Thursday, November 6, 2008

Speaking Laterally

Can you believe it . It looks like the automatic weather information gathering thing in Toowoomba broke down last night and now I have no idea how much rain we had, yes it rained buckets here for a couple a hours, but judging by what is in the bottom of the weed buckets I leave lying around there would have been at least 25 to 30mm so it's all smiles around here.

Laterally speaking.

A few friends here in Toowoomba are growing Tomatoes for the first time and I asked them what they knew about lateral growth on their toms and both said they had heard about them but were not sure what it's about, so here's my attempt to explain lateral growth on Tomatoes and what and why and how we do anything about them.
OK first what. This only applies to what the boffins call Indeterminate tomatoes, that is the ones we usually tie up to a stake for support.
Now you will find these sneaky little buggers, laterals that is not the boffins, between the junction of a leaf and usually the main stem. As shown in the photo above, you can just see where I'm pointing a twig.
Now all that needs to be done is to pinch these little extra stems out so they can't grow any more.

Why. Mainly because if all the laterals are left to grow you will have to much extra growth that will weaken the plant to the point where it produces numerous small fruits that may not even ripen.
The photo on the left shows the lateral pinched out.
This pinching out of laterals will need to be done on a regular basis all the way from the bottom to the top of the bush.
If the photos aren't clear enough I'm happy to do them again for anyone who wants then.

1 comment:

Cathode said...

that's great advice! Thanks Stewart.