slightly larger variety, which grows to around a foot or two in height.

Anmore Treasures: Slow to grow, but can be started early.  Around 12″ tall, with bright red round fruit, 1″ in diameter.  Sensitive to cracking from uneven watering.  Determinate.

Tiny Tim: Fast-growing, with only 60 days to maturity.  18-inch plants can fit in a 6-inch pot.  3/4 inch fruit, bright red and round.  A heavy fruiter for its foliage.  Determinate.

Totem: Very small plant, at only 10-12 inches.  Small, red, round fruit.  The leaves are very attractive, making this work well in a semi-ornamental garden.  Determinate.

Yellow Pygmy: Bush-style plant, with low, dense foliage.  Tiny yellow-orange fruit, 1/2 inch in diameter.  Slightly acidic, sharp flavor. Indeterminate.

So, you’ve decided to try growing tomatoes in containers.  You’ve chosen your containers, planted your tomatoes and watched them grow.  Everything has been going great!

Then, one morning, you go out to check on them, and something isn’t right.  Maybe the leaves are off-color.  Maybe the fruit looks wrong.  One way or another, your tomato has gotten sick.  What do you do?  Here are three common problems with potted tomato plants that affect the fruit and how to prevent or deal with them.

1. Blossom-end rot

Blossom-end rot is exactly what it sounds like: the tomato begins to rot from the place where the blossom attached.  It is caused by low levels of calcium in the plant.  An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure here.  The best way to keep blossom-end rot away from your plants is to keep calcium levels high.

You can start your plants off well by crushing some eggshells in the soil before planting your seedlings.  Fertilize with a non-ammoniacal nitrogen fertilizer, and make sure you are watering regularly and your pots have good drainage.  DO NOT OVER-FERTILIZE.

If you already have blossom-end rot, try to stabilize your plant’s moisture as much as possible.  It’s a good idea to pick and throw out affected fruit as soon as you notice to reduce strain on the plant.

2. Sunscald

If your underripe tomatoes are getting hard, white or light-colored patches on them, they may have sunscald.  These patches will eventually blister and sink in.

Sunscald is caused by too much direct sunlight on the fruit.  Tomatoes are very leafy plants, and those leaves serve two purposes: they soak up a lot of light for energy, and they shade the more delicate fruit.

To prevent sunscald, try to keep your tomato plants lush and thick.  If you prune them, make sure all your fruits remain shaded when you are finished.  If something else causes your plant to lose leaves, you can protect your fruit with light screens.

3. Growth Cracks

When a tomato grows too fast, the skin can’t always keep up.  When this happens, you see cracking.  There are three kinds of growth cracks.

• Radial cracks: These cracks start at the stem of the tomato and reach outward.
• Concentric cracks: These cracks make circles around the stem, never touching it.
• Russeting: In russeting, tiny cracks form and scar all over the tomato, giving the fruit a rough appearance.

Growth cracks almost always result from a dry period followed by a very wet period, where the tomatoes work to make up growth.  To avoid cracking, make sure your tomatoes have a consistent, steady water supply.  Regular fertilization will also help.

Note: If your pots are too small, they may have a hard time holding enough water.  Consider moving to larger pots if cracking is a regular problem in your container tomatoes.

Tomatoes are one of the most rewarding vegetables to grow in a home garden. The difference between store-bought and home-grown tomatoes is dramatic, and truly fresh tomatoes add to any dish. Tomatoes are not terribly hard to grow, and can fit into most people’s budgets and landscapes with just a little bit of effort.

Here are ten tips for growing fantastic high-yield tomatoes.

1. Give them plenty of SUNLIGHT
Tomatoes LOVE light.  Find the sunniest spot in your yard to place your tomatoes. You want a MINIMUM of 6 hours of sunlight a day: the more, the better. Check your yard carefully, tracking the amount of sunlight each area is getting, before choosing the best place.

Tip: If you are growing tomatoes in containers, sometimes a few feet of height will make a big difference in sunlight. Consider piling cinderblocks or putting your pots on a wall until the plants have reached 2-3 feet tall. They may get an extra hour of sunlight a day that way.

2. WATER them heavily
With so much sunlight, soil will dry out quickly. Tomatoes are thirsty plants, which is how the fruit gets so juicy. Tomatoes which are planted in the ground need up to 2 inches of water a week. Tomatoes in containers often need more, since the roots are more compact. Make sure you are watering every single day! If you miss days and then overwater later to compensate, your tomatoes will crack open or develop blossom end rot. Water the soil, not the leaves.

3. Condition your SOIL
Tomatoes prefer slightly acidic soil. You can get soil test kits at your local garden center. You are looking for a pH between 6.2 and 6.8. If your soil is too acidic (pH below 6.2), you can add agricultural lime to raise the pH. If your soil is too alkaline (pH above 6.8), you can add sulfur to lower the pH. Remember to fertilize regularly, too: plants don’t just need dirt, they need the nutrients in the dirt. Compost or commercial fertilizers provide those nutrients.

4. Crush EGGSHELLS into your soil
Calcium helps tomatoes make fruit! To add calcium to your soil, crush a few eggshells and sprinkle them into the soil. If you are planting from seedlings, you can put the shells directly into the hole you’re making for the seedling. This will help give you round, even fruits.

5. Stake or CAGE the tomatoes
Tomatoes are heavy. When the fruit starts to come in, tomato plants will begin to bend and sag under the weight. You don’t want to let your tomatoes touch the ground, because that can encourage rot, disease, and insect damage. To keep this from happening, place a cage around your tomatoes. The bars will help support tomato stalks. If branches begin to get too long, you can tie them up or prune them off. Don’t let your tomatoes waste their energy! Put the cages in while tomatoes are seedlings, so they grow around the cages.

6. Give the tomatoes lots of HEAT
Tomatoes LOVE being hot. Any way you can raise the temperature of the soil will help them to thrive. In you can, put black plastic on the soil a few weeks before you plant, to prepare it for the tomatoes. Wait to mulch until temperatures are higher, since mulch can cool the soil. For container gardening, dark-colored containers will make warmer soil.

7. PRUNE regularly and thoughtfully
You don’t want to prune your tomato plants too heavily, or they won’t grow full and lush. However, you want to be certain your tomatoes aren’t wasting effort. Determinate tomato varieties need no pruning, but indeterminate tomatoes can benefit from pruning away the wasted branches. There are two major ways to prune tomatoes:

• Trim branches that reach too far beyond the cages.  If the cage doesn’t offer support, these branches will start to sag and break.  Even if they already have fruit or flowers forming, it is best to trim these away early.  They’ll do no good if they snap before the tomatoes are ripe.  Don’t let your tomatoes waste effort!
  

  Tomato Suckers

• Trim away tomato suckers.  Tomato suckers are the little leaves and stems that grow at the joint between tomato stems.  If you let tomato suckers grow, they will form new branches.  Eventually, these branches will flower and fruit, but the fruit will be small.  Thick plants are good, but don’t let them get TOO thick.  Pruning away most (not all) tomato suckers will let your plants focus on big, healthy plants, and allow sunlight to reach inner leaves.

With these tips, you will wind up with healthier,  tastier tomatoes, with higher yield.  Enjoy!