Tomato Plants from Seedshow to grow tomato plants from seeds

The best part of summer is a fresh, sun-warmed red juicy vine ripened tomato. Depending on where you live this can be a long or short season.

There are three different types of tomatoes. They are cherry tomatoes- good for salads and eating, plum tomatoes- good for sauce, soups and canning and don’t forget the slicing tomatoes-great on a fresh bread on those hot summer days. Tomatoes should be left on the counter and most importantly never refrigerate them.

If you look out on my deck you will see the most beautiful tomatoes ever. I know this because our neighbors are constantly checking over our fence and it is not so see us. This is because we found a fool proof way to grow tomatoes with very little work. The secret is using “Earth Boxes” earthbox.com.

Personally, I choose to grow the beefsteak variety along with sweet 100 cherry tomatoes. Don’t forget to plant some green leaf lettuce for completely fresh salads during the summer.

Gary Nave helps consumers choose the right tomatoes for their needs.

A disorganized garden will still usually produce vegetables, fruits, and flowers. You might then wonder why it is important to have an organized garden.

There are many answers, but three of them leap out: An organized garden produces more in a given area, they are easier to maintain and to harvest, and they look much nicer.

The biggest key to it all is in the planning. This stands to reason when you consider that most garden failures occur because of poor planning. There are many aspects to a well thought out garden, too.

* First, know the growing habits of the plants you are going to grow. This sounds basic and it is. Gardeners will often plant without allowing for enough room for the plants to grow. For instance, vine growing plants like squashes, gourds, cucumbers, and melons require a great deal of room to spread out. If they are grown too close together, the roots of each compete with those of its neighbors, resulting in weaker plants, less produce, and smaller fruits and vegetables.

If they are planted too close to other plants, as they spread out they can also deprive the other plants of sunlight, killing and stunting them.

This isn’t always easy to consider. A beginning gardener with limited space, buying four inch tomato plants will often plant them close together, not understanding that most tomato species bush out as they grow. Tomato cones can help, but not much if the tomatoes are too close together.

* Second, plan well defined rows. These should be wide enough to walk down between them easily, even when the plants on each side have bushed out. If the rows are too closely spaced, it becomes much more difficult to maintain the garden, harvesting becomes a chore, and the garden looks ragged.

* Third, keep the garden weeded. Growing weeds can quickly make a garden look like a weed patch. Worse, the weeds directly compete with the garden plants for food, water, and space. This results in a weaker garden that produces far fewer and smaller fruits and vegetables.

Included with this is to keep the garden tools like hoes, shovels, and spades where you can easily get to them and know where they are. Having to spend a half hour finding or getting to a garden hoe is that much less time you can spend weeding.

Fourth, don’t be afraid to train your garden to grow the way you want it to. For example, garden beans can be given garden twine to climb, and with only a little effort on your part, the beans can be made to use these supports. This goes a long way toward organizing the bean patch, which results in a greater harvest and a better means of harvesting.

This also includes pinching back plants so they grow in a particular direction. Tomato plants respond well to this sort of training.

It also includes thinning. Plants like radishes and carrots are often initially planted too close together. Leaving it that way leads to disorganization. Removing weaker plants to allow the remainder more room to grow, builds organization, and results in a bigger, better crop.

Finally, keep notes of what you’ve tried and what the results were. What works well in one area may not work at all in another. It may not help you organize the garden this year, but it is valuable information for next year.

Organization of the garden is a major key for gardening success. The garden looks nicer, the plants are healthier, they produce better, and the vegetables, fruits, or flowers are a lot easier to harvest. There is effort involved, but there always will be. Still, planning is the least effort consuming part of the whole endeavor, and sadly, often the most neglected.

One day when I was about seven years old, Me and my mother were gardening.

I remember this day was the first day I saw a ripe tomato on the vine. Through a haze of wonder I reached out and touched it. It was so perfect, so bright red and shiny. The leaves were bright green, and you could smell hay in the air. My hands were coated in dirt from digging up worms to feed to the chickens. How I stared at that tomato.

My mother turned to me, and she said “Kaila? Do you remember when I handed you that tiny seed and told you to put it in the ground?” So dumbfounded I couldn’t speak, I merely nodded. She went to her basket and pulled out a little brown packet, turned it over, tapped it twice and handed me a similar seed to the one I had planted months before.

“This Kaila, this is what you planted. Because you planted it, and because it had dirt and water and sunshine, it grew, and to thank you, it made that tomato.”

She plucked it off the vine and handed it to me along with the seed.

“All the magic in the world, can be found within a single seed.”

In wonder I stared at the tiny seed and the giant tomato in my hands.

Something so small made something so big, and I helped.

So my mom smiled. I cried.

I didn’t know why I was crying. I was happy.

But I cried, and she hugged me.

So we made bread, and then we made pasta, and she let me make the sauce.

That day I learned my mom was magic. Because she could make things grow.

Grow a Salsa Garden

Growing plants can be a very rewarding experience. The best thing is walking outside to grab a few vegetables and herbs from the garden, and then making a fresh meal. It’s even better when you only have to go to one place in the garden to get the proper ingredients for your recipe.

Gardens with a theme can be fun and it’s real easy. First you want to choose your “ingredients” for your kitchen garden. A good start for a Salsa Garden is tomato’s, there real simple to grow. You can purchase young plants at your local plant nurseries, or you can start them from seed. Tomato plant sprout very quickly with the proper care, always read the back of the seed packet to ensure proper growth. More plants in the Salsa Garden are, tomatillo, green onion, and basil.

Now that you have an idea of the plants you want to grow, plan your space before you buy the plants or seeds. For this particular garden you need about a 10 square feet of space; it can be circular, square, or whatever shape tingles your design sense. If you bought seeds to start your kitchen garden, plant them in small pots or seed flats (which can be usually purchased along with the seeds) to ensure strong growth before you transplant them into your garden. Till up the dirt in your designated gardening area, so that it is nice and loose, then mark where the plants will go. A good rule of thumb when you planting is to plant tall to small; the back of the garden space should have the bigger taller plants, and the front should have the shorter smaller plants. The tomatillo often grow taller than a tomato plant, so you would want to put the tomatillo in the back followed by the tomato, and then the green onion flowed by the basil. Tomato’s grow more like a vine than the tomatillo does; this means you will need to purchase a tomato fence to properly support the tomato, and purchase simple bamboo poles to prop up the tomatillo. Now that you have a plan go ahead and get dirty!

After a few weeks you should start to see the results of your hard work and constant effort. It is a good idea to constantly take “ingredients” from you Salsa Garden, because it helps with growth and the strength of the plants. Here is a salsa recipe that should knock your socks off.

Hot n’ Chunky Salsa

3 cups tomato

1 cup tomatillo

cup green onion

cup fresh basil

2 tbs hot sauce

2 tsp onion powder

1 tsp cayenne pepper

The easiest way to make this salsa is with a food processor. Just throw all the ingredients into the processor and in a few minuets time you have a delicious salsa. If you don’t own a food processor you can easily chop all the ingredients separately, and then toss them together in a bowl. Use all the juice from the tomato’s to make the salsa have a nice juicy consistency. Refrigerate for about an hour, then serve with chips and enjoy.

• Lycopersicon esculentum
• 0.1 Grams: Approx 35 Seeds
• Germination Rate: 92% – Purity: 99% – Country of Origin: USA
• Days Until Harvest: 60
• Generic Seeds: The Same High Quality Seeds Made By Mother Nature Just in Cheaper Packaging

Product Description
The Juliet hybrid is a cluster tomato with small 1 oz fruits. The indeterminate vines continue to grow and produce the 1″ tall fruits that stay on the vine well. The fruits are attractive, glossy, sweet and come in large numbers. The Juliet Hybrid is an All-American Selections winner…. More >>

Juliet Hybrid Tomato Seeds – Lycopersicon Esculentum – 0.1 Grams – Approx 35 Gardening Seeds – Vegetable Garden Seed

• Free seeds w/ every Seed Needs order!
• Fresh seeds
• Easy to grow
• Great price!

Product Description
75 days. 1¼ inch, sweet, firm fruits abundantly produced on tall indeterminate vine over an extended season. Excellent flavor…. More >>

Red Cherry Tomato – 200 Seeds

• Red Heirloom (2), Golden Harvest (1)
• Harvest in about 12 weeks , keep harvesting for up to 6 months
• No dirt, mess, or pesticides
• Includes seed pods, nutrients and Tending & Harvesting Guide
• For AeroGarden Classic, PRO100, PR0200 & AeroGarden Deluxe

Product Description
Grow delicious vine-ripened cherry tomatoes, right in your home. Enjoy the sweet flavor of fresh-picked tomatoes – even in the middle of winter. The kit includes both Red Heirloom and Golden Harvest cherry tomato varieties. Plants are ready to harvest in 12 to 14 weeks and continue producing fruit for up to 6 months. Simple, foolproof Plug & Grow seed pods are guaranteed to grow. No dirt, pesticides or green thumb required. 100% success guaranteed…. More >>

AeroGarden 0002-00Z Cherry Tomato Seed Kit

During my thirty years as a gardener, I have found that there are some plants that are easy to propagate, and then there are some that need a little more care. Tomato plants were the first plants that I found that you could grow from a cutting. All that I did was break off a sucker that was growing out on the stem. I snapped it off, placed about half of the stem in the ground, kept it watered, and within a week or so it had sprouted roots. With house plants it is some what different. With the vining ones you pin the vine down on top of the soil in a pot next to the parent plant, keep it moist and it should root with very little trouble, or you can simply cut a section of the vine off, place it in a cup of water, and it will sprout roots that way. Once it has roots you can place it a pot of it’s own. An African Violet is best propagated in a pot of soil that is kept moist and out of direct sun light. Just cut off on of the larger, healthier leaves, dry the cut off to avoid rot, place it in the soil, about one inch is enough, and in about four to six weeks it should have little plants popping out of the soil. But as with any propagation technique, always make sure that the soil is moist at all times, but do not drown the cutting.

Tomato Troubles

I wish I could tell you how the Early Emily tomato seeds ended up in the gutter above the front porch of our two story white farm house. I really wish I could. No, I was not drinking. And no, I was not trying to plant them there. They were originally supposed to end up in the tiny trench I dug somewhere between the beets and the sugar peas.

Those sugar peas are behind this I tell ya. Lord knows that they possess the magical powers to make plants levitate out of the ground and over to the gutters just because I was late one day with the Miracle Grow Plant Food sticks. Miss one day and the world goes to Hell in a flowery hand basket of columbine blue stars, according to the sugar peas anyway. The corn could care less. And don’t even ask the potatoes, they’ll just wave their leaves at you and keep quiet. They must have been threatened by the green beans who are in cahoots with the sugar menaces dominating the southern part of my plot of garden.

Yes, folks, I do consult my plants on where they would like to be planted every spring. I just never expected to wake up on a blustery May morning and see a vine hanging down between the weatherworn columns of the porch as though screaming “Hey, look here moron. Look where I ended up.”

Which left me with a very important question – just how does one go about transplanting a tomato plant from a gutter back to the garden, especially when you have no clue how it got there to begin with.

So, doing what I do best – getting these great ideas in my head and not actually thinking about how much the insurance premium is going to rise once I end up in the emergency room for a garden related injury, I sauntered on down to the barn, startled the goats, and grabbed the only ladder on the property – one built by grandpa way back in 1942. It was missing a few rungs, but hey, I’m tall enough to step over them.

So began the epic show of my redneck heritage on retrieving this tomato plant. At first, everything went great. The ladder was sturdy like the oak from which it was hewn, the wind a little less homicidal, and the plant within easy reach – until I heard the skittering clip of cloven hooves rounding the corner over the paver stones and the tiny tinkling of aluminum bells.

Sasquatch the goat was loose and leading her girls out to breakfast, courtesy of my garden. So what does one do in this situation? What any other proud redneck would do, start hollering loud enough for the neighbors

My grandparents had the greenest thumbs in California. I can still picture their lush garden filled with rose bushes, various trees of avocado, persimmon, plum and citrus. The one thing they didn’t grow were vegetables. There was one exception: the tomato. Being a young child, I didn’t care for veggies of any kind. My older sister had a deep hatred of tomatoes and because she hated them, so did I. I refused to eat the big red fruit in any form unless it was a sauce surrounding a great meatball.

In the late summer, my grandparents gave me a task of pulling weeds that surrounded the hot house tomatoes. My grandfather picked one from the vine and bit into it as if it were an apple. I was horrified that he would boldly eat the flesh of what I thought was a vegetable. He sat down next to me and said, “Just try it. A homegrown tomato is nothing like a store bought one. You’ll never know unless you try. Just try it once for me and I won’t tell anyone. I promise.” He picked a cherry tomato and handed it to me, “This is a good size for your first one.” He smiled knowingly and placed the little red devil into my hand. With great trepidation I popped the whole thing in my mouth. I tried to get it over with as quickly as possible. I didn’t want him to see my face, I had been defeated. Looking up at him, I simply asked if I may please have another. He smiled and said, “You can have as many as you like.”

I now have a small garden of my own and grow tomatoes with great pride. I take the same care as my grandparent’s did. At the end of the season, I pickle the green tomatoes before they turn and remember my grandmother canning everything that grew in their garden. I didn’t realize as a four year old, how that day would give me a love of growing things. My sister still doesn’t eat tomatoes and all I can say is she doesn’t know what she’s missing.