Time to Start Feeding my Tomatoes

My Tomatoes are doing well. Despite this last week of almost continual rain they are starting to set fruit. I have eight plants in all, all outdoor. Four of them are in the sunniest bed in the garden and four in the ‘almost’ sunniest bed in the garden.

Last year, all of my Tomatoes were on the south-facing wall. They loved it until the rains came and blight set in. Now the south-facing wall is out of bounds for Tomatoes since blight can hang around in the soil year on year. But that’s okay – I’m over it. We’ll go with the sunniest bed for now.

If the rain continues, then I’ll be putting all my trust in Ferline’s reputed blight resistance – and a strategically-placed sun umbrella to keep the rain off.

Will it work? Who knows? All I know is that with small Tomatoes starting to form, it’s time to start feeding them (with Tomato feed) and crossing my fingers for fresh Tomato pasta come the end of August. How is everyone else’s Toms doing?

Category: Propagating     Tagged: , ,

25 Comments on “Time to Start Feeding my Tomatoes”

  1. Mine are outside too, in pots, with big green fruit on, though showing no signs of reddening up. Perhaps they want some sunshine or something? Constant rain here in London too, and I’m also starting to wonder if I should be building a roof. Or an ark.

    I’ve also got some hanging toms in baskets and have had a good few handfuls of those already. Delicious, if slightly thick-skinned. Not sure why – they’re watered regularly, but I suppose they get (got!) a lot of sun.

  2. Mine are quite happy in the greenhouse, but I just missed a huge disaster. I thought they all had blight, as the fruits started shrivelling up and going brown.
    I was minutes away from burning the lot when someone diagnosed it as blossom end rot (which apparently means I’m a bit slapdash at watering them….). Crisis averted, now got lots of juicy toms! Have you ever come across that?!?

  3. Mine are starting to ripen. I had them indoors for a good while and now they are out in the “sun” as the weather has “improved”. Chist I think I should move to a proper country, Irish weather sucks satan’s ass.

  4. Here in south Cheshire I decided not to grow outdoor tomatoes this year as potato blight wiped them all out last year and it semed a lot of effort for no return. This year has not been good for toms even in the greenhouse – hardly any fruit and certainly nothing even remotely pink yet. I’ve also got hanging baskets full of them and all I have to show are lots of green marbles. I’m not alone – even the ‘tomato meister’ down at the allotment is moaning about the lack of fruit this year. Hey ho – Morrisons, here I come!

  5. Well I had my first tomatoes yesterday both cherry varities ‘Galina’ and ‘Broad Ripple Yellow Current’. This is the earliest I have ever had tomatoes and i grow mine outdoors every year. This year and last year I have grown them under a covered structure, see the link, as in 2007 the wet weather cuased them to be desimated by blight, which as anyone who has lost tomatoes due to this will tell you its very disheartening.

    http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_wNGXTrtW5rc/ShMrFOP5__I/AAAAAAAAA8g/eOs4X6EjHZ0/s1600-h/IMG_3209.JPG

    I’m growing twelve varieties one of each so still lots to come as like most of you though my plants are also heavy with green fruit in all stages of developement.

  6. Hi all,

    Well, sorry to make you all sick, but here in Austria our tomatoes are thriving and we are harvesting them faster than we can eat them!!

    However, for those of you still awaiting tomatoes, I have a lovely recipe that I tried out the other weeek to try and use some tomatoes up before I harvested the next lot (they are cherry tomatoes and we’re getting about a dozen a day- I have 3 plants, all outside).

    The recipe is a tomato salad (fresh toms cut into chunks or halves, sliced fresh spring onions, mozzarella cheese cut into chunks, fresh basil, s&p – everything home grown except for the mozzarella, I might add!!!), then grill a piece of chicken and cut into bite size pieces. Cook some pasta and when it’s done, drain it, chuck it back in the pan and add everything else to the pan. Just stir it round for a minute or so in the still hot pan to take the chill off so there’s not such a contrast between the pasta and the salad. Add balsamic vinegar to taste, and voila!!! I think it would also work as a cold pasta salad if you can eat cold pasta. It was really yummy.

  7. I have 7 outdoor plants; all are in pots andall have green fruit on but no signs of ripening yet. For the last two years I got a very poor return, perhaps because of the poor summers. This year I seem to have more tomatoes but still not like the long trusses I was getting a few years back.

  8. Hello! Your tomatoes are looking lovely! I have 7 hanging basket toms that have yet to ripen, but then again they’ve only just gotten going so maybe I’ll give them a bit more of a chance! I’m also trying currant tomatoes which have grown into huge plants – didn’t quite anticipate that one! There are some pics on my blog here http://rosylipsandlavender.blogspot.com/2009/07/project-garden.html – so proud! And there’s lots more now so awaiting their ripening with bated breath…

    Like Frugilegus, I’m in London and there’s been a fair amount of rain so I might need to construct a tent!

  9. I seem to get tomato plants all wrong.Too much green leaf, and hardly any tomatoes.I have some in the greenhouse,and some outside, neither are ripening yet, but looking forward to a tasty though small crop.

  10. Hi, lovely site!

    I took some tomato seedlings and planted them in our very sunny, quite sheltered garden. We seem to have lots of fruit now and they’ve shot up, plants are all over a metre high and quite happy looking. They are very leafy and triffid like tho, am I supposed to snap off any of the leafy bits so the sun can get to the fruit? I have been doing the pinching thing at the base of the little branches off the main stem (can you tell I’m not a gardener…) but I just wonder if the leaves are going to overtake the fruit at this rate…

    Very exciting that I can at least make green tomato chutney if nothing else!!

    Thanks

  11. Yes blight can be a real problem. Last year everyone I know who grew tomatoes didn’t get a decent crop (or any at all). Shame, as my fiance makes the BEST tomato sauce for pasta EVER.

    We were so annoyed with last year that we havent grown any this year – we only have a small balcony so the space is pretty precious.

    Maybe we’ll have a try again next year.

    Good luck.

  12. Mine look about the same – green but not ripe yet and they are all in pots on a sunny patio this year as they didn’t do so well in the ground last year. I was wondering if I should start feeding them – thanks for the tip on that.

  13. We’ve had some ups and downs with our tomatoes this year. Transplanting them into pots on our patio in May resulted in some serious leaf curl. They looked terribly sick through the hot spell in June, despite lots of watering. Now, however, we’ve lots and lots of trusses setting on both our cherry toms and our plums (Gardener’s Delight and Roma) but, as with everyone else, no signs of ripening yet. The long range forecast for next month is looking up – meant to be a return to sunny skies. Fingers crossed!

  14. I have 4 tomato plants in the green house just starting to show some green toms and quite a few yellow flowers (first time this year so not sure what to expect)

    Also two plants in hanging baskets outside that have smaller toms showing and some yellow flowers

    Growing in Scotland so the weather seems to confuse most plants i think hot and dry one minute pouring and howling rain the next and thats only the summer months lol

    I hope to get something this year but any tips you have a greatly received

    great blog by the way have it on RSS and check in regularly

    cheers
    Mick

  15. Congrats on the tomato success :-) The rain here has been difficult on many of the veg growing in gardens. I didn’t grow any this year, but looking at your pics, I wish I did.

  16. Hi here in Sunny (lol) Wiltshire my toms are just forming.This is my first attempt at growing them, so happy to read all your comments and tips keep them coming.

  17. Here in the rainy North (ey-oop) I have 10 in beds in a greenhouse and about 20 outside next to a brick wall – we went a bit beserk with the seed planting this year, but didn’t have the heart to compost any (and we gave about 20 away!!!!!)

    Mine have started to go red, (hurrah) and I’ve been feeding twice a week recently as I’ve got loads of fruit. Once they have set the fruit, I cut off a lot of the leaves so they concentrate on the fruit rather than greenery. lets hope that sun ripens your tommys soon, mtp! Cat x

  18. Mine are at the same stage as yours, but mine are in the greenhouse. I wish they would hurry up and ripen, I’m looking forward to eating them!

  19. Kerry – lots of green leaf and fruit which is slow to ripen could be a symptom of too much nitrogen. Nothing to do about it now, but maybe next year.

    I’m giving tomatoes away by the sack full to anyone who will have them, but alas the plants don’t look very good and I fear they will fail soon. Too much rain here as well – across the ocean in the Southern U.S.

  20. We have previously grown our tomatoes outside. These start off well but tend to suffer when there is a stretch of wet weather. So this year we’ve got Eight Sun Gold tomato plants dug directly into the soil in our greenhouse and have planted our cucumbers outside instead. We have had success with this cherry tomato vareity in the past. Already all the plants have lots of fruit and are starting to ripen. So far the cucumbers seem to be doing very well too.

  21. My tomato harvests are starting to gain speed. Today I picked 3. 2 Better Boys and 1 Lemon Boy. Unfortunantly my red tomatoes have all come down with green shoulders.

  22. All’s well here in northwestern Slovenia … We were hit by severe weather in mid-June which took out about a third of the plants but the rest have lush growth and are producing tomatoes rapidly.

    No sign of blight yet. I’m spraying with red algae mixture (Cuxin – Algoplasmin) about every 2 weeks.

  24. Well.. feeding tomatoes…

    I’ve got a thriving Tomaccio plant on my balcony which already provided 3 ripe fruits plus 2 more are redding at the moment. Unfortunately there will be some loss because of blossom-end rot – we’ve had a very dry period this month in Hamburg (Germany, by the way)… but most of the fruit which have developed are doing fine nevertheless.

    I still have to cut a lot of leaves and even flowers at least every two weeks, as the balcony is very narrow and I have some other plants to care for at the other end :-)

    I regretted fertilizing the plant earlier, because it grows so vast.

    But back to your post’s title: What do you mean by “feeding”? It isn’t fertilizing – or is it? What kind of feed do you use?