Re: too late to prune tomatoes ??

[James Bass]

Thanks for the feedback. I actually did that a couple of weeks ago & figured I would be allright, I even have bungee cords on the stakes to try & keep them upright, but they just keep spreading out. I think that next year I will try some of the tomato ladders from gardeners.com.

-thanks again James

>Reply-To: "James Bass" > >From: "James Bass" [e-mail] > >Newsgroups: rec.gardens > > >The plants are beginning to hang & droop, I'm worried that the plants > >are going to break as they are so loaded with fruit. Now I hate to prune > >branches w/fruit but I had rather have some thna none at all abe cause the > >plant breaks @ the "trunk". Should I trim the branches that are hanging ? > > > >- > Tomatoes can go up and they can go down--no problem--you could take some twine > and tie the drooping branch near a fruit clusterto the cage for added support. > Tomatoes are sprawlers and are happy going every which way--take advantage of > your eager plants desire to grow and producem forget this pruning nonsense. > > > > > > > > > > > > > >

[Mark Anderson]

I read up on pruning and pruned once very early in the year when the plants were just starting to grow funny. I followed the instructions and pruned the suckers. Now they're huge and I'm getting big tomatoes this year. Last year all my tomatoes were small and I had a lot of yellow leaves. I grow my tomatoes out of big containers BTW. After the plants got big, it was very difficult to figure out what to prune and what not to prune so I just let nature take it's course. I do think, based upon my anecdotal evidence, that my early pruning did help the plants grow decent sized tomatoes this year. YMMV.

This was the size of the tomatoes on June 13 and I pruned them a week later...