An old French method of dwarfing tomatoes

[Shule]

'The French mode of raising tomatoes is as follows: "As soon as the cluster of flowers is visible, they top the stem down to the cluster, so that the flowers terminate the stem. The effect is, that the sap is immediately impelled into the two buds next below the cluster, which soon push strongly, and produce another cluster of flowers each. When these are visible, the branch to which they belong is also topped down to their level; and this is done five times successively. By this means, the plants become stout, dwarf bushes, not above eighteen inches high. In order to prevent their falling over, sticks or strings are stretched horizontally along the rows, so as to keep the plants erect. In addition to this, all laterals that have no flowers, and, after the fifth topping, all laterals whatsoever, are nipped off. In this way, the ripe sap is directed into the fruit, which aquires a beauty, size, and excellence unattainable by other means." --Gard. Chron.'

The Field and Garden Vegetables of America (1863), by Fearing Burr, Jr., p. 632.

Note that there is another method of growing tomatoes (not by dwarfing them) listed before the French one.

[JRinPA]

Will it force earlier ripening? Earlier tomatoes from that plant? I'm willing to try it.

It sounds like the the inverse of single stemming.

[Pippin]

Love the book and the method. I might try this too, it’s like forcing an indeterminate to a determinate.

I cannot figure out if there still is a single stem or multiple? It sounds like all topping is done on the main stem?

[Shule]

@JRinPA @Pippin

I haven't tried this, yet, but, I thought it sounded interesting.

I don't know the answers, but it sounds like they top the main stem, let a new branch grow from it, top that, let another grow from that, and so on (so, it may look like one stem, but each successive part of the top growth is technically not in the same degree of ramifications as the last). So, maybe kind of like single-stemming, except they keep topping it, forcing a new branch to grow (where they all together look like one branch), instead of letting the original main stem grow all the way up unabated.

I'm not sure about tomatoes, but I've read that I think the third degree of ramifications in cucumbers is supposed to be more prolific than the others before it.

By 'degree of ramifications', I mean the original main stem is the first degree. A branch that grows out of the main stem is the second degree. A branch that grows out of the second stem is the third degree. I don't know where the terminology for degrees of ramifications came from, but I didn't make that up myself (I saw it in the thing I read about cucumbers).

[Shule]

Oh, I think they allow additional lateral branches to grow if they have flowers, up until the fifth topping, or so. I wonder if they top each of those five times, or if they just let them grow once.

It sounds like the idea is to remove the stems with no flowers, and only allow one or possibly each branch to go out five times.

[Shule]

I'd definitely want to do foliar sprays of calcium nitrate in the early stages of this method (for the growth spurts).

[bower]

I'm in! Lets try it and show pics here of the results.

[Setec Astronomy]

I'm in! Lets try it and show pics here of the results.

I'm not going to understand it until someone does a good YouTube of what you're supposed to do. I could never understand how to prune a tomato to single or double leader until I saw the videos from the nice lady at the Univ. of Arkansas.

[Pippin]

This sounds like a fun experiment. I would prefer growing just one leader and make all topping in the upper part of that leader. The shoots growing from the lowest buds (i.e. from the cotyledons) might activate quite early but I would prefer removing them immediately to avoid multiple leaders. Not sure if that is supposed to be done in the original method but it might suite better to my short growing season.

[Pippin]

… unless I was growing one in a large pot with a small cage and would not bother to remove any suckers. Whenever there was a new flower cluster, it would be simply topped.

Would that be too lazy version of this old French method?

[Shule]

By 'degree of ramifications', I mean the original main stem is the first degree. A branch that grows out of the main stem is the second degree. A branch that grows out of the second stem is the third degree. I don't know where the terminology for degrees of ramifications came from, but I didn't make that up myself (I saw it in the thing I read about cucumbers).

Oh, I think I might be wrong about this. The leader might not be the first degree; I think the first degree might be a branch from the leader.

[JRinPA]

LOL I read it differently.

Leave the plant grow until it puts out the first flowers. Top immediately above that.
Now the suckers will start growing. As soon as you see flowers on a sucker, top the sucker above the flowers.
Repeat for a total of 5 flower trusses.
Then suppress all other suckers.
That is the way I read it. The final plant has the main and 4 sucker stems coming off the main.

[bower]

… unless I was growing one in a large pot with a small cage and would not bother to remove any suckers. Whenever there was a new flower cluster, it would be simply topped.

Would that be too lazy version of this old French method?

That's more or less what I had in mind. Lazy? Just like determinates except you have to nip the ends. So not quite as lazy.

[JRinPA]

I think of it as
single stem = series circuit = voltage drops, full current
this way = parallel circuit = voltage remains the same, current is split

Now, how exactly the voltage and current relate to a tomato plant...there are easy parallels to make with fluid flow and a few other disciplines, but I'm not so sure about biology. Size of the pipe versus length of the pipe, I mean physical layout, that probably correlates.

I'm just not sure how 5 trusses of fruit would have enough energy with just those few leaves catching sun.

[Pippin]

A train travels 100 km at a uniform speed…

In my mind, there was at least 11 flower clusters. 1 + 5 * 2.

[MrBig46]

I'm in! Lets try it and show pics here of the results.

I like that method. I'll go into it too. I will use one Start F1 plant for that test.
Vladimír

[svalli]

That is quite interesting method, but I would not try it in my greenhouse, where I have more room up than to the sides.

Few years ago I read in Gardenweb about French pruning of tomatoes. It is described on Tomodori website http://tomodori.com/3culture/taill_sur_2-tiges.htm
I usually grow indeterminates on 3 stems and if my plants get leggy, I may cut them before planting and root the tops to double my plants, so the bottom part is about same as the beginning of the instructions on that site. But because I have not found reason why the stems are pruned above 3 flower trusses I have not done that. Does anyone know what effect that pruning above flower trusses could have?

Sari

[mama_lor]

Maybe I didn't understand quite right, but I don't see how this could be shorter than the original plant.
The typical indeterminate has 3 leaves then 1 flower cluster. But each new sucker has more than 3 leaves before the first cluster (4-5). So how does this make it shorter?

[bower]

@svalli pruning above a cluster will induce fruit setting quickly in that cluster. Indeterminates tend to get leggy in my greenhouse, and in some (crowded or cold) conditions certain varieties don't set fruit as expected, so I've experimented with various prunings. A plant that doesn't set can be made to do so by pruning above a cluster, but we usually leave one leaf as well, to shade and nourish the fruit. But it's also true that new shoots will develop from that top leaf and the plant will get taller again. According to the method quoted, the new growth will come from the axil of the two leaves just below the cluster, if you top above it.

@mama_lor I doubt the plant will be so small as claimed (18 inches!) in my growing conditions. It would have to have very short internodes. You correctly pointed out that every sucker has the same number of leaves before the first cluster, as the main stem of the original plant. That number is under separate genetic control from other features of growth habit (det or indet), and is commonly 7 but I have grown a few plants with 10 leaves before a cluster.
If topping above the first cluster causes two suckers to grow from the first leaf node below, those two branches will reach quite a bit higher than the main stem, leaving the first fruit well below the second clusters.
If I understand the instructions correctly, the expectation is that a second set of suckers then grows from the second node below on the main stem, and so on for a total of five. So for my usual number of seven leaves, there would be suckers from five of them with the bottom two removed.
The tricky part for this method IMO will be removing all the suckers that want to grow on the suckers themselves! Because it will certainly happen, after topping the first cluster on any branch, they will want to branch again from below.
The final shape will depend on the variety and the growing conditions - we may end up with some quite different shapes.

[Shule]

At what point do you decide a lateral has no flowers? Do they mean only keep them when the flower buds are visible within the first inch or two of growth?