Days

 I'm new to gardening. I bought some tomato plants and they're doing
well. Each was marked at a certain number of days such as 'Early Girl 80
Days'. What is 80 days? Does it mean the number of days from seed to
edible fruits or something else?

I saw no explanation of 'days' anywhere in the garden center where I
bought the plants. As a comment, I bought these plants which were about
as tall as my thumb in early June. Today they are up to my chin - or
about 165 cm. They are intermingled because I only planted them maybe 30
cm apart. I figure they are ok that close. Should I trim off the
branches which intrude on their neighbors?

 
Well, sorta.  Best use for this sort of information is "which of these
cultivars will ripen soonest?" in a relative sort of way, rather than
counting on the "days" thing to mean much.  And yes, it's supposed to be
days from planting to harvest (first harvest in the case of things that
will keep producing for awhile)  However, in the real world, the actual
number of days to harvest will be strongly dependent on air and soil
temperatures and amount of sunlight.


I usually plant tomatoes about 30" on center, or about 75 cm apart,
with about a meter or 1.25 meters between rows.  The closest I'd consider
planting the tomato cultivars you list is about 18", about 45 cm. apart
in the row, and that if the plants are trellised.  They're really competing
pretty hard for sunlight and nutrients and water at such a close
spacing.  No, I probably wouldn't trim, but try a wider spacing next
year.  Bet you'll get more yield per plant.

Kay

 Kay Lancaster wrote:

Thanks, Kay. Impossible for me to hope for more tomatoes if the ones
which are now green turn red. Yet clearly, they are competing for space
and sun which can't be good.

Next year I'll greatly enlarge the garden. My wife understands these
things. I took a day when she was at a seminar to purchase the materials
and do the plantings as a surprise.

Not surprised I did it a bit wrong.

-paul

 Craig said:

This is an old tip that I've never had the occasion to test directly (but I
will comment more after):

Drive a small spade down in one or two spots  around one of your
plants and cut a few roots.  This might shock the plant into ripening
the tomatoes.

OK, this year one of the new varieties I was trying was not ripening any
tomatoes, not even a hint of color, even after all the others were doing
so.  It was so full of green tomatoes that the stake was leaning over
threatening to crash into the fence. (I have electric wires at the top so
this would have been a Bad Thing.)   I drove in a couple of small stakes
to tie off the larger one and stop the leaning.  And shortly after that, a
whole bunch of tomatoes on that plant started turning red.

 Now, I would think this was entirely coincidental, except for having
remembered that old advice.  So I may have unintentionally confirmed it
works.  Or, maybe not.  I doubt it would hurt to try.

--
Pat in Plymouth MI ('someplace.net' is comcast)
  
Any technology distinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced.
(attributed to Don Marti)

 
Trellised tends to protect the fruit from sunburn; I personally prefer to
grow mine sprawled on clean mulch (better yield per plant).  I wouldn't top
tomatoes; the plants know what they're doing pretty well.  ;-)
Remember the part you're trimming off also is photosynthetic, and loaded
with minerals the plant has had to absorb, translocate and turn into various
compounds -- might as well let them keep it, is my motto.  Also, removing
apical meristems tends to cause more branching further down the plant...
I really don't want the plant pushing for more vegetative growth while it's
fruiting.

But methods of growing tomatoes get a bit into almost-theological debates
at time... so if you've got a method that works well for you, use it, is my
motto.  If you've got a method you want to experiment with, then try it.
I've known gardeners who have practically espaliered tomatoes, and gotten
nice fruit.  I'm in the "least effort" camp, and have gotten good fruit.
Tomatoes are pretty cooperative about growing no matter what, in my experience.

To the OP: if your plants are flexible enough and you've got enough room,
you could try to encourage every other plant to lean forward onto grass
or mulch, which would give more exposed leaf area for interception of
light.  Or you can just say, "next year"! :-)  Most of us are not subsistence
farming... we're gardening for the pleasure of it.  So celebrate the
tomatoes you get this year, and do a little reading for next year....

Kay