There is a lot of talk about mulching your tomato plants, and the rest of your garden. This is a good thing, but don’t think you have to run to the local garden center and get a truckload of expensive mulch.

Mulching around your vegetable garden, or the rest of your garden for that matter, helps to retain moisture, which helps cut back on watering, which of course helps the environment stay green, but it doesn’t have to be the expensive bark mulch you can get in a rainbow of colors now, unless you are going for a trendy looking garden!

As long as you have not sprayed your lawn, and your lawn is not on any “drugs” you can bag your clippings as you cut your lawn, and use these around your tomato plants. Lawn clippings are full of nutrients. Or you can use that pile of dead leaves you have in your back corner, or hay from a local farm.

But the important thing to remember about mulching your tomato garden, is that you must wait until the soil reaches a good warm temperature, or else the mulch will insulate the cold in the soil.

Your tomato plants, need the soil to be warm to thrive, so depending on your climate, let the plants get a good start first, keep the weeds down, (weeds don’t seem to care what temperature the soil is!) , and make sure they get watered. As the temps start to rise overnight, and the soil gets warmer, then mulch. This will retain the heat in the soil as well as the moisture needed.

Plus as an added bonus, mulching tomato plants keeps those dreaded weeds down. I usually mulch to about 2 inches deep and then turn it into the ground in the fall. It also helps energize the soil for next years tomato crop.

Any tomato grower, will recognize this scenario, and promptly tell you “been there done that” in regards to the tomato garden.

Picture this: You have slaved over your vegetable garden all season, and have paid special attention to those tomato plants. Everything is great, you are just a few weeks off of harvesting a bumper tomato crop. You have dodged bugs, rodents, and all those critters that thought of your garden as a midnight buffet..

But along comes mother nature with the perfect storm. You know the thunderstorms of summer, with the heavy rains, whipping winds, and sometimes the dreaded hailstones.

You can’t do much about mother nature, but wait it out inside, and watch your tomato garden suffer. You hope that your tomatoes weather the storm, and you head out only to find a bunch of green tomatoes on the ground.

Here is what you do:

Pick up all the loose green tomatoes, check your plants for any damaged ones, and discard them so as to allow the plant the energies it needs to recover and ripen the other ones still on the vine.

Take your green tomatoes, and dry them off, find yourself a cardboard box, line it with newspapers, and lay your tomatoes in this box (with a bit of space for air around each one) Next put in a couple of ripening bananas (yellow but with a tinge of green still on them). The bananas will give off a gas that will help ripen your tomatoes. Cover with loose sheets of newspaper.

In about two weeks, you will have ripened tomatoes to enjoy, as well as your tomatoes from your prized tomato garden. Enjoy!

For many people, growing big juicy tomatoes is part of what makes vegetable gardening so enjoyable. Whether purchasing plants from your local nursery or starting tomatoes from seed, there are a few basic steps to follow to ensure that you harvest an abundant crop at the end of the growing season. There are many different varieties of tomatoes to choose from, depending on whether you will be cooking, canning, slicing, or eating miniature or grape-like varieties right off the vine. Sweet 100ís are very abundant, and are good for salads as well as eating fresh from the garden. Roma tomatoes are good for making salsa, because the peels are not as tough as others so you donít need to peel the skins off. Romas are also known as the classic paste and sauce tomato. There are Early Girls, Early Boys, Big Boys, Big Mamas, Sweet Baby Girls, Beefsteaks, French Rose hybrids, Big Rainbow, specialty tomatoes and many more. So start by choosing the kind of tomato you would like to grow.
Planting Tomatoes from Seeds
Tomatoes grown from seed will require six to eight weeks before they can be planted in the garden. Purchase individual containers or flats, starter soil or mixture, and the seeds of your choice. Fill each container with soil, pressing it tightly to remove air and to avoid settling problems after watering. Typically, seed companies print instructions for planting right on the tomato seed package. Each variety is a little different so follow instructions carefully. Prepare a label identifying the type of tomato and the date started. You can make your own from Popsicle sticks or purchase them at the store or garden center.
Insert your label in the pot and mist with water. Place containers in a sunny window and keep seeds moist by placing a plastic bag over them. Small greenhouse containers are also available at your local nursery. Watch for seeds to germinate and remove plastic when plants emerge. Wean out weaker looking seedlings to give strong ones more room to grow. Keep moist by misting or watering tomatoes when needed. When plants have a second pair of leaves it is time to transplant these seedlings to your garden or a large pot in which they are to grow.
It is a good idea to harden off or acclimatize a plant to outdoor conditions before planting by setting it out in direct sun during the day and bringing it in at night. After a few days, the tomato plant will have adapted to the new surroundings and can be transplanted in the desired location. Place plants directly outdoors after the threat of frost in a shady location, out of the wind and protected from heavy rains.
Purchasing Started Plants
If you prefer to purchase plants from your garden center or greenhouse, select dark green plants that are stocky in size and that do not have any fruit. The fruit will stunt the plant growth and the total yield will be reduced. Tomatoes are one of the few plants that will tolerate being planted deeper than they sit in the pot. So a taller plant can be placed a little deeper if preferred. As mentioned, harden off the plant before moving it to a final location.
Preparing Garden Soil For Tomato Plants
The soil should be deep, loamy, and well-drained for the best harvest. Tomatoes prefer a slightly acidic soil with a pH of 6.2 to 6.8. The term pH balance refers to acidity or the alkalinity of your soil from a numerical scale of 1.0 to 14.0. The neutral point on the pH scale is 7.0. Higher than 6.5 indicates alkaline soil, lower than that indicates acidic soil.
Test kits are available at garden centers or through local horticultural organizations. To raise the soilís pH, work agriculture lime into the soil. Use sulfur to lower the pH of alkaline soil. Using fertilizers and compost amendments will also change the soilís pH over time. Adding decomposed organic compost will improve any soil structure. You can purchase or make your own compost. Once you have cultivated your garden area and prepared the soil, it is ready for the plantings.
Planting The Tomatoes
Inspect all of the transplants, looking for insects, wilting or blight. Plant only healthy plants. Tomatoes prefer full sun, so choose an area with at least six to eight hours of sun per day. Practice crop rotation in your vegetable gardening by planting tomatoes and other vegetables in a different spot every year. Tomatoes prefer to be planted by chives, parsley, marigolds, nasturtiums, garlic bulbs, and carrots. Avoid planting tomatoes by potatoes or members of the cabbage family.
For large healthy tomatoes, give them plenty of room to grow. Space plants twenty-four inches between rows and leave twenty-four inches between plants. With your shovel or spade, make holes slightly larger than the plants. Tap gently on the bottom of the individual container, loosening the soil and gently removing from the pot. Tomatoes are susceptible to cutworms, but placing a 3-4 inch nail next to each stem before planting or wrapping strips of newspaper around the bottom of the stems will help prevent these pests. A paper cup surrounding the stem also works well.
Place tomato plant in hole and back fill with soil until it is well compacted. Place a rack or cage around each individual plant to help support future growth. Water around the base of the plant, avoiding the foliage. Do not over water or soak the seedlings as this can promote disease and rot. Water early in the day to discourage blight.
Using a rake, spread organic mulch, such as weed-free straw, over plants at least two inches deep. These is an effective way to prevent weeds, preserve water and keep the soil warm, thus reducing the maintenance required for vegetable gardening. Fertilize the plants throughout the growing season with compost or organic matter. Water when needed and inspect leaves periodically for the signs of tomato blight and insects. If blight is discovered, remove any infected leaves and destroy them. Treat plant with a fungicide. Be sure to remove all debris from your garden in the fall, as blight can survive on the dried tomatoes over the winter.
Most tomatoes take 100-days to bear fruit, so follow these easy directions and get ready to harvest the fruits of your labors and enjoy that first BLT of the season.
Items Needed For Growing Tomatoes:
- Tomato seeds or plants
- Containers or flats
- A small greenhouse kit or plastic bags
- Starter soil or mixture
- Marking pen
- Popsicle sticks or labels
- Rake
- Spade and shovel
- Water, sun, adequate soil and patience

While the debate about whether the tomato is a fruit or a vegetable continues, there is no waning in the popularity of this fruit/vegetable. With over 100’s of varieties and many different types to choose from, an average American eats around 22 pounds of tomatoes every year, and this includes the tomatoes present in soups, sauces, and ketchup. Buying tomatoes in the supermarket can turn out to be fairly expensive, and one never really knows how fresh the batch in question is. With the entire country facing tough fiscal times, an increasing number of people are beginning to grow their own produce, and tomatoes feature on almost every of these lists.
Growing tomatoes can be accomplished fairly easily, and if done right, you can have your own batch of juicy succulent tomatoes. What you would essentially need is a good pot or some space outside your home, good drainage, and some dirt/compost In growing tomatoes, try and get a loose dark soil. Acidity levels of around 6.2pH are good especially if you want big tomatoes.
If you intend to grow the plant/s in pots as opposed to the ground, make sure that you do not add to much fertilizer; a rule of thumb is that around one tablespoon of fertilizer should be enough for a ten gallon pot, and this fertilizer should ideally be added to the soil a couple of weeks before planting the plant.However, please consider the label recommendations for the particular fertilizer you are using.
Buying your young plants is an important aspect in the final outcome. It is important that you get your young plants from a trusted source, as this would largely affect the produce of your efforts. While there are scores of trusted providers to choose from, try and get you requirements met by providers who specialize in their given field. For instance, if you wish to buy Organic Heirloom Tomato Plants, your best bet for getting some great plants at great prices would be tomatoheirlooms.com. Not only do all their plants come with a replacement guarantee, they also have a number of offers running from time to time, and also offer free shipping anywhere in the US.
Once you’ve planted your tomato plants, it is a good idea to stake your plants as this improves the production and also makes getting to the tomatoes after they’re ready easier. In doing so, use minimal force in pushing the stakes beside the plant because excessive force could hurt the plant’s roots. Use a yarn or a soft twine to tie the stake to the plant, and ensure that you leave some room for the plant to grow.
If you are growing your plants outdoors, make sure that you plant them at least 24″ apart, as planting them too close to each other could result in reduced air circulation, and can result in diseases breaking out. Since tomatoes have a very high percentage of water (around 95%), it is necessary that you water your plants every day. In growing your tomato plants outdoors, try and cover the soil with hay, mulch, etc, so that evaporation in minimized.
With the following details taken care, you should have your own batch of fresh tomatoes in no time, and might probably never have to buy a tomato again.

To grow tomatoes on your patio you need to first make sure that you get enough sun light in the area you want to use. You need to let them get several hours a day of sunlight so that they will grow properly.

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First you need to go to your local garden store and buy some small starter plants. You will also need a pot and soil to replant the tomatoes when you put them on your patio. Make sure that you read on the instruction card to see what is required for sunlight and water.

How to: Get DIY Help

Next when you replant them make sure you either use a stake or a wire cage so that when the plant grows it will have support. One of the most important things that you do is to make sure not to over water your plants. This is a common cause of tomato plants dying.

After you have your plant on the patio and it is replanted in a bigger pot then you want to water it really good the first time. You want to make sure that your saucer underneath the pot gets water in it, this way you know it got a good amount of water.

Finally make sure that you water your tomato plant no more than 1 to 2 times a week. But you need to soak the soak well when you give it water. Before you know it you will have great ready to eat tomatoes that you can enjoy with your family.