Great Big Plants

[Sodak]

http://www.greatbigplants.com/Tomato...act-s/1823.htm

I received this from Laurel last year and used it as a "dunking" mix for transplants. They did well, but they were in new potting mix or new raised beds and used TTF for fertilizer after that and had good results. Used Neptune mix as a foliar spray as well.

Anybody else used this "liquid compost" or have a take on it?

Dick

[FILMNET]

Sounds nice, I use Neptune's also, actually i am growing herbs in pots which will be in these pots all summer. I put Neptune water in the dirt before putting the seeds in. They all came up in 1 week, really fast for me.

[b54red]

I was more than happy with Texas Tomato Food last year and hope it works as well this year.

Bill

[carolyn137]

I do like Neptunes Harvest products as well, but partly b'c that's where the variety now called Neves Azorean Red came from, as given to the then owner, I means the tomatoes, in exchange for the fish and seaweed fertilizers, both cold pressed to retain micronutrients.

Carolyn

[Sodak]

Carolyn, do you dip the transplants' rootball in anything prior to putting in the ground?

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by Sodak

Carolyn, do you dip the transplants' rootball in anything prior to putting in the ground?

No I didn't Dick.

My set up when I was in my prime tomato growing days was growing tomatoes by sprawling, in 250 ft long rows where I had many hundreds of plants and varieties each season. Distances within the rows was about 3-4 ft and distance between rows was 5 ft so that cultivation could be done, via tractor, at least initially, by one of the men who worked for Charlie, my good farmer friend who prepared my large field for me each year. And if Roy wasn't available I was out there with my Mantis tiller, using it as a mechanical hoe.

I preferred to set out plants, crawling along a row on my knees, that were rootbound, not fluffy as in a fibrous root system, since those fibrous roots break quickly and are very fragile.

Soooo, I always wanted slow steady growth that is the best for forming a new root system when those roots were adapting to real soil and never wanted to push them along with ANY fertilizers. So absolutely no dipping of rootballs into liquid fertilizers

Actually, by choice, I never put anythingin the planting hole except the plant, and then watered in to get rid of any air pockets.

And the plants were never fertilized until at least two weeks after being planted.

I used the Neptune's harvest stuff only as a foliage drench when I couldn't get near enough to the root system to add granular fertilizer.

Long answer, but that's what I did.

Carolyn

[Ken4230]

Originally Posted by carolyn137

My set up when I was in my prime tomato growing days was growing tomatoes by sprawling, in 250 ft long rows where I had many hundreds of plants and varieties each season.Carolyn

How much of a production increase, if any, do you think you got by letting the plants sprawl? My grandparents always said it was about a 20-30 % increase by letting them run.
When we canned lots of tomatoes, we grew mostly Rutgers on cardboard boxes that Sears refrigerators were shipped in. Spread the cardboard out, roll railroad ties up on the edges and put the plants in the ground.
The only fertilizer we used after the ground was prepared was a strong cow manure tea, applied when the blooms began to form. One more round when the tomatoes were marble size was it.

Now i use a bloom booster from the local farm store two or three times a year in my raised beds. It seems to work really well

Ken

[carolyn137]

Originally Posted by Ken4230

How much of a production increase, if any, do you think you got by letting the plants sprawl? My grandparents always said it was about a 20-30 % increase by letting them run.
When we canned lots of tomatoes, we grew mostly Rutgers on cardboard boxes that Sears refrigerators were shipped in. Spread the cardboard out, roll railroad ties up on the edges and put the plants in the ground.
The only fertilizer we used after the ground was prepared was a strong cow manure tea, applied when the blooms began to form. One more round when the tomatoes were marble size was it.

Now i use a bloom booster from the local farm store two or three times a year in my raised beds. It seems to work really well

Ken

Ken, all those years when I was growing at the old family farm the only way I did grow my tomatoes was by Sprawling. Growing up to 400 plants a season there was no way I could cage them or do anything else, and besides, of the many acres of tomatoes we used to grow on the farm when I was young, that's the only way we grew them.

So I have no comparisons to be able to tell you if there was an increased production.

When I moved where I am today, I was growing plants at three different places, a few here at home in a large raised bed, and now in some containers, and Freda, who helps me with cleaning and so much more, does that for me.

But before I landed in this walker I was growing lots of plants at the farm of Charlie, my farmer friend, which was near the old farm, and grew them in long rows there, and then in a place near where I now live in long strips of blocks, also sprawled, but then at a third place where I used the cages that Steve had made.

And sometimes the same varieties would be caged up here and also be sprawled at Charlie's farm, and again, no good way to compare yields since I'm not one who counts or weighs fruits.

At the old farm Charlie would plow under the plants in the Fall, then plant winter rye, then plow that in in the Spring, then disc and smooth my field for me.

Roy, his cousin, would fertilize with I think 5/10/5 or triple 10 with that automatic tractor mounted spreader, then come back from time to time to use the small harrow to get the weeds out between the rows.

But he often didn't have the time to do my field which was when I had to do everything manually.

The land where I was raised was owned by the Shakers and my grandfather bought the 90 acres in 1905 for 5K and then sold half of that the next year for 6K, paid off the loan, and we then farmed the 45 acres left.

There were several orchards that the Shakers had planted that were still bearing great fruit, my father had also planted two new peach orchards, rows of currants, black, red and white, the huge asparagus field was also planted by them, who knows when, and they must have raised both red and black raspberries at one time b'c the hedgerows had lots of what we called wild ones as well as asparagus clumps that had been spread there from seeds from the large field.

Carolyn