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Has anyone else managed to grow tomato plants this year?
I have been growing tomatoes successfully for years using the following method, with plants on self watering trays under lights until they get too big:
Jan - sow 2 seeds for the windowsill (Shirley)
Feb - sow 4 more Shirley for the windowsill plus 2 balconi to grow on the windowsill then in the garden.
In late March and April I take sideshoot cuttings from the January sown plants to grow on in my friend's greenhouse.
April sow outdoor varieties (usually Sungold, Ferline, Oh Happy Day), several seeds to a pot, pot them up when they have 2 true leaves.
By the end of May/early June the outdoor plants are getting too big for the lights and I plant them out under cover, having to take their chances with frost. I have not lost one yet.
That was the situation up to the end of 2020.
This year I started the Shirley as usual, and apart from issues with mushrooms growing in the compost and uprooting the seedlings, they have done ok. They were rather slow however, and by mid April they had gone rather yellow and no sideshoots appeared that were big enough to pot up until the very end of April. The Shirley seedlings recovered are now big plants on the sitting room windowsill, but despite my usual method of tapping the flowers, a lot of them are not setting fruit.
The Balconi were sown as usual in February and were very slow to germinate, so the mushrooms appeared first. One of them germinated by mid March, so I sowed another 2. These germinated, but all but one leaf fell off one of them, and it is only now starting to re-grow and is about 6 inches high with no sign of flower buds. The other 2 plants are a foot high, bushy and with fruit forming.
Most of the Shirley sideshoots have taken well, and the best ones have been planted in my friend's grenehouse and are starting to set fruit. But some of them went yellow and leaves started to fall off and have grown very slowly, although they do tend to recover eventually. The last 3 sideshoots, treated exactly the same way, have gone mouldy in the middle and died. I have had this happen before, usually to later sideshoots, and I am not particularly bothered as I have just about enough Shirley anyway.
The later sown varieties have been a complete disaster. I sowed 2 Oh Happy Day, 5 Ferline and 6 Sungold. All germinated except for one of the Oh Happy Day, and having run out of seed I sowed 2 Crimson Crush to replace it, of which one germinated. I potted them up into new compost (not the bag that grew mushrooms). So far so good.
The seedlings quickly went yellow and the lower leaves started to go a pale brown and wilt, then dropped off. Some of the plants were worse than others - the Ferline fared best and were judged big enough to put the 3 best plants in the growhouse on 7th June as they were starting to go yellow and lose their bottom leaves. By the next morning one of the plants had a damaged stem, presumably due to a slug or snail - this has never happened before. As it was warm I decided to plant them in the ground with a mulch of Strulch to keep the slugs off (I usually do this). The plant with the damaged stem wilted and I decided to cut it off and put it in water to root, which it did, and it is now in a pot on the windowsill, looking happy. I replaced it with one of the other 2 plants which had been waiting for space at the allotment.
Encouraged by this I planted out the 4 biggest Sungold on 13th June - these were smaller and sicker looking. The next morning the smallest 2 had both been severed at soil level. I brought them in and put them in water - one of them looks as if it might survive:
The other one died. The 2 in the soil look happier and are starting to grow.
The Oh Happy Day and Crimson Crush are still upstairs under lights, and are yellow and unhappy. They were potted up about a week ago into new compost (I never normally do this), but they are not looking any happier and I am starting to despair that they are never going to grow:
I must stress that these plants have NOT been watered from the top - they are sitting on capillary matting with a water tray underneath, exactly as I always do. The plant in the background is the bigger of the remaining 2 Sungold.
This morning I noticed that the middle of the 3 Ferline plants, which was a happy, healthily growing plant yesterday, had collapsed. The stem had been severed just below ground level. Given the trouble I have been having with tomatoes this year, this reduced me to tears. There are a few roots on the stem so I put it back in the ground and watered it in. This is what it looks like now:
Advice please - should I leave it where it is? Should I pot it up in compost and put it in the growhouse? Should I put it in water first?
HELP!!
I have been growing tomatoes successfully for years using the following method, with plants on self watering trays under lights until they get too big:
Jan - sow 2 seeds for the windowsill (Shirley)
Feb - sow 4 more Shirley for the windowsill plus 2 balconi to grow on the windowsill then in the garden.
In late March and April I take sideshoot cuttings from the January sown plants to grow on in my friend's greenhouse.
April sow outdoor varieties (usually Sungold, Ferline, Oh Happy Day), several seeds to a pot, pot them up when they have 2 true leaves.
By the end of May/early June the outdoor plants are getting too big for the lights and I plant them out under cover, having to take their chances with frost. I have not lost one yet.
That was the situation up to the end of 2020.
This year I started the Shirley as usual, and apart from issues with mushrooms growing in the compost and uprooting the seedlings, they have done ok. They were rather slow however, and by mid April they had gone rather yellow and no sideshoots appeared that were big enough to pot up until the very end of April. The Shirley seedlings recovered are now big plants on the sitting room windowsill, but despite my usual method of tapping the flowers, a lot of them are not setting fruit.
The Balconi were sown as usual in February and were very slow to germinate, so the mushrooms appeared first. One of them germinated by mid March, so I sowed another 2. These germinated, but all but one leaf fell off one of them, and it is only now starting to re-grow and is about 6 inches high with no sign of flower buds. The other 2 plants are a foot high, bushy and with fruit forming.
Most of the Shirley sideshoots have taken well, and the best ones have been planted in my friend's grenehouse and are starting to set fruit. But some of them went yellow and leaves started to fall off and have grown very slowly, although they do tend to recover eventually. The last 3 sideshoots, treated exactly the same way, have gone mouldy in the middle and died. I have had this happen before, usually to later sideshoots, and I am not particularly bothered as I have just about enough Shirley anyway.
The later sown varieties have been a complete disaster. I sowed 2 Oh Happy Day, 5 Ferline and 6 Sungold. All germinated except for one of the Oh Happy Day, and having run out of seed I sowed 2 Crimson Crush to replace it, of which one germinated. I potted them up into new compost (not the bag that grew mushrooms). So far so good.
The seedlings quickly went yellow and the lower leaves started to go a pale brown and wilt, then dropped off. Some of the plants were worse than others - the Ferline fared best and were judged big enough to put the 3 best plants in the growhouse on 7th June as they were starting to go yellow and lose their bottom leaves. By the next morning one of the plants had a damaged stem, presumably due to a slug or snail - this has never happened before. As it was warm I decided to plant them in the ground with a mulch of Strulch to keep the slugs off (I usually do this). The plant with the damaged stem wilted and I decided to cut it off and put it in water to root, which it did, and it is now in a pot on the windowsill, looking happy. I replaced it with one of the other 2 plants which had been waiting for space at the allotment.
Encouraged by this I planted out the 4 biggest Sungold on 13th June - these were smaller and sicker looking. The next morning the smallest 2 had both been severed at soil level. I brought them in and put them in water - one of them looks as if it might survive:
The other one died. The 2 in the soil look happier and are starting to grow.
The Oh Happy Day and Crimson Crush are still upstairs under lights, and are yellow and unhappy. They were potted up about a week ago into new compost (I never normally do this), but they are not looking any happier and I am starting to despair that they are never going to grow:
I must stress that these plants have NOT been watered from the top - they are sitting on capillary matting with a water tray underneath, exactly as I always do. The plant in the background is the bigger of the remaining 2 Sungold.
This morning I noticed that the middle of the 3 Ferline plants, which was a happy, healthily growing plant yesterday, had collapsed. The stem had been severed just below ground level. Given the trouble I have been having with tomatoes this year, this reduced me to tears. There are a few roots on the stem so I put it back in the ground and watered it in. This is what it looks like now:
Advice please - should I leave it where it is? Should I pot it up in compost and put it in the growhouse? Should I put it in water first?
HELP!!
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