Tomatoes And Peppers - Spring

Possibly the warmest last week of may I can remember in southern MB. the usual is some risk of frost into early june, this year well - I'll say it - 100% safe this time to plant the tomatoes zero risk of frost I'm certain nature will cooperate

Lucid gem. just enjoying these modern bicolor tomatoes. this batch i've posted is the results from single truss tomatoes grown under lights jan 30-may 20 so about 3.5 months from start to a finished ripe fruit. the experiment was to see if I could grow out just a few in ideal conditions to get some photos. when I grow outdoors, often I'm picking fruit in september ahead of a frost, and green. here the plants are maximally pruned, just two leaves above a truss, which is buzz pollinated with a tool to make sure we get a good fruit set in isolation. it worked great, a bit cramped at 3 plants per 1020 tray with bottom water, but manageable. this setup has me thinking about maybe double truss, or some other training methods. maybe a good environment for breeding, with several generations per year.

Gwondona rose, rebel scum wookie balls, just can't get enough, candy sweet icicle, kayleigh anne, karma apricot, penny lane, ruby slippers, yellow brick road

World in my eyes, velvet knight, shadow boxing, strangelove, black strawberry, dirty curty yellow

Tomato with snapdragon genes

Ripe tomatoes, plants seeded 90 days ago and grown with a single truss training system. proving to be a good way to quickly grow out and evaluate tomato varieties. this year growing about a hundred..

Single truss tomatoes ripening. this is probably the best experience I've had growing tomatoes indoors, a few things had to click for it to work. small pot sizes, bottom watering, a specific pruning method (leave only 2 leaves above the truss), and some electronic buzz pollination tool to get a reliable fruit set. in the environment there's about 3 plants in a 2010 tray, airflow is low to help with isolation, and I have peppers and tomatoes alternated. it's a good test run for a short rotation, and hey we have ripe tomatoes very fast.

Single truss tomatoes on 65 days. looks like 3-4 per 1020 tray is good spacing, a bamboo pole makes things much tidier. and actually picking them up to move things around makes it easy to keep up on pruning. I like it, a complete tomato crop start to finish in 3 months, a small one ok but this method has some fun potential for breeding and growing out several crops in rotation for seed, the indoor setup is excellent isolation. still doing outside plants, starting those today at 8 weeks from planting.

Single truss tomato experiment, I'm trying a small isolated batch of tomatoes indoors ahead of the season. with this method you trim above the very first truss of flowers leaving 1-2 leaves, so the plants stay small, dense and produce a few fruit. reminds me of the sea of green method. in a couple weeks i'll start our plants destined for outside in early june, these ones fruiting today in the 3rd week of march are far too early for transplanting.

Tomatoes flowering at about 30-35 days. trying some single truss plants, a style of indoor growing where the plants are topped above that first truss of fruit. our regular tomato plants will get started in about a month, since we can get frost here into early june I shoot for about 6-8 weeks to transplant.

Potting up tomatoes and peppers this morning. trying a few different variables this year. larger square pots, started about 6-7 weeks before plant out. over plant in cell packs, transplant, wait to thin for biggest ones. think I have a hundred this year between tomato + pepper, growing for seed in isolation. kinda fun.

Time to move tomatoes into the greenhouse. our last frost can be early june, so being cautious. had tomatoes wiped out too many times by a late frost in june. these are planned at around 6-8 weeks old for transplant around june 10. I have 100 between tomato and pepper varieties, going into hoop and netting style isolated rows for true to type seed.

When growing tomatoes is it ok to keep 2 seedlings in one pot? planning to train as 2 stems up a string or stake. I'm growing to save seed and just want to be able to select the fruit that's most true to type. thoughts? #seedsaving #tomatoes #tomatoplant

When you plant tomato seeds that you know are three years old, and they germinate before all the other seeds you ordered.. make you wonder how old those seeds were. 100% of the tomato seeds I have on my shop are from 2023, what's industry best practice just germ test and keep a secret seed lot number with them? that little green cluster at the back are sun sugar 2021, I've been saving seeds since 2015 for this variety as an amateur breeding effort, they're fairly stable but I like to grow a few years to compare and just keep the best tasting and most true to type. In this case, an orange super flavourful cherry tomato.

Germination testing tomato seeds, hazel mae tomato at 3 days showing 100% germ. #tomatoseeds

Greenhouse stayed warm this morning, I have a small GAT system circulating air through the ground, it was 2C at 8am and the greenhouse stayed at 8C. which is good because all tomatoes are in there.. heating a greenhouse without an actual heater is tricky, and even though I built it into a hillside and lined it with water barrels, until I started circulating ground heat with a blower the inside temp would quickly drop and could freeze during a light frost at night. These wireless thermometers are super nice to monitor. #greenhouse #greenhousegardening

Trying something new with tomatoes this year, going to keep them topped low in pots for 12 weeks. We get from about Jun 7 - Sep 7 frost free here, some years a couple more weeks - and usually I'm out in sept picking all the tomatoes green. Hoping to start with larger plants and pick more through august. Trying about 100 plants in a dozen heirloom varieties, some of these will go to friends and family. feels like a good summer for too many tomatoes