leaves on tom plant

[crannman]

a friend of mine cuts off all leaves on his tom plants when he is happy with the crop the thinking behind this is why grow leaves when its the toms you want .I do cut some leaves of my plants but not all leaving some for shade .any ideas

[Nicos]

I tend to take a few off to let the light get to them when they are ripening.
The French tend to strip off most but only when all the trusses are set and tomatoes full sized and needing light to ripen.

Any earlier and I would think you are starving the plant of food!

No harm in pinching out the growing tips and any side shoots to conserve energy earlier on though.

[Alison]

Don't forget that they need to photosynthesise through their leaves to produce fruit

[Jungle Jane]

It's good to get the sun on the tomatoes for ripening. I do the same as your friend,when I'm waiting for my 5 or 6 trusses of tomatoes to ripen (they've finished growing) I cut away a few branches every other day till they're all gone. Then the plants just feeding the tomatoes not the leaves,all the energy goes into ripening. I find it helps but people do things in different ways. It's good to give a high potassium feed every week now so they don't lack any nutrients & for flavour.

[jackarmy]

Ive cut off all of my lower leaves, still doubt ill et a tan though

[Jungle Jane]

I've been trying to work out why & where I'd first heard of doing this,found this old thread that mentions monty don.
http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...ice_59612.html

[Jay-ell]

This confuses me

I understand that sun on the toms help them ripen but I would have thought that they would need photosynthesis to produce the sugars for the flavour

[Jungle Jane]

Sugars are stored in the stem & roots,there's a higher percentage of sugars stored in the stem than the leaves. You know the point where you have lots of green tomatoes & it's nearly the end of summer,they need to ripen faster,I've had to remove flowers because there's not enough time for them at the end of August. I pick tomatoes off the plant when they have a little blush of orange on them too,get them into the kitchen for warmth to ripen,so that the plant can concentrate on the next tomato,otherwise you wait about a week for the one red tomato. My concern is I dont want to have green tomatoes in September & i think theres going to be a problem this year,some of my plants have lots of flowers still. I might start pinching the tops off soon,to let those flower trusses develop?

[Jay-ell]

Hopefully I won't end up with green toms - still eating gt jam amd chutney from last year

[marchogaeth]

I never think the ones ripened in doors taste as good as the ones ripened on the plant at any time. Does any one pull the whole plant out of the ground (or cut the stem) in an attempt to get it to ripen the last few fruit quickly? I have no idea if this works but many plants do do it naturally.

[Jungle Jane]

Time is the problem when the first frost is mentioned on the weather. I have carefully uprooted about 5 plants,removed the soil & worms & hung them upside down indoors to ripen,it was just before the first frost,had to either bring them in or they would have been green forever. After that,I researched everywhere about ripening because they are better (easier too) ripened by the sun,indoors the skins were thicker that's what I remember most. But they did go from completely green to red,but as with green tomatoes the skins are thicker so you can imagine.

[Jungle Jane]

I never think the ones ripened in doors taste as good as the ones ripened on the plant at any time.

I was thinking about this,as I pick them half green/half red. I wondered what's the science behind it all. I found this info;

“Tomatoes develop their optimum nutrition, color and flavor when they’re in the full red-ripe stage. But getting to that point doesn’t have to occur on the plant,” explained Chuck Marr, horticulturist with Kansas State University Research and Extension.

Tomatoes go through specific steps, Marr said, in developing “vine ripeness”:

* A gas called ethylene regulates the ripening process. Tomatoes start producing this gas internally when they reach full size and become pale green.

* When tomatoes turn about one-half green and one-half pink (called the breaker stage), a layer of cells forms across their stem, sealing them off from the main vine. At this stage, tomatoes can ripen on or off the vine with no loss of quality or flavor.

* Tomatoes don’t ripen at refrigerator temperatures. If harvested in the breaker stage, however, keeping them in a cool place (to a minimum 50 F) will slow down their ripening process. Keeping them warm (to a maximum 85 F) will rapidly bring full ripeness. And, once ripe, they can keep for several weeks in the refrigerator.

“This kind of control allows you to spread out the good eating over a longer period,” Marr said. “A breaker-stage harvest also allows you to protect tomatoes from the heat extremes of summer. Tomatoes can’t form their red pigments when temperatures are above 95 degrees. They’ll still ripen, but they’ll end up a yellowish-orange.”

Leaving tomatoes to ripen on the vine also increases the odds for cracking and other types of damage. Plus, it puts an increasing weight load on the viney plant.