Barb,

That book sure sounds like a bunch of baloney to me.

"The tomato plant needs a constant flow of fresh air! The air needs to be re circulated about 60 times per minute. The leaves completely stop this process., The tomato leaves and the leaf branches suck away all the food, water, and energy from the fruit! They need to be removed so that the food, water, and energy goes into the flowers!(the fruit!)"

For one thing, without some leaf cover, in some parts of the country, tomatoes will scald in the sun, as they often do here during the hottest time of the growing/ripening season.

You might ask about the lack of productivity on the zucchini at the Vegetable Forum. I've never read about them not being productive, though the squash vine borer can attack and kill a plant long b4 the seasons end. I'm assuming your plants remain alive, though they just don't produce. I wonder if something might be removing the blooms. Could you have a veggie thief in the area?

Sue

Here is a link that might be useful: Vegetable Gardening Forum

Bgrow - if it ain't broke, don't fix it - you say you always have a fabulous crop of tomatoes, well...you must be doing something right! There are lots of different theories on what to do with plants - pinching suckers vs. not; staking vs. letting the vines run on the ground (some people do that here with tremendous success) - go with what works for you! Taking off all the leaves? Never heard that one before.

I thought the dreaded SVB (squash vine borer) the minute I read about your lack of success with zucchini. I have that problem here, and am going to try to get my act together to cover some plants with remay before the season gets too far underway (means I have to hand pollinate, ugh - I may be too lazy for this). If I still have trouble this year, I may resign myself to buying all squashes at the local farmer's market, and using the space I've been dedicating to growing them to more pretty flowers.

Hi Barb,

I'm so glad Sue chimed in, I was going to say the same thing. The leaves of tomatoes do prevent sunscald.

As to the zucchini problem, I can relate because I had that problem when I first started growing them. When I had bought my house I had very little plant varieties here, I used chems on the lawn for weeds, I sprayed for bugs--to sum it up, my garden wasn't in a natural balance. I stopped using herbicides and controlled weeds by cutting them out or digging them up. I added more variety of flowers and flowering bushes, and even let the weeds have a patch of their own i the back corner because they helped attract benefecial insects. As more and more plants grew here, and the leass I used chemical control for bugs the more pollinators would visit the garden. As my pollinating insects flourished the amount of zukes and other squash increased.

Nowadays, I turn grass and old leaves into my beds, I compost, I grow plants to attract beneficial insects as well as butterflies and bees. I've even added a bird habitat garden with bushes and flowers that produce seeds and berries for birds. The garden has become alive and fruitful.

So, to sum it up, increase the flora to invite beneficial insects and pollinators, decrease your chems if you use them, and add compost or turn green manures into the ground to improve your growing soil.

T

Barb - Even after doing all the right things to attract them, you could still be experiencing a dearth of pollinators. You could try hand pollinating your zucchini. Just take a male blossom (the flowers on skinny stems) and smoosh it against a female flower (with a fatter stem which looks, not surprisingly, like a baby zucchini behind the flower). Dont be alarmed if you only see male flowers at first - the females will arrive soon. Good luck!
Deb

bgrow gardens, I am soooooo happy to meet you!!!

I can't grow zucchini either. (I've been organic for 30 years.) Not only can I NOT grow zucchini, if I go near another garden with healthy, fruiting, zucchini plants they will suffer a terrible death. My mother had 4 plants with (I swear) a dozen fruits coming on each when she took a trip and asked me to tend the garden. Within a week, all 4 plants were flat. I waved the white flag after that.

As for the tomatoes, WHAT will PRODUCE the sugar that goes into the tomatoes if you pull off the leaves that perform photosynthesis?

Hoehum, you sound like me when it comes to African Violets. I sware I look at them and they die. My mother finally banned me from her apartement because everytime I came over and saw her 100 african violets, they started dying.

Anyway, your point about the leaves and photosynthesis caught my eye. I just hung up the phone with my daughter the biology teacher. Asked her what she thought of the idea of no leaves on the tomoto plant. Her response was,
"what happened Mom, has your death disease now spread to tomato seedlings too? No leaves, no photosynthesis, no photosynthesis, dead tomato plant. And by the way, the leaves also help to prevent the stems from cooking in the hot sun of the summer. Ma nature knows what she is doing. If the leaves weren't meant to be there, she wouldn't have put them there. Those suckers you take off all the time are Ma Natures way of making the plant bigger and producing more fruit, which is great when you have long growing seasons. Where they aren't long, like in New England, get rid of the suckers and force the growth on the main stem, but for crying out loud, leave the leaves alone."

Makes perfect sense to me.

Fran

The only time I pulled leaves off a tomato was when I uprooted the whole plant at the end of September, and brought the whole shebang into the basement. I'd hang the vine upside down, and let the green tomatos ripen. Taking off the leaves just lessened the mess.
As to the zuke conundrum.Make absolutely sure you don't have a black walnut in the vicinity..instant death, just when the plant is flowering and looks so healthy. My 2 cents (for what it's worth).

Yeah I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought that, when this supposed tomato book deal mentioned remove all the leaves to improver "circulation.." I don't know bout you folks out there but I have always ended up crowding my tomato's a bit just merely for lack of space ~ Have not yet had a problem with fungus/mold in the past or anything like that?? (Now watch as soon as I say no problems so far as sure as you can guess it I will be this year +sigh+!!) I think my problem with the zucchini has been firmly, hit the nail on the head, with the mention from a previous post of "lack of pollinator's." You know I never paid much attention to that... Granted I work very long ~ trying hours at work, and never paid much attention to it. After all me thinking a lot of tomato's and other crops are self pollinating so why not zucchini??!! DUH. The one thing I have noticed lacking in my yard (although this year I don't anticipate it, was the lack of bee's and bumblebee's in my yard previous years...!) Thank you everyone, I think you have just solved the mystery for me...! I know it's not a chemical thing because I don't use chemicals on my yard/garden at all. Although who knows what the heck they used before me? Although I felt pretty safe when I first started renting here, just because of all the various weeds on the property. Then the owner said to me plant whatever you want... It had been vacant for almost a year to boot. I kept eyeballing the place while driving on my way home to my crummy apartment, and got brave enough to call on it thinking we'll never afford this place!! Thank God I was wrong! I have never been happier, than to get out of those dang apartments!! I have been raised organic gardening from a very young age. Besides chem's/pesticides are way to expensive anyways! The only thing I venture out and buy is some fertilizer about once every 10 years or so. So for me it is mostly compost and natural stuff here for everything.. I figure saving all that money entitles me to buy a plant every once in a blue moon, when there is something I just can't seem to live without! Even then I go home and brew on it a couple of days just to think about it before I buy it. My evil budget has a lot to do with that +sigh+!! So o.k. go ahead and laugh at me when you hear my method... I scrounge bottles and cans from various places to all ready add to my collection of ahem.. beer can's... When I just can't resist the temptations of a plant calling my name, or when I am absolutely desperate for gas $$. I take all those lovely bottles and can's into my local recyclers and cash them all in!! Although I have to admit that this winter sowing gig has put a serious dent in the ol' pop bottle recycling! However, I would rather have the flowers!! I have never been so excited in my life as too see those winter sown seedlings pop up as to say why have you been so stupid for all those dumb years?? Why did you really waste your time starting us indoors only to watch us die off from dampening off?!!! So this year thank you so much to everyone and all. Oh yeah my friends at work look at me like I'm a little nutso' when I say...Yessss!!! I have the weekend off and I am going to spend all of it playing in my garden!! I am going to plant out my tomato seedlings and other wonderful flowers that are growing beyond the bonds of their zip lock baggie homes. I think I am making the one true gardener at work absolutely nuts when I describe my seedlings. I know that for a fact because today she was asking me to tell her all of how/what I do to get those seeds going!! ( I happily did - I think she's a goner!!) Another soul to winter sowing! I am looking forward to an absolutely fabulous garden of flowers that I would never have dreamed of affording. If I had to go out and buy plants for! Winter sowing has shown me the way, beyond my wildest dreams!! Although the one plant that has bitten me lately is this salvia plant called black & blue... I think that it is gorgeous. So if I can muster up the extra $$ sooner or later... I am going to the local nursery and purchasing that one. As I have heard that the seed is apparently sterile?? O.K. you were nice enough to read this far can anyone suggest how deep, or do you leave them at the same soil level as to plant Castor Beans?? They are simply booming along with my blue flax, and Malva, as well as others. I don't want to mess these up! I guess, I can only guess at this point.. However I only have four of the Castor Beans, and they are all up and going. I would like to keep them that way and not mess up on this one... I don't want to plant the seedling's too deep or not deep enough... Do you leave them ate same soil level or??? Call me greedy but I would like to see all of them, grow as I have lots of space to fill... they are supposed to be quite a large plant. It is just getting them to they're full potential in the meantime... Any suggestions would be happily welcomed?!!
Barb

I have had trouble in the past as well until I learned about "romancing the squash"...

A nice glass of wine, music, squash blooms.... what could be better?

Surprise, I have read it. I haven't tried it yet to see if I will ask for my $9.97 back. Supposedly when tomato starts flowering, pull off all leafy branches (don't leave stubs) below flower group-branch. When another flower cluster grows further up, pull off the next lower leafy branch. Said to only grow in a green house with good air flow between 18-28 C ideally, and attach tomato to a sterile cord hanging from a bar/pole that goes from one side of ceiling to other. Tap pole with stick to vibrate plant on rope to pollinate fast. Said to always use new soil and add fertilizer which I think is actually compost made from cow sh!t and straw because this provides the soil to be alkaline. Use fertilizer every now and then with the water; with trace nutrients. Said each plant only needs 3 leaves! Give lots of water while growing. -A

Don't have a clue about the zukinni problem...in all honesty we don't eat a lot of it but I usually grow it cuz it grows so well!...But about trimming those tomatoes...I grow indeterminates and determinates and I leave the determinates along and put the indi's in homemade heavy duty cages...I still try to pull off the suckers but I always grow a couple of plants (usually a large varity like delicious or giant belgium) on a trelis (bamboo fence)..and trim off most all the leaves (more power to the fruit)in the past I have grown all my tomatoes like that (20 - 30 plants)..I plant them very close and trim the dickins out of em...leaving only a few lower leaves and a few at the top (as far as sun scald goes I believe the books author states that you may have to put up some sort of sun shield if you live in the south)...my tomatoes have always done well...now I don't get as much per plant but I can plant more plants per bed....I am thinkiing of next year going back to the fence and severe trimming as they look so dog gone neat and the fruit get so big!
God bless and happy gardening!

That sounds like espallier (sp?) tomatoes. It is very pretty and is also very labor intense. Several years back I grew my first toms from seeds. I didn't have enough bed space so I scratched something into the soil along a fence and planted the toms there. They only got half day sun and had to be bound tightly to the fence too. I didn't have cages or stakes but I did have lots of yarn, lol. They cropped just fine. Everyday I brought in pans and pans of fruits.