Tomatillo Fruiting Woes

[LexLucre]

I have 3 tomatillo plants close together in a bed, all forming fruit which is already starting to ripen.

I have a further two plants in large containers nearby. They look healthy, and have had a big number of flower buds, but they resulting flowers are much smaller than usual and just seem to fall off, some before opening. Neither container plant has set a single fruit.

I had containers in similar locations before which did better than the ones in the ground, so I don't think cross pollination is the issue.

Any ideas?

[Alison]

I've always found they do a lot better in the ground as the plants are so huge. Sounds like they may be lacking in food and / or water but there is loads of time yet. Mine aren't even flowering yet

[TrixC]

For some reason I often find that my tomatillos won't set fruit until partway through the season - they flower a lot but the flowers all drop off, then they suddenly start setting and I have more fruit than I can deal with. I've not been able to work out why this is, one of my theories is it takes the bees a while to discover them. They definitely need cross pollination. It sounds like you might be suffering from the same problem. It's never bothered me overly because the plants are always astonishingly prolific in the end.

[happyhumph]

Mine are outside but still quite small. Flowering bit dropping off as well. Not worrying about it though.

[LexLucre]

Thanks for your opinions. Whilst we're at it, and there seem to be a number of tomatillo growers present, what do people do in the way of support/cages for their plants?

Last year I just used a few verticle canes a bit haphazardly and tied a few stems to them. This worked OK, I had one casualty.

Just walked down the garden to see I've had my first this year, it looks like it's just split down the middle of one of the forks, probably a combination of the weight of all the fruits, wind, and lack of support.

Glad I grew 5!

[Alison]

I just shove random canes in, works very well but also know other people who just let them slump along the ground