How to Grow and Harvest Tomatoes

INSIDE: COME SEE HOW TO GROW AND HARVEST TOMATOES WITH SIMPLE STEPS AND DIRECTIONS – EVEN A CHILD CAN FOLLOW THEM.

Assuming you don’t have a child like we do (she picks tomatoes off the plant and eats them like apples), you can follow these simple rules to produce some amazing tomatoes. Tomatoes from the garden are much more tasty than the ones from the grocery store!

Here are a few things we need to understand about tomatoes before we get started. They like sunlight but don’t love HEAT. So make sure you pick a place they will get plenty of sun and plenty of shade too. The plants need great draining soil since they do not do well with over-watered spaces. Your tomatoes will need a support system while growing, like a cage. These babies can tip over very easily…trust me! It’s worth the investment!

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Ok, now that we understand we are taking on a more complicated beast….let’s get started.

1 – Growing from seeds

Build you own indoor greenhouse with biodegradable pots, seed starting mix (organic like this one), organic seeds, and a greenhouse made out of foil pans with plastic lids (like this). I encourage you to find that green and white label on your seeds for true organic gardening.

To create your greenhouse:

1. Lay out the foil pans
2. Break the pots apart and lay them in the foil pans
3. Don’t over stuff your greenhouse, just buy extra foil pans…they are only $1
4. Put the seed starting soil in the pots – pack the soil slightly
5. Follow the directions on the seed package for how deep to insert the seed
6. Water the soil
7. Put water at the bottom of the foil pan, just enough to reach all the pots, DO NOT over water the bottom
8. Put the top on the foil pan
9. Place the pan in the sunlight
10. The sun and water will create a greenhouse for you! SO don’t open it until it’s time to water.

2 – Harden your seedlings

Just like kids – you have to acclimate your seeds to the outdoor world. It can be a cruel place….so the week before your last frost, take your greenhouse top down and set the seedlings outside for a few hours in the shade. You may have some die…that’s ok…survival of the fittest! Each day you place them outside, increase their exposure to longer sunlight.

3 – Transplanting

When the day has come, and the frost is gone, you can take your little seedlings to their final resting place.

Check out this post to help you decide where to plant.

You can container garden with tomatoes or they can go directly into the ground. The key is giving them a good start no matter where you plant them.

If your seedlings are leggy – that is they are tall and sort of falling over – you will need to bury them deeper into the ground. Don’t worry about where their roots are, tomatoes will grow roots from their stems if they need to. Remember to peel off the bottom layer of the pots before placing them in the final place. They tend not to grow roots out of those so easily. I HIGHLY recommend placing your cage around the plant at this time. That way you will not have any damage to their roots as they grow, the roots will grow around the stakes.

Water your plants after you have transplanted them, so you don’t cause root shock.

4 – Daily care

Water these babies. They need it every day! Water them in the early morning, so they can survive a hot day.

When your seedlings are stronger and start to form a solid stem, pinch off the bottom leaves. You do not want ANY leaves touching the soil. This invites bugs and diseases all the way up the stem, stop it before it gets to your fruit!

I have never tried this but I just read an article that SWEARS by surrounding the stems with rocks above the surface. This is supposed to keep the moisture in the soil for longer. I don’t know if it will work in my hot and humid climate, but I’m certainly going to try it! Mulch is supposed to do the same thing, but if you are organic gardening…mulch is treated wood!!!! So I don’t recommend using it.

5 – Harvesting

Now we get to reap the benefits of all our hard work!!!!! Bring on the yummy-ness!!!

Tomatoes are ready to harvest when the fruit is bright. THINK vibrant colors!!! It can have some discoloration around the stem still, but not much. And just like when you are checking at the grocery store, a little firm. Remember, you can ripen them more inside.

6 – Storage

If you don’t already know this – YOU ARE WELCOME – never store tomatoes in the fridge. EVER….they will lose their flavor!

A few tricks to keeping them fresh longer:

1. Pick the whole stem out of the fruit
2. Store them stem side down – this will keep the moisture in
3. Never store them near a window – they will ripen faster and rot before they even ripen
4. If you want to freeze them, core them like an apple, place in a plastic freezer bag and into the freezer they can go…but be warned, the skin will fall off as they defrost

If you need to ripen them faster, place them stem side up inside a PAPER bag. But if you are growing your own, chances are you will always have some on that are at the proper ripe stage.

Hope you have all the tools you need to grow some yummy, garden fresh tomatoes. Have questions? Send me a comment!

Happy Harvesting,