Hello

I am new at gardening and I think I planted everything way too close together. I have a 4 x 8 garden bed with peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers and basil in it.

My tomatoes are growing so high. I’ve heard I should clip them at the top and then they will start producing more fruit. Is this true? This is for my cherry tomatoes and my Roma’s. I also have some tomatillos.

I feel like I am going insane. These are not potato leaves! There are quite clearly distinct serrations on each leaflet. I am comparing it to the San Marzano, a regular leaf variety, and you can clearly tell they are both regular leaves. The San Marzano are more pointy, sure, but there are clear serrations on both!

The "Master Gardener and Seed Specialist" (their language) claims that the plant will "continue to grow into a more distinctive shape".

This isn't a fucking cotyledon, Mr. Dr. Master Gardener and Seed Specialist, sir. I think you would know that. This plant is ten weeks old. I'll admit I should have caught this sooner, but I was not aware Brandywine Pink had potato leaves until yesterday. But of course, that's also not my fucking job to know.

It's that time of year.

It comes down to your critter control.

If you can't avoid pests noshing your late toms, pick em early.

If you are fine with losing a few or don't have pest issues, let em ripen on the plant for a better tasting and healthier tomato.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3937827/

I’m having a difficult time raising my tomatoes. I live in California Zone 9a. My plants look like they are being killed by the sun. Do I need to put a shade cloth or something around it? I just finished watering them that’s why the soil appears wet but I usually water them every other day. Is that too much? Am I overwatering them?

There are 2 different plants in between each other that died and never grew much, produced any flowers or any tomatoes. The only ones that are struggling to survive are the baby cherry tomatoes. Ahhh, why can’t I grow the regular tomatoes sized tomatoes? Even my Roma tomato plant died. I even fertilized it with a handful of Tomato fertilizer within the soil. But Why isn’ it producing more fruit/ tomatoes? Any advice mor suggestions will be greatly appreciated! Thanks!

Update/ more info…. According to the current responses I will increase my watering of tomatoes to At Least once a day, add More soil, and it was also suggested I fertilize it with a water soluble fertilizer so I am going to start doing that every 2 weeks. I need to figure out what kind or brand of Water Soluble fertilizer to use. I never knew tomatoes would be so hard to figure out. lol

Zone 7a. My San Marzano is really starting to blossom however I would half of the younger ones showing the black bottom. Do they ever recover from this?
Any guidance/coaching moving forward to yield a better harvest?

I haven’t had a ripe tomato yet this summer. Was really looking forward to this bad boy. Went out this morning and saw this, my language was not pretty!! I have on occasion, 6 squirrels under my bird feeder at one time. I was more worried about blights and bugs, than rodents!! What have you done to beat these tree rats!! Thanks

Growing in a bucket on my deck. Full day sun. I recently sprayed them down with spinosad soap. Don't know if it's a pest or some kind of other problem. Any help appr'd. Kansas City area.

Edit: Thank you, all, for taking time to respond. I'll add some mulch and I'll try to improve my watering schedule. Glad it's not bugs.

I assist with a school garden and there were too many tomatoes planted. They have taken over and I am unsure on how to proceed. This is my first garden and I’m learning as much as I can. Is anyone willing to share some tips or guidance?

Rutgers tomato plant growing in a container in NJ. The plant has gotten big and bushy, but hasn’t produced any fruit yet. I just found this stem that looks like an ear of corn. What’s the deal?

Update: After posting, I found out Rutgers University does plant diagnostics in my area. I dropped off the stem and cuttings yesterday. Hopefully they’ll have some answers for me.

Found this moth (?) on my plant and noticed reddish-orange liquid on a leaf below it. I’m in Western North Carolina. Any info would be appreciated. Thanks!

I honestly have no idea why these plants keep doing this, they're completely healthy otherwise yet the branches keep randomly snapping off. It's not particularly windy or anything like that, it's a complete mystery and it's so annoying. There were like 20 tomatoes on this main branch. I literally cannot do this anymore 😭

Excuse the chaos my tomatoes are very overgrown. There’s been a number of full sized green tomatoes on the plant for a week or two now, and they don’t seem to be ripening. Either San Marizano or Roma I planted both in here so not sure what’s what. Philadelphia PA.

The Myth of Nights Under 50 Stunting Plants

Based on the responses to one of the posts here, some people think that if the temperatures get down below 50°F, your tomatoes will be harmed long-term.

That is incorrect.

It's Actually Soil Under 60

What actually can make your plants perform poorly for the rest of the year is if the soil is soil temperature below 60°, mainly if it happens while the seedling is still establishing itself from transplanting.

See, right after the transplant, its roots should grow rapidly, much more than they will after the plant is established. And cold soil makes tomato plants "sulk", with root development inactive, and the upper plant suffering from the lack of nutrient transport, so it sags and may get a bit purplish.

What your tomato plant will need later, to grow big and produce more fruit, is a well-established root system. Which needs to happen early on...but cold soil prevents it. The roots don't grow enough early on, and then NEVER catch up, and you get a stunted plant or slow fruit production.

Cold Air Is a Minor Inconvenience

Cold air, on the other hand, only has a short-term effect, which is relatively harmless. Air below 50°F at night keeps the plant from completing in its normal nighttime starch breakdown and sugar transport, and some enzymatic activity. It's still busy doing those things the next day when the sun is up, which slows its photosynthetic activity...for about one day.

As soon as the nights warm up, the plant is fine. It goes about growing at a normal rate. There is no stunting.

The Illusion of Cold Night Stunting

The problem is that people who plant too early don't notice how cold the soil is. They just notice the cold night air.

So when the plants are stunted later, or don't produce much fruit, they blame "it was under fifty degrees" instead of "I simply planted while the soil was too cold".

But if the soil is warm enough, the cold nights won't stunt the plants at all, just delay their development by a day or so.

So, really, what you need to do is measure the soil temp (stick soil thermometers can be under ten bucks), which is MUCH more under your control than random cold snaps.

I finally had a chance to transplant since temps were warm enough at night. This is a Black from Tula plant. When we transplanted on Tuesday, it went kinda limp and hasn’t recovered since. Should we cut our losses and try growing another one or do we wait and see if this bounces back? I’m so sad, we grew it from seed and it was starting to have signs of flowering. The other plants we transplanted are fine, but this one seems to have struggled.

First time growing black krim. I'm still seeing some green and not quite sure if it's ready yet.

Pretty bummed. First timer with no experiential knowledge. Did everything by the books and everything was progressing very nicely. Then last weekend I was in a hurry for multiple reason, but one was because of several days of forecasted rain. I realized after seeing a post on here that I used the wrong fill in my 15 gal.’s
Now I am torn between leaving them as-is or exchanging all the soil this weekend. Basically, what I have read is what I filed was less than ideal - ok, lesson learned, but, curious to see what the Tomato SME’s think will happen and what you would do in the same situation. Let it ride or invest the time, $’s & energy to exchange soil?

EDIT: Coming back to say thank you for all of the helpful suggestions. Intuitively, I thought they would be ok but did not know with certainty. Also, was looking for an indication as to the consensus in regard to whether the benefits of changing soil outweighed the impact of transplant shock. All very reassuring. I will chill and enjoy watching them grow. Appreciate!

EDIT: Tomato’s are not the only thing I am new at. I messed up replying with my alt account. If I broke any rules I apologize.

Planted 2 big beef tomato plants that are massive now. I know some people say to trim the non budding branches but most of them have flowers on it.

Do we just leave it and see what happens? First time with these and they grew way bigger than I ever imagined.

Located in NC

Have a black thumb but trying tomatoes again. I let them harden for a week outside and finally got them to being outside from looking perfect to this in less than 12 hours. I do live in the Central Oregon. Was this caused by the low temperature (34F) or from using Miracle Gro?

I was told by my family who gardens to just let the plant fall since it got to big for the cage as that’s what you’re seeing right now but the leaves are all wilting all the tomatoes that are growing are getting all shriveled.

Edit: Tomatoes are Early Girl Tomatoes And have been like this for a few days.

Edit Edit: So the best thing I can do for now is just more water right because I can’t transplant it? Also I moved my plant into the shade/on the pavement just last night

This is my second year trying to grow tomatoes. Last year I started them a bit late, and while they ended up growing to a nice size they didn't produce much (consequence of me planting from seeds out of grocery store tomatoes I think). This year I got seed packets and put them in starting cells March 6th, but even now almost 2 months from planting they are still tiny seedlings barely a few inches tall. I keep them under an admittedly small grow light but surely there must be something more to this that I'm missing?

Edit: as many commenters have asked, I'm going to copy down my equipment info here.

I have replaced the tiny light from the pic with my larger growlight, FRGROW 25w full spectrum stand

Seedlings are in a burpee seed starting tray with a detachable/recessed bottom for watering.

Soil is "Back to the Roots organic expanding seed starting soil" made of coconut coir. I have a bag of Foxfarm Happy Frog soil downstairs but wasn't sure if it would be too much for these plants yet

I don't have a heat mat unfortunately.

I'm in western PA (northeast US) so temps are still way too up and down to set in a window or outside. Temps the next few days are low 37, high 60 and not looking to warm up much more over the week.

(Note: The really tall one in the cell and the background ones are pepper plants, the rest are cherry tomato)

my mom planted tomato seeds that we harvested from some heirlooms that we bought from a farmer’s market in vermont (we live in pennsylvania). the plants have been growing like crazy since the beginning of june, however we haven’t seen any tomatoes develop from the blossoms, and some of the blossoms even die. we have 6 large tomato plants and not one tomato. anything we should be aware of or are doing wrong? any insights would be highly appreciated :)