Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

market-farming - [Market-farming] Fertility for Growing Tomatoes

market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Market Farming

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: Allan Balliett <aballiett AT frontiernet.net>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [Market-farming] Fertility for Growing Tomatoes
  • Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2008 08:00:45 -0500

Good fertility - so they grow and produce before our southeastern diseases stop production

Can you folks give me a more concrete idea of what constitutes fertility for your tomatoes?

WE follow organic practices.

I used to plant my tomatoes by drilling a 12inch posthole 3 ft deep and then backfilling it with straight compost. Although, in theory, there is a lot wrong with planting anything like this, we got great tomatoes every year.

Now that we plant a lot more tomatoes, that approach is not practical.

I've taken to applying aged cow manure to the land the fall before, applying a general organic fertilizer in the spring and then making plastic covered beds and planting into that.

I admit: most everyone complains about their tomato crop around here the last few years BUT...

I worry because I've heard from some growers that too much N will restrict tomato productivity and not just by making plants that are too leafy. Some folks have told me that they don't apply any extra N to tomatoes.

I used to spray them with fish and sea weed weekly, but didn't do that last year.

I think there's a direct relationship between spraying fish on peppers and getting foliar diseases. (could be because increased N makes leaves softer and more invadeable by fungus) I don't have that feeling about tomatoes, which do seem to get early blight regardless of how I raise them or bed them.

Thanks

-Allan Balliett
Shepherdstown, WV
Zone 7




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page