Tomatos growing in my greenhouse

[jlwalke12]

I have a 10x12 greenhouse with a raised bed inside. Right now I have 3 plants a Brandywine, Beefsteak and Mortgage Lifter growing. When the plants grew up to the ceiling I started tying string and training them to grow horizontally.

[ddsack]

That's a nice looking greenhouse! Was it from a kit or professionally built? Your plants look very healthy!

[jlwalke12]

Thank you. It was professionally built.

[jlwalke12]

Does anybody have any experience growing indeterminate tomatos in a greenhouse like this. If so, what did you do when they grew up to the cieling and ran out of room?

[mdvpc]

I have grown some, but I usually grow dwarf plants in the winter. I topped mine when they reached the ceiling.

[saltmarsh]

I'm an optimist, I,m topping mine after the 7th cluster. These are in a heated cold frame. I'm having a problem with early blight, caused by the high humidity and warmth in close quarters. I removed the diseased foliage and treated with Spectracide Multi-Purpose Fungicide. I'll know in a few weeks whether it worked or not. This week's forcast calls for low 30's to highs in the 40's and overcast all week. Not exactly tomato growing weather. Claud

[mdvpc]

Claud

Looks very good. What varieties are you growing?

[saltmarsh]

mdvpc,
Peron Sprayless tomatoes, Garden Sunshine bell peppers, red, yellow, and purple cayenne peppers, Pingtung Long eggplant, and Yellow Borettana Onions. I'll transplant lettuce into the bed in a couple of weeks. Right now, it's 41 degrees outside and 57 degrees inside the cold frame at the farthest point from the heater. Claud

[mdvpc]

Claud and JL

Please update thread when you can.

[saltmarsh]

Jl, I've grown indet. inside in a grow box. I used tomato clips (you can see them in the closeup posted above) and as I harvested the tomatoes from the lower clusters and the plants grew, I lowered the tomato plants down and wound them around the grow box. When they finished up the vines were 15 feet from the bottom of the vine to the top. Those were Big Beef and Better Boy. The Better Boys did much better under those low light conditions than the Big Beef. The Better Boys set about 4 times as many tomatoes as the Big Beef even though the vines were about the same. Claud

[hillbillyBob]

I topped my last group when they reach the roof,get pinch out the crown

[jlwalke12]

Saltmarsh can you explain what you mean by lowering them and winding. Also does topping them off mean cutting them off when they reach the cieling? Very good looking tomatos by the way.

[saltmarsh]

JL, I made a drip pan for the 2 grow boxes I used and screwed 7' support arms onto the base of the drip pan. Then I screwed a 1 3/8" wooden closet rod to the top of the arms. I used a 25' nylon twine tied to the closet rod to support each stem. The excess twine was wound up and held with a rubberband until needed. By the time the plants reached the dowel rod the first clusters at the bottom of the vine had ripened and the lower leaves removed. I then untied the string and trained the stems of the tomatoes to wind around the grow boxes allowing the plants to continue growing up the twine.

To top the tomato means to pinch out the growing tip at the top of each stem. If you don't allow the tomato to produce new suckers, topping the stem will cause the plant to redirect its energy to ripening its existing fruit clusters. It's common practice to prune tomatoes to a single stem in greenhouse production.

The Cold Frame in the picture above is just an experiment I wanted to try to answer some questions that had been bouncing around in my head. All of the stems are topped after the seventh cluster is produced, but some of the tomatoes are pruned to 2 stems and some to 3 stems, so some plants now have 14 bloom clusters and some have 21 bloom clusters. Will all the plants produce the same number of pounds of fruit or not. What will the individual tomatoes weigh. Will the additional fruit clusters cause more problems with blossom end rot or not. How much warmer does the soil stay inside as opposed to the outside soil temp (currently 75 degrees inside and 52 degrees outside - 2 inches below the surface) How hot will the cold frame get on a sunny day and the plastic down (+134 degrees at 10:30 in the morning with an outside temp of 52 degrees. That's why I had to install the cooling pipe and fan in the picture above.) And on and on and on. Claud