permaculture

[tanya <tanyagarden@gmail.com>]

Oops! I looked back at my source and actually it doesn't have anything to
do with photosynthesis or sugars.

The root pruning is done 2-3 weeks before expected frost, in a circle 1
foot out from the stem and 6 inches down. Cutting the main feeder roots
limits access to water and nutrients, which shuts down vegetative growth.
The plant then focuses on ripening fruits that are full size but still
green. So think of it as a stressed plant diverting all its resources to
reproduction, and producing viable seeds. Also think about what a plant
does if you cut one branch: it makes two more. As long as the plant has
access to water and nutrients, it will try to produce more leaves and
blossoms.

That original discussion was about topping plants -- reducing overgrown
plants to a manageable size -- and the experts were saying that it takes
too much time to do that if you have many plants, and that it's more
effective to stress the roots by cutting as above, or by yanking and
twisting the whole plant (just enough to sever the feeder roots). They were
also talking about east-coast cold-winter climates.

Here in the land of almost no summer rain, some people at the community
garden stop watering tomatoes after July 1. Their tomatoes are well mulched
and lots of cover crops were incorporated before the plants were planted. I
generally water no more than every 10 days once tomatoes start producing.
Withholding water improves the flavor, though fruit size may be smaller. I
generally have a good harvest until Oct. 15, though flavor starts to
decline after Sept. 15 or so because of cooler nights, and some smaller
tomatoes and cherry tomatoes keep producing until the first frost around
Dec. 1. A big rain in Oct. will cut the season short, however -- foliar
diseases propagate quickly on wet leaves. So in my climate, the
season-ending event can be a big rainfall, rather than a frost.

On Tue, Jun 25, 2013 at 12:41 PM, David Muhl <dmuhl65@yahoo.com> wrote:
I was also thinking about what Tanya had to say about the "folklore" of
end-season pinching, specifically about the sugars and sweetness.  If the
shoots are just these little 2-3" growing tips, and you pinch them before
they fill out, you would still have basically the same amount of vegetative
mass actively photosynthesizing as before. And again, I'm taking about the
last 7-14 days of the plants life here. Now, wouldn't other factors, such
as soil quality, plant variety, and ripeness play a more dominant role in
the brix content of the fruit?  I have heard of cutting back on water prior
to final harvest, and I'm wondering if the trimming of roots idea may play
into that.  There are no shortage of tasks or experiments that can be
conducted on a farm, and like many endeavors, one has to prioritize what
they want to take on...based on what the perceived benefit may or may not
be.