How to Grow Tomatoes From Seeds, Homegrown Organic Money Saving Gardening
Personal_Finance / Gardening Feb 11, 2018 - 06:48 AM GMTBy: Sami_Walayat
Now (Mid February) is the right time of year to get started growing your own vegetables of which given the high shop prices tomatoes should be at the top of ones list. In this comprehensive guide, Sami shows literally how anyone, even a child can easily grow hundreds of tomatoes indoors in a small pot from seed germination, to planting, to hand pollination, to pruning and then enjoying the fruits for a whole years worth of money saving crops of healthy freshly organically grown home tomatoes, good for your financial and physical health as well as delivering a lot of self satisfaction
Tomato Seeds Planting
Firstly pick the right variety. If you want to grow the same tomatoes as sold in the supermarkets then get hold of Alicante Red either from discount stores, garden centres or online. Don't buy hundreds of seeds as you will only need about 2 to 4! Failing that you can get the seeds right out of a store bought tomatoes, you will just need to let the seeds dry out for a couple of weeks.
Tomatoes need hot summer to grow the fruit, so whilst you can plant the seeds at any time of the year the best time to plant is during Feb-March so that the plants can germinate and be ready to grow during summer. Though there is nothing wrong with starting the plants earlier say January, because the seeds will still germinate but only grow slowly until summer arrives.
Tomato Plants Growing
Within 2-4 weeks most of the seeds should have germinated and sprouted into baby tomato plants. Don't worry if they are taking longer to spout, just give them a few more weeks and they should be emerging as they can take upto 8 weeks to emerge.
Once the plants have reached about a foot height then look at repotting into separate pots. Though remember that each plant will produce approx 100 tomatoes so if you have 6 like here then pick 2 or 3 of the biggest plants and throw the rest away after the plants have survived repotting.
Plants Location
Tomato plants need a sunny location, a south facing conservatory or kitchen window sill is deal.
Other options include a growing in bag in a green house.
Pollination
It won't be long before lots of yellow flowers start appearing which is where the tomatoes will grow. To pollinate, all you need to do is to touch the inside of the flowers with your finger tip, takes just a few minutes each week.
Plant Support and Weekly Feeding
By June the tomato plants will be growing fast and will need some support, nothing fancy or expensive, plant supports can be bought from most discount retailers such as Poundland. By now the plants will also need weekly feeding with Tomato Feed that can be bought from DIY stores.
Summer Maintenance
by late June there should be lots of green tomatoes growing, so now cut off most of the remaining flowers so that the plants concentrate on producing big juicy tomatoes.
Early July First Crop
The first crop of red tomatoes may not yield much more than handful but they will be bigger than the store sold tomatoes
Tomato Flood
During July and August sit back and enjoy a flood of tomatoes as each plant could yield as many as 100 tomatoes each!
At peak expect over 50 tomatoes a week!
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By Sami Walayat
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