Question about pinching

[wolfcry]

Hello all,

Awesome place you have here!

I have a question about the pinching of new leaves that start to form on the seedling.

I read the sticky about this but am alittle confused and, to be honest, a little worried.

I have approximately 20 tomato seedlings growing and I was advised to 'pinch' off all new growth on the seedling. Recently I've been noticing new leaves growing and I pinched them all off; leaving the first two top leaves.

Did I do this right or did I just damage my tomato plants? Also, I read at other places not to pinch off the leaves but leave them until you get about '5 - 6' levels of new leaves (not including the top two leaves) and plant them under the soil to produce a stronger root system.

Is this correct?

Thanks for all your help.

[TZ -OH6]

I think you just screwed up big time.


If you plant multiple seeds in a pot and only need one of them you can either dig up the extra seedlings and replant, or pinch them off to kill them.


When you go to plant out you want a few inches of stem underground, so you may have to pinch off a few of the lower leaves that would be buried.


On larger plants out in the garden, once the side branches (suckers) start to form in the leaf axils you can pinch some or all of these off in order to manage the size of teh plant.



Near the end of the season, in order to stop your plants from overgrowing cages etc, you can pinch off the tops to stop growth.

[hendi_alex]

I'm not a big fan of leaf pinching. The leaves are the factory of the plant. Especially when starting out, the leaves will help generate a thick, healthy plant with just a couple weeks of growth. IMO pinching leaves at the early stage will slow down the process. I do like to have at least six inches of bare stem at the bottom of the plant when it is planting time. So bottom leaves are pinched at that time. Also, I remove any lower limbs that might contact the soil. Additional pruning on more mature plants, for me, would involve limiting the amount of sucker growth, and removing inner limbs/leaves to open the plant up for better air flow.

[GardenJester]

I assume you have yet to tranplant the seedlings into the ground? and the suckers are growing below the point of where you will eventually bury the plant when you transplant the seedling into the ground? If you are going to transplant soon, it doesn't really matter if you pinch or not, may be even better not to, because you don't want to stress the plant unnessarily just before transplanting. If transplant date is still awhile yet, then pinch away. No point having the plant growing leafs you just going to bury anyway.

[TZ -OH6]

OK, I misread slightly. When you said top growth I thought you meant you pinched the tops off, which is done with some plants (not tomatoes) to induce lateral branch growth. If you had done that it would have set the plants back weeks. Removing lower leaves is not as bad, but it weakens the plant and slows growth. Don't remove any leaves until the day-of or day-before you put them into garden soil (when planting deep).

[wolfcry]

TZ, when I had read your reply I was terrified. I was like, noooo in slow motion lol.

I'm not new to gardening but this is my first time growing tomatoes. I'm pretty excited about it.

Ok, it's good to know that I didn't do any serious damage and no, I haven't transplanted them yet. Won't be for about another month. Sorry, for not making that clear.

Thanks for of your help guys. really appreciated!

[gixxerific]

I'm confused a bit myself here. Did you pinch of the seed leaves, the first leaves that come out at the very beginning. If so that is not good. The seed leaves are where the plants get it's nutrient from in order to form the true leaves that follow.

[wolfcry]

gixxerific (cool username )

No, I didn't pinch off the top two leaves. I left those alone. All I pinched off were the new tiny leaves growing between the joint. Or at least they appeared to be growing from between the joint.

I was worried because I wasn't sure if I was pinching them correctly or if I was pinching off essential leaves.

See that's where I'm confused. The new leaves that start to form (under or around the joint of the cotyledons), are the true leaves right? Am I not supposed to pinch those off or are they also considered the suckers as well and can / should be pinched off?

It also appears pinching tomato seedlings is a controversial topic amongst fellow gardeners.

Thanks for the input

[TZ -OH6]

Ok now I see what you did. I thought the seelings were bigger and you wiped out some true leaves too. The seed leaves often fall off once the seedling gets a little bigger, but they are needed as long as possible. generally you pot up to them or even cover them once the true leaves rise above them a bit. You can pinch them off if they are going to be buried if you like.


I had nightmares of "Organic Tomato Magic" being done on innocent baby plants.

[gixxerific]

I see now too. Yes you can pinch off the suckers if you want.

I "sucker" mine to a certain extent but not all of them. I really can't explain it but what feels good to me. Maybe half or so. I normally have very huge bushy plants with lots of fruit. Usually about half way through they are too big to sucker anyways. Too hard to figure out what is what by than.