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The Premier
Gardeners Guide

Growing Tomatoes

Choosing  Tomatoes

Tip 1: One thing you should remember about tomatoes is that the indeterminate types can produce a stream of flowers and fruits in just one summer. Their fruit usually has excellent flavor, and the plants remain productive until the first frost.

Tip 2: If you chose the taller and lankier species of tomato, be prepared to use stakes, trellises, or wire cages. That’s because the stems usually cannot provide the right support as the tops grow heavy with fruits. Stakes and trellises will help keep the fruits off ground and off the many insects and bugs that thrive in the soil.

Tip 3: Many popular tomato varieties can be purchased as bedding plants. As soon as they arrive in stores, buy them. Choose those that show no signs of flowering or yellowing leaves.

Tip 4: Generally, you ought to put tomatoes in the ground within one to two days. However, if you can’t do that, then you can transplant the seedlings into four- or six-inch pots, filled with good potting soil and let them gain roots there for a period of at most two weeks. This whole time, you should continue to care for the plant and the soil, until a time when you can harmlessly transplant it in the ground.

Germinating and Planting Tomatoes

Tomato seeds germinate best at 75 to 85 degrees. When transplanting tomatoes to the garden, only set them out when nights are consistently warmer than 50 degrees.

Tip 5: Before planting, make sure you enrich the soil with plenty of organic material.  This is a time when the best natural tomato fertilizer around is not something that you can buy off gardening shops. For that, you only need compost made from kitchen scraps or humus.

Tip 6: When planting seedlings, make sure you do it in such a way that at least two inches of the main stem is covered by the soil. This will help protect the stem from wind damage and encourages the development of extensive roots.

Tip 7: For newly transplanted tomatoes, protection from cold wind is as essential as the best natural tomato fertilizer. Cover the plants with cloches or a plastic tunnel.

Caring for your Tomatoes

Watering requirements for tomatoes will depend on the soil and the temperature. If your tomatoes are in containers, you need to water them daily as water quickly runs out in a contained space. But if your tomatoes are in the garden, once or twice of week of watering should be enough.

Tip 8: Add mulch to maintain the soil moisture.

As for fertilization, the best natural tomato fertilizer is one with an N-P-K composition of 5-6-5 or 3-5-6. This will provide the plants with a modest amount of quick-release nitrogen, along with phosphorous and potassium.

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