Hydroponic Tomatoes

[Sequim]

Originally Posted by ElementalDomain

Hey that looks pretty good! Bet you feel like a proud father about now! Hydroponics is a steep learning curve - it is not in any form as forgiving as soil gardening. With soil things sort of creep up on you and you have much more time to affect a remedy. With hydro it can literally be here today, gone tomorrow.

Actually I've found the plants to be quite forgiving. Here are two serious blunders I've made, and in both cases the plants didn't even notice.

Blunder 1
Last winter I prepared a new batch of solution for my tomato line, installed it, and started the usual procedure of adjusting the pH (it changes radically for a day or so, then finally stabilizes). My final adjustment for the day was a big one; adding acid to make a big downward move.

The next morning I measured the pH, which was a shocking low 2.something. I immediately calibrated my meter and re-measured the same value.

So I tasted the solution and immediately realized that I had added the acid concentrate instead of the 1/10 diluted solution I should have used.

So I drained and rinsed the equipment, and refilled with new solution. Despite their overnight stay in the very sour solution the plants never showed any reaction.


Blunder 2

This time it was one of this summer's crops; I removed for maintenance the vortex atomizer that keeps the solution oxygenated, but forgot to reconnect its power on replacement. I don't know exactly how many days passed, but guess 4 or 5. I then noticed some strange bubbles on the solution surface when I took a test sample, but ignored them. The test sample was normal with little adjustment needed.

The following morning test showed the pH had spiked to over 8 from a normal 6.2. It didn't take much searching to find the disconnect. I drained, rinsed, and refilled the system and the plants seemed to take it all in a day's work.

But there was an aftermath to this one. This was one of two growing systems in the same greenhouse; same tomato variety, and same plant date. The plants in the troubled system had somewhat lagged in growth compared to their siblings in the other system. Withing a week of resolving the blunder they showed much more vigor and soon overtook their siblings. I guess a plant threatened enters an aggressive state to overcome the obstacles.


Pete

[Elagrow]

Its been a couple day's since I removed the rockwool, I since had 2 leafs die out and trimmed them from the plan. (bottom leaves) seems to be having some transplant shock, I hope it pulls through alright.

[Elagrow]

Tomato Update!!!

been going good so far, almost 1 month since planting the seeds and my good tomato plant is coming through well at this point it seems, has several good sized roots stringing from the netpot, has doubled in size since my last picture, and has several good leaves, at around 8-10 inches tall. it also sucked down around a quart of water in like 5 day's!!! little bugger is thirsty.

[Sequim]

Plants can be amazing. They really want to live and grow, and work very hard at doing so.


Pete

[Elagrow]

Well, I finally decided it was time to move my tomato plant into a larger grow area, so I put it in a 5 gallon bucket with a meshpot and hydroton medium... it outgrew the PC Grow Box. the 1 plant took up almost all the open area in the PC box. Ill post some pictures of it later, took me over an hour to get the roots out of the little 3" netpot, and didnt have time to take pictures.

[Elagrow]

I have an update on my Tomato Grow, and a few questions.

I scrapped the Roma Tomato Grow, I put it into a 5 gallon bucket but was unable to provide the light it needed to keep it growing strong, and it is dieing off. almost expected being my lack of experience with Hydroponics.

But on a brighter Note, I started a Bitonto Grow, and the plant has filled out the system nicely, it has even started to Flower, the leaves are dark green and look very healthy.

The question I have is, it started to flower a couple weeks ago, and I am unsure if there is anything else I need to do to make it veg. and how to increase the quality of the veg. I have read that I have to shock the plant with high PPM of nutrients in the solution to get the veg process to start, and I have heard that a lower light cycle can also help with vegging also. Anyone have any information about this?

Also, about the quality of the veg, is there anything I should do to increase the flavor of the fruit? I have heard that Hydro tomatoes tend to be very watered down, and almost completely flavorless, but there are ways to increase the flavor. Anything on this would be appreciated also.

[Cole_Robbie]

Where did you find Bitonto seed? Territorial doesn't have it, and I can't find it anywhere.

[Sequim]

Regarding the flowers, they need some form of mild agitation to assure thorough pollination. Bumblebees are good for this but I'm guessing you don't want to maintain a colony in your growing room. I use a retired Braun Oral B electric toothbrush, which I touch lightly to the blossom-laden trusses, but not to the blossoms themselves. You don't want to shake violently; just a little buzz. If the light is just right you will see little clouds of pollen dust falling from the blossoms.

The blossoms are receptive to pollination when their petals are bent far backward towards their stems. A truss might have only a few receptive blossoms near the end, and more that have already passed this opportunity.

I try to do this daily at mid day, but I've noticed that the blossoms remain receptive for a couple of days.

I've never seen any need for special tactics to switch a tomato plant into its reproductive state. They know when they are ready and get there without any help. My simple-minded guess is that the hormonal change is triggered when the roots are strong enough to deliver surplus energy so the plant decides to capitalize on this and start producing fruit.

I've found it important to hold back on nitrogen through the plants entire life, but especially so for young plants. My standard practice is to cap the solution nitrogen level at about 71 parts per million until the plants start setting fruit on their fourth cluster. Then I raise this cap to 117 ppm.

Oh, I should mention that this is for the vigorous hybrid tomatoes that I grow (Sun Gold, Sweet Cluster, and Bella Rosa). Your baby Bitonto reminds me of Red Robin, which would probably do better with slightly lower nitrogen levels.

I've built an Excel spreadsheet that helps to make sense of the element concentrations of nutrient solutions. It also keeps track of my various solution recipes, and prints log sheets to use for daily solution maintenance. I'd be happy to provide it if you'd like to try it. I made for my own use, and didn't make it particularly user-friendly, but if you know your way around Excel I think you'd figure it out pretty quickly. In it I have characterized most of the compounds I use to mix my nutrients. You would have to characterize the ones you use.

As for the "watery" issue, any fruiting plant that has constant access to water will maintain a high hydration level in all of its cells, including those of the fruit. You can mitigate this pretty well by keeping the EC (electrical conductivity) of your solution high, meaning you mix the nutrients more concentrated. This restricts the plants ability to uptake water. Try to do this while keeping the same proportions of element concentrations, maybe slightly decreasing the nitrogen proportion if you move the EC a long way up.

I keep the EC for my young plants around 1,600 microsiemens, and right now my adult plants are hovering around 2,350 microsiemens. I let this slide upward a bit as the solution approaches end of life, then start over with fresh solution around 2,200 microsiemens.

I've had good success adding sodium chloride (plain table salt) to the solution to raise the EC. Tomatoes tolerate this very well, but you have to add it gradually in case your variety is hyper sensitive. If you go too far the plant will quickly start to wilt, so be prepared to quickly add fresh water to dilute back down. I once overshot a long way, so I drained the solution, rinsed with fresh water, and started over with fresh solution. The plants recovered quickly.

I have not yet tried this, but a growing method that uses a water-retaining media with intermittent water application might give better control of plant hydration than the high EC approach. I'm hoping to have this implemented for my spring crop using an approximation of Dutch bucket growers with a mix of coir and Hydroton-like media.

My current winter crop is doing well right now, though its clear that I didn't allow enough space for the husky Bella Rosas. I took a few pictures of the plant growth process which I could post if you think they would be helpful to you. They are big hybrids though, maybe not a great role model for your little Bitonto.


Pete

[Elagrow]

Originally Posted by Cole_Robbie

Where did you find Bitonto seed? Territorial doesn't have it, and I can't find it anywhere.

I found them on territorial, in october or so. They should be restocking soon I think, I been seeing consignment seeds popping up in lowes already so i assume they are going to restock soon on territorial.

I have also had a few dud's in the packet I got, I am not sure how common those are with territorial but I found a couple.

To reply to Seq.

as far as pollinating, there is one thing that is worrying me, the blossoms seem to be fairly week in comparison with the rest of the plant, and have been showing for sometime but not going into a full blossom. Also, will it be able to polinate with just 1 plant, or does there need to be a female and male plant? I am unsure how to really tell the difference.

I also dont have a extra electric toothbush to follow your method of pollinating, could I use a toothpick or something and agitate it manually without damaging the flowers?


On another completely different topic, I am getting a warehouse soon and would like to dedicate an area for growing, being as you grow on a large scale indoors any tips would be greatly appreciated for when I start... just remember, im a beginner

[Sequim]

The tomato blossom includes both male and female parts and are therefore self-fertile. But they are not self-pollinating and so need a little help getting the pollen to fall out of the anther tubes and onto the sticky stigma. I've heard some growers claim that just tapping the base of the truss with a pencil a few times will release enough pollen to fully form a fruit. Of course you'd have to do this at least every other day, but daily would be better. Partially pollinated fruits will not develop to full size because only a portion of the potential seed chambers will develop.

Remember to tap the truss stem though, not the delicate blossoms. You just want to make them tremble a little without knocking them loose. I'm not sure a couple of taps is sufficient though. When I use the electric toothbrush I notice a rain of pollen lasting about 3 seconds before the supply is depleted

As for indoor growing, my hobby is definitely small scale. Right now I have only 7 plants growing under lights in a row that is 16 feet long. I now know I should have limited this to only 4 or 5 plants. This was my first experience growing Bella Rosa under lights, though I should have realized their size from last summer's greenhouse crop.

I'll look around for some pictures that you might find helpful.


Pete

[dice]

A couple of links on tomato flower anatomy:
http://www-plb.ucdavis.edu/labs/rost...e/flranat.html
What are called stamens in the illustrations and pictures above are
also called anthers.

http://www.kdcomm.net/~tomato/Tomato/xingtom.html

[Elagrow]

I went in to my system today to check if the blossoms were developed enough to start trying to pollinate, and they looked great so I started to tap the stems around them with a pencil, it created a pretty good amount of pollen in the box...

During this I noticed there was 3 very small tomatoes starting to grow, they were about the size of a dime.

[dice]

So, the things to know are that pollen forms on the inner surfaces
of the stamens/anthers. When the flower is receptive to pollenation,
it exudes a sticky substance that coats the stigma on the end of
the style (the "center post" of the flower, so to speak). When
the pollen falls off of the anthers and sticks to the stigma,
pollenation occurs and fruit form.

Vibration, like tapping the stem of the flower cluster, wind,
a bee grabbing the flower and vibrating it, etc, causes
the pollen to fall out of the anthers and get all over the stigma.

I have heard of pollenating tomatoes in large commercial
greenhouses by walking through them with a leaf blower.

[Elagrow]

Originally Posted by dice

So, the things to know are that pollen forms on the inner surfaces
of the stamens/anthers. When the flower is receptive to pollenation,
it exudes a sticky substance that coats the stigma on the end of
the style (the "center post" of the flower, so to speak). When
the pollen falls off of the anthers and sticks to the stigma,
pollenation occurs and fruit form.

Vibration, like tapping the stem of the flower cluster, wind,
a bee grabbing the flower and vibrating it, etc, causes
the pollen to fall out of the anthers and get all over the stigma.

I have heard of pollenating tomatoes in large commercial
greenhouses by walking through them with a leaf blower.

That is about how I did it, just a tap and blow technique, but I am unsure of how the tomatoes that are growing now got pollinated... o well, whatever it was seemed to work good enough to start the fruit

[Crandrew]

I'll be interested to see how it keeps developing the fruit. This is where the Light and nutes play a big part. Without proper lumens the fruit will grow slowly and potentially not develop properly. I'm interested to see how that 50hps works.