How to prune this? [PICS]

[cultivateIT]

Hi,

Can someone help me prune this tomato plant to one vine?
As you can see from the pic below, It branches out to 2 main vines.
So, which one do I knock off? They are roughly the same length.

http://i981.photobucket.com/albums/ae29 ... 1273643255

http://i981.photobucket.com/albums/ae29 ... 1273643564

[Kisal]

I wouldn't remove either one. They will both produce fruit. Your picture, in fact, looks exactly like one of my tomato plants did last year.

[a0c8c]

I'd get another pole and grow both stems, but if you really want to trim one, trim the one that isn't next to the pole already.

[cultivateIT]

I see. Thanks for the feedback guys.
The problem is: It is a raised bed and with room for only one stake, the one you already see in the pic. Is it okay to then stake both vines to the stake? Should I just go with 1 vine as mentioned, closest to the stake? How would you guys proceed?

Also, forgot to mention, in the first pic *noted: sucker, it is flowering.. do I still prune this sucker off?

So confused

[cynthia_h]

I grow veggies in raised beds. I had a very enthusiastic Roma in summer 2008 which decided to give me multiple strong branches. And, yes, there were competing veggies in neighboring soil.

I have a bag of old pantyhose which I use to tie up plants. (It's amazing how long they last when used as plant ties...) I simply tied the branches to the stake independently, using a figure 8 tie two or three times per pantyhose leg. This gives the plant support without the risk of strangling its circulation, and the multiple branches can counterbalance one another on the stake.

And I let the tomato plants grow as much as they want to, give me as many tomatoes as they want to. No pruning of tomatoes in this garden.

Cynthia H.
Sunset Zone 17, USDA Zone 9

[applestar]

The way I understand it, you only want to prune Indeterminate tomatoes because Determinate tomatoes only fruit as many fruits as they're geared to produce. Determinates should only be pruned to remove excessive foliage that block sunlight from the interior leaves (but remember to preserve shade for fruits prone to sunscald) and to maintain good air flow to avoid disease problems. Is yours an indeterminate?

Typically once the sucker/side shoot growth takes over, it develops faster than the original main stem and produce many flowers, so it's always a difficult choice to make. I think it would be OK to keep both of these stems and promise yourself to pluck off the side shoots as soon as you can get a good grip on them from here on. And yep, tie them both to the same stake.

[TZ -OH6]

For my staked tomatoes I remove the suckers below the first flower truss and then keep all forks and the occasional big sucker. This ends up being 3-4 vines per stake, any more and it gets unwieldy and crowded. I also have my stakes 2 ft apart. If they were closer I would prune a little more to benefit all of the plants.

[gixxerific]

I do practice selective suckering but I never remove a sucker that big.

[AIP]

I would not remove it.

[Kisal]

I tied both branches of my tomato to a single stake.

And I wouldn't remove that flowering sucker.

[cultivateIT]

Guys, thank you so much. Y'all are awesome here!
Responses are clear, informative, and doable.

I will keep both main vines A and B (tie them to the stake), and for the moment keep an eye on the flowering sucker for fruit

Thanks again for helping this newbie

*note: the tomato is an indeterminate variety called "brandywine". I think it is an heirloom variety.