If you are growing tomatoes with no experience, start with young plants.
Container And Soil
To grow tomatoes, consider large sized container because it provides enough space for the roots to grow and accommodate more nutrients which helps in healthy growth of plants.
Every year change the place of the container which consists of all the facilities to grow the plant. The container must be upto 25 inches deeper and change the potting soil for every 20-24 months.
Along with the large sized plants, the plants which needs long time to mature also requires deeper containers. The potting soil helps in retaining the water.
If the roots of your plant are larger and even coming through the drain holes, transfer the plant to another pot. Don’t pull the plant instead break the pot and transfer it safely into another.
Every year remove the top layer of the soil and replace it with new layer of soil.
Watering
Water the plants with care. Place the finger into the pot upto two inches deep. If you observe the soil is dry near the tip of your finger, water the pot.
Drill the drain holes at the bottom of your container to drain excess amount of water. Providing less amount of water results in dry tomatoes. So, always provide required amount of water.
Sun Light
Tomatoes requires 7-8 hours of direct sunlight.
Nutrients
Add compost and fertilizers in required proportions. Over watering washes away the nutrients in the soil and infact they are accessed rapidly by the plants. So, feed them with composts and fertilizers regularly.
Fish and seaweeds acts as best organic fertilizers for tomato plant.
Staking
Staking makes the young plants to grow fast.
Deficiencies In Tomatoes
Calcium Deficiency
Since calcium deficiency leads to rotten tomatoes, provide organic compost to the plants regularly.
Nitrogen deficiency
the leaves turn into pale green color and then turning gradually to yellow color are the symptoms of nitrogen deficiency. So, add organic fertilizers like fish meal to reduce it.
Potassium Deficiency
leaf veins turning into yellow and the formation of yellow pattern flames on leaf are the symptoms of potassium deficiency. Add banana peels and timber ash to suppress it.
Phosphorus Deficiency
If there is drop in harvest, leaves turning into reddish purple color and old leaves turning into black color are symptoms of phosphorus deficiency. Add bone meal to reduce it.
Magnesium Defeciency
Yellow dark spots on leaves, leaves turning into yellow and slow leaf growth are symptoms of magnesium deficiency. Epsom salts work well.
Pests And Diseases In Tomatoes
Horn Worms
Horn worms causes lots of damage to tomato plant. These are usually green in color and devours all the stems, leaves and fruit. It easily moves from one plant to another and damages complete garden.
Blight
Also don’t neglect fungal infections such as blight because it spreads easily from one plant to another and infects whole garden.
Small dark black spots observed on leaves, stem and tomato fruit are the symptoms of blight. So, cut the blight infected part or remove the whole plant and burn it.
Septoria Leaf Spot
Sometimes brown spots are observed instead of black spot which is called septoria leaf spot. Don’t become panic because by proper care, fertilizing and weeding we can eradicate it.
Pruning
- Pruning helps in preventing the wastage of nutrients.
- Remove the dead leaves to control bugs and many more infections.
