A guide to nurturing your tomato plants
Sweet, juicy tomatoes grown by your fingers will taste better than shop-bought every single time. They’re fresh and delicious and ready to be used in a myriad of ways or simply eaten straight from the vine.
Tomato plants require some care and attention to grow well, but the payoff is infinitely worth it every time. If you’re not sure how to care for tomato plants, read on for our in-depth guide to cultivating lush tomatoes.
Getting started—How to look after tomato plants
It can be quite daunting when you start to research growing you’re on tomatoes, quite simply because there are so many varieties to choose from.
Which are the best ones? The easiest to grow? The best tasting? There are fruits of different colours, sizes, flavours, and textures to select from, far more choices than you’d ever get from a supermarket.
But which one is best for you? If you’re a complete novice when it comes to growing tomatoes, the first thing to know is that there are typically two ways tomatoes will grow: cordon or bush, which is sometimes referred to as indeterminate or determinate.
Cordon tomatoes are fast-growing varieties that will get very tall, which means you’ll need to support them. They can grow in greenhouses and outdoors and typically take up little ground space. However, it’s important to know that they require regular maintenance, such as watering, feeding, removing shoots, and tying the plant's supports.
Bush tomatoes — ideal for smaller spaces, bush tomatoes are typically more compact. There are trailing types that you can grow in hanging baskets and window boxes. What’s great about these varieties is that they don’t need much maintenance, just watering and feeding.
Beginner gardeners will benefit from growing bush tomatoes at first, as there won’t be a need to stake them as they grow. As you gain confidence with gardening and growing, you can try out cordon types of tomatoes.
Sowing your tomato plants
You don’t necessarily need a greenhouse to grow tomatoes, just a sunny, sheltered spot.
It’s best to start sowing tomatoes in late January to late March. Plant them in 7.5 cm pots in rich, fertile soil or peat-free potting compost.
Cover the pots with cling film and stand on a bright, warm windowsill or in a propagator.
Once the seeds have germinated, keep the compost damp and allow them to grow to around 3 cm tall. Then, transplant them into individual pots with peat-free multipurpose compost that is kept damp.
Keep them in a bright location with a temperature of at least 16 °C and water regularly. After about four weeks, they should be ready to be planted in their final position.
When moving the plants, it’s best to support the plant by the leaf rather than the stem, which can be delicate. If you find that the plant is leggy, there is more stem than leaf, when replanting, bury them deeper in the compost, so the bottom leaf is just above the surface.
How often should you water tomato plants?
Tomato plants need regular watering to keep the compost or soil moist. If they begin to dry out in parts, this can affect the plant's growth.
If you’re growing your tomatoes in containers, they’ll likely dry out quicker, especially in hot weather, so make sure you keep on top of watering.
Applying mulch to tomatoes growing in the ground can help them retain moisture and deter weeds. Just ensure there is a gap between the base of the stem and the mulch.
When to plant tomato plants
After sowing the seeds and starting the process of growing your tomato plants, you’ll have to wait till around May/June to plant them out. If you want to know when you can plant tomatoes outside, then temperatures should be consistently above 16 °C.
If you’re growing outdoors, you’ll want a warm, sunny, and sheltered area that’s not prone to excessive winds. If you're growing inside a greenhouse, you’ll need to provide some shelter from the sun, as excessive heat can cause issues for the fruit.
If your tomato plant is being planted in a pot, one plant will need a pot roughly 30-45 cm in size.
How often should you feed tomato plants?
We’ve discussed how tomato plants require plenty of water to keep them evenly moist for the best-growing grounds, but what about tomato plant feed?
Tomato plants thrive with a specific feed. It’s recommended that you start with a balanced liquid feed and then switch to a specific tomato feed once the fruits begin to appear. You should feed tomato plants every 10–14 days to ensure you get the most from your crop.
Pruning your tomato plants
Bush tomatoes typically don’t need pruning, however, cordon tomatoes require regular pruning to help them thrive. Here are some of the advantages of pruning your tomatoes:
- Prevent heavy fruits from breaking thinner side shoots
- Helps to increase the quality of the fruit
- Stimulates the upright growth of the plant, as well as the production of fruit on other shoots
- Ensures the plant takes up less space
- Gives better air circulation around the plant
- Discourages the development of soil-borne fungal disease
How to trim tomato plants
The type of tomato plant you have determines when exactly you’ll need to trim and prune, but the time to prune is when you first see the flowers opening on the plant.
You’ll have to continue pruning them, typically every two weeks, until they need to be harvested. It’s best to trim your tomato plant early in the morning on a dry day, this allows the wounds to easily heal.
When trimming your tomato plants, you’ll want to look out for the little ‘suckers’ which grow between the stem and a branch. If left, these can grow into full-sized branches, which will weigh the plant down. You can pull these off if they’re only short, however, you’ll need cutters if they’re longer to ensure that you don’t split the vine or end up with ragged edges.
If you have branches that touch the ground or are really low-hanging, they should be removed, too. If they touch the ground, they are more likely to encounter bacteria or viral infections that can infiltrate the whole plant.
Pest and disease management
Unfortunately, a number of common pests and diseases can affect tomato plants, such as hornworms, aphids, and blight. So, it’s important to be vigilant and check your plants regularly, so early intervention can help preserve the plant’s health.
A natural solution to help prevent diseases of your tomato plant is to mix a heaped tablespoon of baking soda with a teaspoon of vegetable oil, add a small amount of mild soap to 3.5L of water, and spray the plants with this regularly to help stave off pests and diseases.
Harvesting your tomatoes
Typically, tomatoes ripen from the middle of summer onwards. However, this can change depending on a number of factors, like the variety you’re growing, the fruit size, and weather conditions. Smaller fruits ripen more quickly than larger ones. If you’re growing your tomatoes in a greenhouse, they’ll crop earlier than those grown outdoors, too.
When harvesting your crop, it’s best to check your plants every couple of days and pick the tomatoes individually. Ensure that the stalk is still attached, too.
Once the growing season is over, and you still have tomatoes on the plant that haven’t ripened, you can place them somewhere warm and dark or in a drawer with a banana.
Enjoy your tomatoes
Once you’ve harvested your tomatoes, simply enjoy them in your favourite way. In the comments, let us know how you’ll be eating your home-grown tomatoes this year.
- James Beesley
