seeds for grafting tomatoes

[chillithyme]

Tell me about it, I dread what the allotment will be like , I haven't been able to get down for a month, and i've been ill the last week or so too,the only reason ive managed to get grafting is because I have the plants in my room (hidden from the rest of the household), I have been know to turn places into a jungle! At first I though it was a compliment, but soon realised it was more of a concern

Its good to be a bit mean nickdub, I call it being frugal or resourceful when it comes to growing home veg

[chillithyme]

Ive now attempted to graft some chilli plants onto the leftover rootstock plants. I'm not that confident, but its worth a try to see how it goes. My aubergine plants are too big for grafting or I would have tried those too

[Mark_Riga]

My tomatoes (22 planted out) are doing fine now (apart from 2 near the end that got waterlogged with all the rain). They've been a bit neglected as took time out to decorate a room so still need tying up hopefully will be done before any keel over. Some tomatoes growing but none ripe yet.

[Mark_Riga]

All not well in the tomato house

Latest update: Quite a few plants are wilting when the weather is warm and blossom dropping from the plants.main variety is the alicante. Could be the amount of top growth they are supporting (2 vines allowed to grow from each plant). was wondering whether over or under watering but I haven't been watering that much, no more than 80 litres twice a week between 22 toms and a few aubergine planted in the border soil. Could be just succumbing to the deseases in the soil. They look OK at the moment (dull and overcast) so will just see how they perform. Had about 4lb. of toms off them so far - gardeners delight/ galina/ marmande.

An added complication that will reduce the yield further is the appearance of tomato leaf mould in part of the greenhouse, probably brought on by the very hot period last week. It is mainly on the 3 marmande plants - that have a good crop developing but 1 or 2 spots on galina and a plum tomato nearby. I suspect it could be from the marmande seeds used but can't be sure:



Next year (shouldn't be talking about next year already) will incorporate organic matter into the soil and may be a square foot of new soil round each plant

[nickdub]

I've had disease problems with about 30% of my plants and the others which are growing OK are not cropping well yet - however there is a lot of green fruit, so hopefully I will get a reasonable crop.

Next year I'm panning to do some grafting and also intending to prepare the ground I'm planting in much better than I did this year - the ones I have picked have been tasty though :-)

[chillithyme]

Adding organic matter is on my list of things to do for next year too.

Ive also been having some troubles, i've got leaf miners amongst the grafted and non grafted tomatoes at home, i'm not sure whether this will affect the crop or not but the plants look vigorous with green fruits developing now.

Also I successfully grafted 1 chilli cutting onto a tomato rootstock, the rest 4 or 5 failed. It is far behind my other earlier sown and earlier planted plug plant chillies, I will update later on the season to see how it goes.

Talking of next year if all goes well I may graft again and start earlier in the season

[Scarlet]

I'm very jealous....I didn't have any luck and then nothing matched up. I will start earlier next year as I would like to try again.

[chillithyme]

Update. I lost all of my plants at the allotment to blight. I have one surviving grafted tomatoe plant at home, amongst some non- grafted tomatoes plants. It provided a higher yield than the same variety of non- grafted tomatoe. However it yielded lower than different varieties of non grafted tomatoe plants. I will graft again next year, but will start off earlier and see if it makes any difference.

As for the grafted chilli, I only had a single chilli off of it, whereas my non grafted chilli plants gave me large yields, so I won't bother with chillies again. It may also be because the rootstock variety was not suitable for chilli grafting.

[Mark_Riga]

A final update.
At the end of the season, I managed to harvest 82kg from the 22 plants which is significantly down on the previous year (110kg). The different weather could be one factor but the main one was a tomato leaf mould infection which will be difficult to eradicate. I had this 4 and 3 years ago in the main greenhouse. I then grew in a different tunnel for 1 year and was clear and last year, back in the main greenhouse was clear but this year (2 years after any infection) it resurfaced - with a vengeance. Whether is is a reinfection from seeds used, or a latent spore that survived for getting on 3 years, I don't know. I had intended this year to save my own seeds to guard against re-introducing it but...
So not sure what to do, I've emptied the greenhouse, washed down with ***** fluid and acquired some sulphur candles to burn in there. If anyone has any other thoughts I would be interested to here them.

The only thing I would add to grafting tomatoes is that you need to be very careful to keep the rootstock plants from mixing with the varieties being grafted. I had just 3 gardener delight plants that i wanted to graft and the 3rd one, when I chopped its head off, fell into a few tops that were on the bench. I thought I picked it up but must have got one of the rootstock heads as one of the plants I ended up with had heart shaped fruit which I assume was a rootstock grafted on a rootstock.

[nickdub]

I'm very jealous....I didn't have any luck and then nothing matched up. I will start earlier next year as I would like to try again.

what sort of clips did you use Scarlet ?

[Scarlet]

^^little orange ones

I'll have a look when I get home

[Scarlet]

A final update.
At the end of the season, I managed to harvest 82kg from the 22 plants which is significantly down on the previous year (110kg). The different weather could be one factor but the main one was a tomato leaf mould infection which will be difficult to eradicate.

Mark are you planting too closely. Have you got enough ventilation? I have side vents, roof openers and I also leave the doors open - day and night from June.
Also making sure all extra foliage, armpits etc is removed is really necessary.

[chillithyme]

Mark I don't have a greenhouse, the only thing that I can think of is it being too humid. When my porch where I grow chilis and aubergines gets too humid and wet that is when my problems start, including mouldy leaves.