Huuuuuuuuuuge Trusses....

[brownfingers]

on my Shirleys. I'm talking in excess of two dozen to a truss. They all seem to be developing too, no blind ones. Do I nip some off, or leave them to do their own thing? If I leave them, would it be wise to increase the feed rate?

[Nannysally99]

Hopefully someone with knowledge will come along in a minute. But woo hoo, good for you with your toms

[Penellype]

I find that Shirleys tend to get too heavy for their trusses and the stems bend double so the trusses droop, so it might be a thought to support them somehow. You may find the tomatoes are smaller if you let them all develop but I don't really see why you shouldn't if the plants look healthy. I tend to under feed mine anyway so I am not really qualified to talk about feed.

[solway cropper]

I always support heavy trusses with strings from the roof of the greenhouse or with canes for the outside ones. If the stems bend too far it can restrict the flow of nutrients to the developing fruit. With larger beefsteak fruit it's best to restrict the number per truss.

[Potstubsdustbins]

Rely depends on how many trusses per plant you have. A plant grows its fruit to reproduce so can start off with many small fruits awaiting for one to go ripe and then discard the others.

IMO if you try to bring them all on you will have to up your feed rate especially if they are in containers and pick the fruit as soon as it is ripe.

[Bill HH]

Shirleys have huge amounts of largeish fruit if you don't support them the stems will break. I cant see much benefit in reducing the amount per truss because the remaing ones will just get bigger to compensate. Up the feed and support each truss. Given the huge output you may wish to restrict the number of trusses to 5, maybe 7 if you think we are in for a very hot sunny autumn.

[Penellype]

Don't put too much faith in this, but the current weather models ARE forecasting a warm autumn with high pressure particularly in September. However (and it is a BIG however) in the much more forecastable range, hot and humid seems to be the order of the day, and that unfortunately means a big risk of blight.

[brownfingers]

I keep the gh well ventillated to reduce risk of blight and other fungal infections.

I use cut down ladies tights to support all my trusses of toms, even ones that look like they may be ok without. They afford a bit of give, and if cut wide, they don't cut into the stems.

I always limit the amount of trusses to five or six, depending on the size of the trusses. Looks like some extra feed is the order of the day.

Got my first cases of BER today. All on just one plant, a Roma which is outside. All the gh toms are fine.