Questions on WSing tomatoes?

17 years ago

I'm really excited to winter sow for the first time this year. Winter sowing offers to me a way of sowing all the seeds I've always wanted to, but never had room for. I never had the money for expensive light set ups, so always did my seed starting in windows, and I only have so many windows lol. This year I'm planning on planting oodles of seeds for WSing.

My one concern I guess would be tomatoes. By the time transplanting time comes, my indoor started tomatoes would be of good size. Not huge, but as big as the ones from the store you can buy, anyways. Wouldnt wintersown tomatoes be smaller? I'm afraid if I winter sow my tomatoes, I'll be waiting forever for the fruits.

I'm thinking I'll winter sow some of them and start some indoors.

Just wondering what all your experience is on the size of wintersown tomatoes at transplant.

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Comments (8)

Ann
17 years ago
I started about 10 varieties of tomatoes during the WS process and almost all did well. Yes, they started off smaller than the ones you by at the nursery but you have the satisfaction of growing the varieties you want and seeing them take off as the weather gets warmer. I highly recommend it! IMHO it's the best thing! Mine were probably about 4-6 inches tall when I planted them out and they ended up being 4-5 feet tall. Thanks, Ann
highalttransplant
17 years ago
Yotetrapper, I had the same concerns as you last year, and did exactly what you are proposing. I wintersowed the ones designed for short seasons, with DTMs in the 60 - 80 day range, and then sowed indoors any with DTMs in the 80 - 90 day range. Yes, the wintersown ones were a little smaller when I planted everything out, but they caught up quickly, and my first ripe tomato actually came from one of the wintersown plants. I'm definitely wintersowing more of them next year.

You don't list what zone your in, but I think if you are a zone 5 or higher, you would have excellent results wintersowing tomatoes. I hope that you'll give it a try!

BTW, what varieties are you planning to grow?

Bonnie
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yotetrapper
Original Author
17 years ago
I am in zone 5. At this point my tomato list included:

crnkovic yugoslavian
new yorker
phenomenal
beefsteak
sheyenne
bloody butcher
heinz 1439
chico III
chocolate cherry
sweet 100
and probably an early girl
highalttransplant
17 years ago
I'm trying Bloody Butcher this year too! I have seeds for some of the other varieties on your list as well. My problem is that I only have space for about 8 plants, and I have 47 different kinds of tomato seeds, LOL! I could grow new varieties every year for 5 years before I try them all. Somehow that doesn't stop me from accumlating more though. I think it's a sickness really : )

My list is by no means final, but here are my current top ten for next year:

Amish Paste
Aunt Gertie's Gold
Bloody Butcher
Brown Berry (similar to chocolate cherry or black cherry)
Earl's Faux
Indian Stripe (related to Cherokee Purple I think)
Isis Candy
Kellogg's Breakfast
Skorospelka
either Brandywine or Golden Jubilee

My goal is one paste, one canner/det. type, a couple of cherries, at least one pink, red, orange, yellow and black, and mostly - varieties that can be eaten fresh as well as makes a good sauce.

*** Please don't hold me to this list, LOL ***

Bonnie
tndandelion
17 years ago
My WS tomatoes caught up with my nursery grown tomatoes in no time. Of course, I have a pretty long growing season here but I can't imagine ever needing to buy a nursery grown tomato plant so long as I can WS them. You just have to keep an eye out for critters when they are small.
trudi_d
17 years ago
I love WSing tomatoes; the seedlings have the most amazing root systems ;-)

Here is a link that might be useful: Who needs some tomato seeds?
lillyjane
17 years ago
I WSowed tomatoes last year in a 16 oz foam cup, I started with it half full of dirt, & as the plant grew I added more dirt. Those were the best tomato plants ever. They were a bit smaller when they went into the garden but very quickly caught up with the ones that I bought at a local green house, & in a short amount of time I think the wsowed ones outgrew the greenhouse ones. The greenhouse had a different variety that I wanted. This year I am making sure to get all the different varieties of seeds that I would like to have.

Thanks Trudi, I learned that way from you. BIG GRINS ")

Jan ")
vera_eastern_wa
17 years ago
I wintersowed tomatoes the past 2 yrs too and from now on won't have it any other way! Yes, some were a bit later producing, but was well worth waiting for :)

Here is the list from this year:
Branywine pink (my fave on taste this year)
Tiger-like (good producer)
LaRossa Paste (heavy producer!)
Wisconsin 55 (low production, but container grown...may be nutrient issue on my part)
Zapotec Pleated (Yummy!)

I should say these were "springsown" rather than "wintersown"...started Mar. 23rd and 24th. We had an unexceptionally colder than normal April so I kinda cheated and brought my gal. jug containers of non-sprouted tomatoes in for a few nights. I got germination and immmediately returned them back outside to finish. After that they only came back in if night time temps dropped too low.