my tomato garden 9-24-2011
 

The tomatoes plants are still looking really good even at this late date.

Nice looking plants KY. Can you explain the buckets to me, I assume the bottoms are cut out. How does that affect the root system. Yours are staked, would the buckets work with cages and unpruned plants? My plants got septoria late in the season, they always have. Been removing all plant matter at end of season for a couple years now, and it seems to have helped a lot, the septoria comes later now. Had plenty of maters right til it was time to pull and winter cover. Do you spray? Never sprayed before, but am going to try several home made brews next year. Don't care for commercial sprays, I am not totally organic with fertilizer, but use no toxins, although every thing is toxic at the right level, lol, even water.:D

wow, they look great! Very healthy and robust. And looks like you will be harvesting many more tomatoes later :)

Looking good Greg. Ami

Impressive considering the punishing heat this year.

[QUOTE=kenny_j;234845]Nice looking plants KY. Can you explain the buckets to me, I assume the bottoms are cut out. How does that affect the root system. Yours are staked, would the buckets work with cages and unpruned plants? My plants got septoria late in the season, they always have. Been removing all plant matter at end of season for a couple years now, and it seems to have helped a lot, the septoria comes later now. Had plenty of maters right til it was time to pull and winter cover. Do you spray? Never sprayed before, but am going to try several home made brews next year. Don't care for commercial sprays, I am not totally organic with fertilizer, but use no toxins, although every thing is toxic at the right level, lol, even water.:D[/QUOTE]

[LEFT][COLOR=#000000]Yes they are 5 gallon buckets cut in half with the bottom cut out. I dig my hole, fill it with potting soil/mix and tap the "bucket sleeves" down an inch or two. The bucket sleeves help with keeping my big feet off seedlings while I am working in the garden and also help with cut worms (I think). In addition I ony have to water inside the sleeves and put any soil ammendments there also. Also as the seedlings grow, I add more soil mix to the bucket sleeves, perhaps simulating "potting up".

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I think they would work well with cages. I prune plants primarily for disease prevention, not because of the bucket sleeves. Pruning however does make the bucket sleeves more accessible. This year my plants did not look good early on; septoria I assume but I am not real knowledgeable on diseases. I use Daconil every year. This year I also used a copper solution and in addition sprayed with diluted molasses and also some hyrogen peroxide.

Great job!
21 of my plants have already been pulled. The others are hanging on but aren't doing much! Instead of a table full of tomatoes, we have a plate full and the plate is getting smaller and smaller.

Enjoy the late harvest!

I am so jealous. Your plants look great! I have only a few pineapples hanging on for dear life with a few tomatoes left and hardly any leaves ! Great job!