A new way for tomatoes

[taff]

funnily enough, I'm in position to agree with what Zazen says, from the opposite way around.
Last year i grew plum tomatoes, and F1 variety, and let them do as they wanted to, and got what i considered to be not that many tomatoes from them. This however, was before i started taking off the unripe ones at the end of the growing year, and letting them ripen on the windowsill.
This year, same type, grown as cordons. There were two large bunches of fruit, say about 8 or nine x 2 on the plant, and that was it. They were all growing on the first two trusses, all respectable sizes, the last bunch is ripening now I've chopped the leaves off.

So, both were grown in the same place, the polytunnel, this year was cooler than last admittedly, but the amount of fruit i got off the ones that went wild was much more than ones off the cordon grown ones. The only difference is the ripening time. Less leaves and foliage means they ripen faster, which is about it really.

[FROSTYFRECKLE]

Ah, just a big bog standard cloche. Okay. Still means I don't need to fight with the midges Think I would need to shuggle things around to take into account longer ripening times.

[Flummery]

Mine are exclusively greenhouse grown and I do start every year with the best of nipping-out intentions. By now of course, it's a jungle in there. I don 't find much probem with yeild but in a bad year I can get problems with botrytis and such if there's not much air flow.

I love a good 'fair test' Zaz!

[Piggle]

I've with you Flum ... best intentions and then I will take my eye of them for a minute and they're all over the show!

[zazen999]

I'm not complaining about this lot; and I still haven't got to the bottom of the trug yet.

These are plus the ones I've harvested today.

Passata crazy.

[justgimmeethefaxmaam]

O.K just for discussion..a friend of ours used to grow crops in the desert for the Saudi Princes. He reckoned the tomato vines would grow in excess of 50ft sideways from the main stem. He just took the growths... armpits or whatever and strung them along like a cordon. Up to 10 cordons per side of the main stem.
He had huge crops.
He's got a smallholding in France now still growing the worlds supply of fruit & veg

[justgimmeethefaxmaam]

Oops...forgot to say his mantra is...LEAVE 'EM ALONE

[zazen999]

Precisely. It's the future!

[Lotsaveg]

Interesting! I think I'm going to try growing outdoor tomatoes in the same way I grow runners and just keep tying them on to the canes.

[Shadylane]

Well I have dozens of tommie seedlings in my overwintering onion bed that must have popped up from the compost I forked in recently. And to think I normally germinate them in the airing cupboard I think next year less mollycodlling is in order.

[binley100]

here is a pic of the volunteer toms on the CG. All I've done is removed some leaves to help ripening apart from that they've just been left to get on with it. I think this is two plants .........

[teakdesk]

Interesting post Zazen; I remember a thread on this sometime ago (hope I didn't say your yield would be reduced, but I may have!! )

I like the idea of the plants rooting along the stem - do you think this contributed to your yield?

Like Flummery, I suffer botrytis in the greenhouse if I leave armpits, and even large leaves, on the plants so I remove as many as I can. However, the same varieties outside get left to their own devices apart from staking. Greenhouse fruit are always larger than outside but that could be due to the weather rather than armpitting.

I believe commercial growers often use more than one vine per plant but don't let the plant "go wild".

Just one other point from me; I have noticed in the greenhouse that with certain varieties (such as gardener's delight) when sideshoots grow on the plant the "joint" is weak and they can break off unless well supported (ie they don't bend down under the weight of fruit but snap off).




.

[Two_Sheds]

Well I have dozens of tommie seedlings in my overwintering onion bed that must have popped up from the compost I forked in recently. And to think I normally germinate them in the airing cupboard

Yeah, but October is pushing it a bit for any kind of crop ~ keep forcing them on in the airing cupboard

[bethduckie]

I stuck a few in the ground this year and left them to go feral. Bajillions of tomatoes. But they got blight a good two weeks before the pampered ones did.

[Sylvan]

I always thought you had two choices, Leave the suckers on and get many many fruit, but small ones, or take them off and get fewer, but greater in size ones

I've always thought the same as Leeds Lad but my Principe Borghese were allowed to grow completely wild this year and they produced bigger tomatoes than I expected.

They do need to be planted further apart if you don't armpit them though. I had 8'x4' beds with 12 plants in each and they became extremely tangled