Posted on July 8, 2009 in latest news
Growing tomatoes is easy and it means you can enjoy more flavoured tomatoes than ever. Best quality seeds, sunny location, slight acid soil and lot of water are the requirements for growing health tomatoes. This article gives few gardening tips for growing great tomatoes.
Gardening Tips for Growing Tomatoes
- Season: Tomatoes are best grown in warm seasons. It is better to start growing tomatoes after frost when the day time temperature is about 90 degree F and night time temperature is about 76 degree F.
- Soil: Tomatoes can be grown in any soil but they grow best in a slight acid soil of pH 6.2 to 6.8. A soil that is loamy, well-drained, rich with organic matter and nutrients is best suitable for growing tomatoes.
- Sunlight: Tomatoes thrive for heat and light. They need lot of sunlight. If temperature is low you can augment light by constructing fence or barrier behind that can reflect sunlight and heat. Spreading black plastic over the soil around tomatoes will help absorb and retain heat. This also helps in reducing water evaporation and controlling weeds and insects. But one should be careful not to overdo as this can make soil loose more temperature at the night time.
- Water: Tomatoes are 95 percent water. So they need lot of water to grow. They need about 2 quarts of water per day per plant and plants that are yielding tomatoes need about 2 to 4 quarts of water per plant. Mulching with straw, clean hay, compost, paper or plastic help in reducing water evaporation and also help in controlling insects. Soak the soil thoroughly while watering.
- Spacing: Ideally there should be 24 to 36 inches of space between two tomato plants. Rows should be about 4 to 5 feet apart.
- Fertilizers: Fertilizers low in Nitrogen, high in Phosphorous and medium in Potassium are ideal for tomatoes. The best analyses for tomatoes are 8-32-16 and 6-24-24. Urea and Ammonium Nitrate can be harmful thus avoid these while growing tomatoes.
- Weed and insect control: Aphids, cut worms, tomato fruit worm, leaf miners etc can attack your tomato garden. They can be controlled by regular spray schedule. Use mulches to avoid a lot of hoeing hand weeding. Using red plastic mulch can help controlling the weeds.
- Harvesting: Ideal time for harvesting tomatoes is when you see them fully coloured. For best flavour allow them to blossom to their full color on plants.
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