Greetings all.
I have planted two varieties of tomato plants this year, Roma and Celebrity. These performed very well for me last year so I figured I would only plant them.
What I thought I would try is to stake all my plants, as I have done in the past, but this time I thought I would pinch all of the suckers off to a single stem. I expect I will really need to do that because I planted the plants 2 feet apart with 3 feet between the rows.
Now to my question. I read somewhere that you shouldn't pinch suckers off or Romas...that you should let them grow multiple stems. Is there anything to that?
Tell me it is okay to prune my Romas to a single stem and that I didn't screw up by planting my plants so close together in anticipation that I would be able to do so.
Thanks kids.
- hendi_alex
- Super Green Thumb
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Celebrity is a determinate but gets taller and produces over a longer season than most determinate varieties. The plants grow so vigorously that IMO thinning out the suckers probably makes sense. But just as an experiment, why not thin out a vine or two and compare the results to those that are not pinched back.
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- Green Thumb
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Just my experience:
I had a volunteer Roma last year that went berserk. It ended up flopping over, so I popped a couple stakes in the ground and tied them together to try to prop up the plant. I eventually gave up and let it do its thing. In the end, it was nearly 4' tall and spread out about 7' or so in diameter on the ground.
That plant produced into October, although the quality of the fruits dropped as the season went along because the plant got fairly diseased. Nonetheless, I harvested many, many lbs of tomatoes from that thing over 3-4 months.
I had a volunteer Roma last year that went berserk. It ended up flopping over, so I popped a couple stakes in the ground and tied them together to try to prop up the plant. I eventually gave up and let it do its thing. In the end, it was nearly 4' tall and spread out about 7' or so in diameter on the ground.
That plant produced into October, although the quality of the fruits dropped as the season went along because the plant got fairly diseased. Nonetheless, I harvested many, many lbs of tomatoes from that thing over 3-4 months.
- hendi_alex
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 3604
- Joined: Sun Jul 06, 2008 7:58 am
- Location: Central Sand Hills South Carolina