So Texans, Where do you Stand on Tomatoes?

[karstopography]

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I brought in the bigger and better half of the Bella Rosa tomatoes. The plant will surely die Monday when the temperatures dip well below freezing. Maybe these will ripen into something edible. I could also make some fried green tomatoes.

[karstopography]

22 out of 24 up. Only Aunt Ginny’s Purple and Giant Belgium remain dormant.

[karstopography]

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Got all the tomato, pepper, and eggplant seedlings outside on this sunny 65° afternoon. They all needed watering and I prefer doing that outside, weather permitting. Maybe the warm sunshine will stimulate the last two tomato seeds yet to sprout, Aunt Ginny’s Purple and Giant Belgium. I think Nora might be the only pepper that hasn’t come up. I reseeded that one. If AGP and GB don’t sprout soon, I might reseed those or just say better luck next year.

[karstopography]

Aunt Ginny’s Purple sprouted. Only Giant Belgium of the 24 hasn’t sprouted. Labeled 2018 seed, might be past its prime.

I picked out any weak looking sprouts and have now thinned most cells to three plants per cell if there were more that three sprouting. I got a little heavy handed seeding at times so there might be six or seven seeds to start with. Once they get some true leaves and a little more developed, I’ll separate each into their own individual 3” or 4” containers, probably the next convenient warm, 60-70°day. I like to do all this repotting outside so I don’t have to think about the mess.

Maybe I’ll keep the best two of some varieties or just one, depending on my grow light space limitations. Still can’t decide how many to transplant plant. Twenty or so seems reasonable.

[karstopography]

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These are definitely getting more color. Now I’m getting hopeful.

[karstopography]

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The tomato line up this afternoon under the grow light.

[karstopography]

All 24 came up, even Giant Belgium. True leaves are just starting to bud out. Eggplant are on the right front.

Been so cold here these are staying a little colder than they might otherwise. That’s alright, I’m in no hurry to transplant.

I’ll have two or three times more starts than needed. Time to find some takers, although, no one thinks about growing tomatoes around here when it freezing out.

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[MissS]

Those cool temps will slow down your growth and make your plants nice and stocky. I always try to get my seedlings into cooler temps just for this reason. I don't always succeed with it though.

[karstopography]

Those cool temps will slow down your growth and make your plants nice and stocky. I always try to get my seedlings into cooler temps just for this reason. I don't always succeed with it though.

Supposed to get up into the 60s today. Plan is to take the seedlings outside and water with a bit of fertilizer in the mix, probably a weak solution of fish emulsion. I like to do any watering outside as it allows the plants and soil surface to dry out a little faster. I don’t want to deal with dampening off. Jiffy soiless starter is the top layer and Baccto premium potting soil is underneath and that underlayer has some nutrients, but a bit of nitrogen from the fish emulsion will help stave off any anemic growth.

I’m also going to put some of the peppers into bigger containers. Got to take advantage of a warmer day, once again some colder air is inbound and arrives tomorrow. Easier to do all the messy stuff outside rather than in.

I can fit three aluminum roaster pans in my grow light zone. The bigger containers all these seedlings will eventually go into be the limiting factor on how many I can transplant. I still don’t have an exact number of each, tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant I want to plant. If I use 2.5’ spacing, approximately 5 square feet per plant, I can fit 18 tomato plants in my prime, best situated raised beds. But, that means some of the 24 varieties I started get left cut from the list. I probably can squeeze in the remaining six plants into the other beds somewhere.

[karstopography]

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Slowly, these Bella Rosa are gaining color.

[karstopography]

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I got these all outside yesterday for a good drink as it was a perfect day outside for tomato seedlings. The sun was muted a bit with some thin clouds, the temperature pretty perfect at or a little below 70° and there was just enough breeze to be good for strengthening the tomato stems. I didn’t feed them anything yet as the underlying potting soil looks like it has enough nutrients to keep these growing well for now. The true leaves are only just coming out anyway. The 2018 MMMM seed of Giant Belgium did eventually sprout several days behind most of its peers. I guess older seed takes longer to wake up.

I thinned almost all them to two plants per cell. In a couple of weeks, I’ll upsize the containers and maybe get down to thirty something tomato plants total, perhaps 18 or 20 to plant mid-late February and the remainder withheld in reserve into March for insurance. The transplanting window opens up about 30 days for now, I’ll be looking at 10 day forecasts around February 10th.

[karstopography]

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Taking the seedlings outside today. No chance of scorching sun, but plenty bright enough even with some drippy rain off and on and the breeze is guaranteed to strengthen the stems. Currently 62° going to 67°. Only thing I need to monitor is the chance of strong storms. Don’t think they are quite ready for that yet. I generally take my seedlings outside whenever the weather allows instead of doing all the hardening off at the end of the period.

I’ll have to upsize containers soon. The entire week looks doable temperature wise.

Edit: I noticed in the photo a potato leaf and a regular leafed plant in the same cell, Missouri Pink Love Apple. The regular leaf seedling just got pulled, I’m betting it was an escapee from the neighboring Principe Borghese.

[karstopography]

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I separated my tomato seedlings. 15 got put into the square 3-4” sized containers, the rest are still in the six packs. Plan is to offload several this weekend to a garden friend and he can grow them. That’ll free up some grow light real estate to up size a few peppers.

[karstopography]

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Getting all of the little plants outside today. 62° currently, going to 68° with some mid level thin cloud cover and a light northerly breeze. Seems like a day with near ideal conditions to thicken up the stems. I have never confined hardening off to some rigid schedule of the last one or two weeks before transplanting. If the weather is right, the plants go outside.

[karstopography]

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I gave everyone a drink with some diluted fish emulsion. Some of the plants could be greener, but the fish emulsion should correct that in short order. I upsized the containers for the remaining eggplant. Some plants are a little floppy from the watering, but they’ll likely straighten out by sundown. It’s warm enough for staging them in the garage overnight for the next several days and bringing them out into the sunshine during the day. 60s for highs for the remainder of the month. Any fish smell should be gone well before I have to bring them back inside the house.

I have maybe 30 days more of this in and out shuttling of plants. I actually enjoy the process. Hopefully, my friend can get down here this weekend and take some of the plants. He’s got zero eggplant going and his tomato seeds germinated very poorly, probably because he used those plant starter pods.

[karstopography]

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Gray and a bit cooler day here after the abundant sunshine of yesterday. I started with the tomatoes out on the fire ring, but some showers moved in and I decided I didn’t need them to get any more water or especially beat up if the rain got any heavier.

This dumpster dive drafting table serves me pretty well for an ad hoc greenhouse since I wasn’t keen on bringing the wet plants inside. Currently 64° in the garage, 59° outside, and I want to slow the progress on these little plants, but not so much so as to harm them in some serious way. The window faces west so they’ll get whatever sunlight is able to materialize. The portable LED lights should help keep things moving or at least creep forward.

[Wildcat82]

IMG_6716.jpegGray and a bit cooler day here after the abundant sunshine of yesterday. I started with the tomatoes out on the fire ring, but some showers moved in and I decided I didn’t need them to get any more water or especially beat up if the rain got any heavier.

This dumpster dive drafting table serves me pretty well for an ad hoc greenhouse since I wasn’t keen on bringing the wet plants inside. Currently 64° in the garage, 59° outside, and I want to slow the progress on these little plants, but not so much so as to harm them in some serious way. The window faces west so they’ll get whatever sunlight is able to materialize. The portable LED lights should help keep things moving or at least creep forward.

I'm envious - your seedlings look great.

Unfortunately I won't`be posting much in this thread for a while since pretty much all seedlings have died or are in the process of dying. Of the 12 seedlings I planted 1 December and another 12 planted Mid-December, only 2 Maglia Rosa's look like they might make it. And the 4 of the 6 Sungold clones I took in Mid-December have died and the other 2 are in the process of dying. This supernatural stuff happens to me every year.

This year I did the following:
1. used fresh seeds
2. used sterile peat pellets in sterilized starting trays
3. Used professional grow lights are directed
4. used a heat mat to maintain 75 degree
5. bottom water the seedlings only when the peat pellets are very dry
6. watered with 1/2 strength Miracle Grow every 10 days
7. transplanted my seedlings into sterile cups filled with Fox farms potting soil when they got 2 true leaves, about 3 weeks.

I always get very good germination rates but after a couple weeks, the seedlings languish. Your 3 week old seedlings are way bigger than my 6 week old seedlings. I figured that the peat pellets might be too dense to prevent air flow so I gently crumbled away the moist pellets for half my seedlings when I planted into potting soil. It was shocking to see there were essentially no roots on the plants.

The SunGold clones were taken in mid-December and transplanted into sterile cups filled with potting soil. They did great for about 3 weeks then became stunted,withered and are dying.

The only possible explanation is that there must be some type of airborne fungus/mold in my house. We keep our house pretty clean and I've never seen mold but no other explanation makes sense. The only way I have ever been able to grow any seedlings in the past 5 years is to use the brute force approach - grow 100 seedlings and 5-6 outliers may survive.

It looks like I will be forced, as usual, to buy some crappy little tomato plants at the nursery in March like everyone else. Til then, @karstopography, we'll be relying on you for updates.

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[karstopography]

@Wildcat82 I’m sorry about your tomato plants. What a mystery. I wish you success finding out what disease or condition is harming your plants. My friend nearby has had trouble with his tomato seedlings this year also. Does not appear we can take these things going 100% A-Okay, disaster is always on the prowl.


I moved my seedlings out into the garage. It’s a little cooler out there and I have more room in the garage. I’m trying to slow down my plants a bit. Garage is 63° and that’s about where I want them. I’m soon to be upsizing the containers for the tomatoes I have in the six pack starter cells. I have room for only three trays inside, but can do at least four out in the garage and do a fifth (and sixth and seventh if need be) inside.

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[KaguyaCloud]

@Wildcat82
That's quite strange considering that I basically do the exact same as you do with Fox Farm Ocean forest and liquid synthetic fertilizer(but I water from the top). Do you find the leaves of your seedlings being very soft to the touch or even wilted when they're in the process of dying? I find myself to needing to water at least every 2-3 days for my seedlings when they reach that size. Peat based soil media is very hydrophobic when it becomes really dry, I wonder if that's one of the reasons that root growth is hindered if the soil isn't fully saturated when it is watered.

The amount of nutrients in a container that small is actually not that much. I've grown things in Fox Farm Ocean forest with basil seedlings in a 6 inch pot and they usually become nutrient deficient once 6 leaves grow out. It's possible you need to fertilize much more frequently with the miracle grow, possibly every 2-5 days. I water ppm meter may help with measuring the nutrient levels, but I find plants get stunted once it's less than 400ppm.

You can do some tests as well such as sow seedlings and keep the potting soil as moist as you can for 3 weeks with more regular fertilization.

[Wildcat82]

@Wildcat82
That's quite strange considering that I basically do the exact same as you do with Fox Farm Ocean forest and liquid synthetic fertilizer(but I water from the top). Do you find the leaves of your seedlings being very soft to the touch or even wilted when they're in the process of dying? I find myself to needing to water at least every 2-3 days for my seedlings when they reach that size. Peat based soil media is very hydrophobic when it becomes really dry, I wonder if that's one of the reasons that root growth is hindered if the soil isn't fully saturated when it is watered.

The amount of nutrients in a container that small is actually not that much. I've grown things in Fox Farm Ocean forest with basil seedlings in a 6 inch pot and they usually become nutrient deficient once 6 leaves grow out. It's possible you need to fertilize much more frequently with the miracle grow, possibly every 2-5 days. I water ppm meter may help with measuring the nutrient levels, but I find plants get stunted once it's less than 400ppm.

You can do some tests as well such as sow seedlings and keep the potting soil as moist as you can for 3 weeks with more regular fertilization.

For several years I watered and fertilized my seedlings more frequently but always got damping off problems. Now I try to water the seedlings when the pellets get really dry but the seedlings aren't wilting. I've read many times on this forum that drying out the seedling a bit is good for them since it encourages root growth. But my seedlings just don't grow or send out any roots. They've never wilted but the roots on my 6 week plants consist of a couple of 1 centimeter long roots.

I'm convinced this is some sort of disease problem that affects everything in my grow room. It's not just the seedlings, it's also the clones. It looks like some kind of slow acting bacterial wilt but bacterial wilt is caused by a soil-borne bacteria. How in the world would a clone potted up in a sterile cup filled with soiless mix develop a soil-borne bacterial disease?