Patridge bantam chicken poorly foot?

[AJuff]

I asked your advice a while back if it was too late to sow tomatoes. Response was to have a go . . so i did.

 

I have lots of tomato plants which I've put in the greenhouse and I water them well. They are just about ready to flower. I read somewhere that you should take out lower leaves or something but I can't find the thread. Advice needed.

 

Also will they be ok to water with the smelly nettle soup i made last month? Will it 'feed' them?

[Valkyrie]

Nettle soup is fine! You might find the leaves will go spotty brown occasionally, but that would be magnesium deficiency, add Epsom salts to sort that out. I don't bother with the lower leaves until they start to die back. If you have the toms that should be grown up a pole you will need to pinch out any extra growth which appears in between the leaves and the stalks. The flower stems grow in the middle of the stalks - I shall try and get a piccy for you.

[Valkyrie]

Hi again

Hope this helps:

 

 

These little leaves are forming at the leaf joint - pinch these out - or you can let it grow a bit more and then pinch it out, put it in some compost and it will root and make another plant. If you leave them on the plant your toms will be much smaller and take a long time to ripen.

 

 

Here you can see the flowering shoots/tomatoes are growing out of the stem nowhere near the leaf - but I have another shoot to pinch out further up.

 

If you are growing bush tomatoes you don't need to pinch anything out.

 

If your leaves go like this:

 

You need to give them a dose of Epsom salts - like I am going to have to do. Apparently this usually happens when you use peat free compost.

Edited August 8, 2008 by Guest

[AJuff]

Thanks for the info and pictures. I'll be out checking themover tomorrow.

I think I need to sieve the nettle soup though as it has lots of strange creatures in it now. Things that look like they're going to fly off . . . . . yuk!

[chickencam]

They will be midge or mosquito lavae probably it is amazing how fast they find a bit of water

 

Good luck and keep us posted on how your toms get on.

 

Good tip about the epsom salts Koojie that is what my tomato leaves are looking like. Although with a note of caution my Grandad once sprayed his toms with epsom salts and killed the lot I think it only meant to be a liquid feed.

[Valkyrie]

I tried diluting Epsom salts in the can, but a lot refused to, so I sprinkle some around the top of the plant and then water some on the top before topping up the drip trays. These ones are the beefsteak variety and must use up a lot more magnesium than the others. Also I put a few drops of washing up liquid to see if the mosquito larvae died. Some did, some didn't although none since in any tray - I figured if it was OK to spray above with washing up water to keep the pests off, it must be fine (as long as you don't overdo it) below. I haven't had any pests on the toms at all, although my penstemon cuttings and some weedy aubergine plants had greenfly for a short while before their bubble bath.

It is amazing what survives in the water/feed - I had a frog that didn't mind a bath in seaweed solution or comfrey!

[AJuff]

Following the advice I've been in the greenhouse this morning and pricked out all the tips growing from the leaves/stem. The flowers are just out today too.

[AJuff]

Err I seem to remember my father years ago used to dust each flower with a small paintbrush to pollinate them. Do you still need to do this?

[Valkyrie]

Not necessary, you can mist them with water or let the bees do the job for you.