I like to root them sideways if its big enough-- if not I continue to hill dirt in pots for a while.

My other half did catch my daughter's bunny mid-decapitation of my 2+ft ws potted early girl. I had a stem with 2 leaves and a BIG top! Fortunately, I had a half-filled pot to spare and plopped the top in it the next day, no rooting hormone or anything, and it's short but blooming on the rocks outside. That's one I kept adding dirt to.{{gwi:754461}}

It had been laying on the floor of an unheated porch overnight in early May! The stem is now blooming in the garden! The ones the bunny ate all the way down to the seed leaves are also blooming in the garden!

Basically tomatoes are a wonderful resilient plant. Now I just wish those darn heirlooms would take off like the EGs!

Great idea for a thread, luv2gro. We certainly don't have the zone advantages of others when it comes to growing tomatoes, and there is very often a lack of discussion about a lot of hybrids in other Tomato forums......very often they turn out to be the best bet in lower temp climates.

Ive grown mostly in containers with them but have had a few types in the ground.

Some ones I've had good luck with:

Health Kick
Better Boy
Early Girl
Sweet 100
Sweet 1000
Scotia
Manitoba
Prairie Pride
Lemon Boy
Celebrity
Heartland
Tiny Tim
Starfire
Yellow Pear

to name a few!! Im sure others will have a bazillion to add.

I've had fairly good luck starting them earlier and burying up to the top leaves. When I put them in the ground, i dig a long trench, fill it with composted sheep manure (stuff from Olds College in bags is usually readily available at Crappy Tire and Home Depot) mixed with a bit of bonemeal, nothing fancy. They've seemed to grow very well in it. I've not done a lot of "in ground" gardening due to space limitations so I've often put them in terrible places and they've still produced.

Billy

I still haven't succeeded with Tomatoes yet!

This spring I started some seedlings indoors and now have them planted outside in pots. Some look barely OK and the others look wretched. That could be a combination of relatively low temps and outrageous rain and hail...I live in Calgary.

Tova

That's a shame, tova, hopefully they will bounce back a bit. do you normally take your time in hardening them off? And yes those low temps can sure make a tomato plant look awful, can't they? :-)
Billy

tova......have you tried cozy coats around your tomatoes once you set them out? even if they are in pots as long as the cozy coat will fit over it....it will keep the tomatoe plant warm and safe from nasty weather...as long as you keep the top closed.

I also use the cozy coats on the cucs too, till they get to big...then I take them off...by then the weather has warmed. The tomatoes I usually leave them on till I pull the plants in the fall....I just open them and the tomatoes keep growing right out the top.

Sierra

Tova,
Just wondering if you have added any fertilizer? Tomatoes are quite heavy feeders. I never used to fertilize mine and I couldn't grow them very well, but I started to fertilize about three years ago. I have really noticed an improvement in their health, growth and most importantly, their yield. I've added blood/bone meal and tomato fertilizers and seen an improvement. I'm still trying to determine which fertilizer is best.

What fertilizers does everyone else add?

Shauna

I have tomatoes this year too. I started them from seed indoors in March. They had been outside through the cold spring nights and a couple of times I thought I lost them. Well they really are very resiliant. I broke down and bought those Hot Hats a couple of weeks ago because the forecasted temp was for -2C overnight one night...well they have been growing like mad. I even have buds on one of my Starfire plants...

I have them growing in 5 gallon buckets up against the south side of the house.

I have been using Schultz Expert liquid Tomato Food every couple of weeks.

Next we'll be sharing tomato recipes!

Very nice, Hunnerbun! Im growing some Starfire too and had them out a couple nights at low temps too, they certainly can take a beating. Yours are looking fantastic!

I'm glad I'm not the only one with unhappy tomatoes, Tova - you give me some hope that maybe its not just my haphanded newbieness ^_^;;; One of my Sub-Arctic Plenties is having another go at flowering, so maybe it'll be alright....

What are "cozy coats" and where would they be found? I don't think I've seen any such a thing in any of the garden centers I've been to.

Your tomatoes look so leafy! Mine (sub-arctic 24) are just viney. I started a bunch of plants from seeds, and to make a long story short, I guess I mistakenly dropped a tomato seed in my with cilantro seeds (which I am growing indoors). So now I have 2 tomato plants outside and one inside, all started from seed. The only big difference that I have noted is that the indoor tomato has a nice green stem, where the outdoor tomatoes are rough brown vines. But the size are still about the same.

What are cozy caps?

Thanks for the good advice. I am using fertilizer and when the whether is going to be cold I cover them with big milk jugs with the bottoms cut off and cover everything with a sheet. Some are doing better than others I think it may be the potting soil I used as I ran out part way. I did add composted manure and blood and bone meal too.

Tova

McAvoy your plant there looks fine to me! When I start them from seed they look WAY worse. I am not the best tomato grower but I try to churn out enough Romas each year to can a few. Been cheatin' the last couple of years, buying them in cell packs at Walmart... *blush*. This year I couldn't find any Romas so I got some Manitobas (I think) some Heartlands and a Tiny Tim, which is sharing a pot with two black sweet potato vines.

My old Portuguese neighbour is a pretty good gardener and he SWEARS by pinching off all growth below the main "canopy" of the tomato plant. I haven't had the nerve to try this but his tomatoes are always better than mine so he might have something going there.

Hello Fellow Canucks:
This is my second year of growing tomatoes so although I cannot pass along tried and true techniques, I can tell you what has worked for me so far.
This year I wanted to try some different tomatoes, one of which is "Marvel Striped Orange" which has a 90-110 days of maturity period. Way out of my zone. I bought that tomato greenhouse from canadian tire and Kozy Coats from Lee Valley. I started my seeds inside and put them out in the beginning of May. All plants are currently about 3-4' tall, with flowers. A few plants, including my marvel striped orange has a teeny tiny tomato. I've got 1 stupice in a raised bed in the sun and one in a barrel which gets less sun. What a difference! The barrel stupice is about 6" taller, but only has the main stalk with a few leaves and flowers while the raised bed stupice is strong and bushy. I'll try to remember to post some pics.
The varieties I have are:
Roma
Purple Prince
Lemon Boy
OxHeart pink
Calabash
Marvel Striped Orange
Most people near where I live planted their tomatoes between Victoria Day (we actually has 5min of hail that day) and now. Their plants are less than a foot high. So I would say that the extra protection I gave the plants were a definite plus.

Here is a link that might be useful: A Kozy coat vendor

Here's another link to kozy-coats. I haven't got any yet but this looks like a fairly good deal from Stokes.

I started a thread a few months back on using 2 litre pop bottles instead of kozy-coats. I still think it would work. I just noticed another thread on the tomato forum a few days ago by someone suggesting the same thing. Didn't try it this year. My timing for planting was way off because I had to wait for my DH to double dig the garden area where the tomatoes were being planted. By then, the soil had warmed up enough to put them out on their own.

I have another question. Yesterday, I went to raise the ties up my plants and my sweet 100 had bent over about 6" from the top. There is a fairly deep crease through this bend. Any chance it will heal or should I lop the top off? If I lop the top off, there goes the growing tip, all of the flowers that are just coming, etc. Might as well try to find another one, I think.

Shauna

Here is a link that might be useful: kozy-coats

tova......the link in the above post shows the cozy coats. Mine are a bit older so they are the clear color ones...I think you can only get the red ones now. I got mine at T&T several years ago.

They are a bit of a pain to fill with water, especially when its cold out. LOL....but they do seem to work well early in the season.

Sierra

I can't remember whether I read it here or elsewhere, but someone said that you shouldn't use miracle-gro on tomatoes. I have the standard plant food miracle-gro, and it has a tomato on the box (along with flowers and other greens). Is there something to this claim?

I've heard a few people say that, mcav0y.......i have the same stuff too. They chalk it up to being too high in Nitrogen (15 I think it is), and their actual tomato only food is 18, so even higher.

Apparently they say that it will grow all sorts of lush green foliage, but make the plants drop their blossoms instead of fruiting/and/or reduce fruit production due to excess intake of Nitrogen. If you look at some tomato specialty foods, sometimes the Nitrogen level is closer to 5 or 6 so there must be something to it. But I think if you are not overfeeding them it shouldnt be a problem. I use it and get fruit regularly and o'plenty. I just dilute the mixture by half of what they suggest to use and things seem to turn out fine for me.

Miracle Gro makes a special Tomato Formula. It's good. Their rose formula is very good too.

Hi Tomato fans. Has anyone planted Tomato tree tomatoes? This tomato can grow to about fifteen feet and produces tomatoes somewhat larger than a golf ball. Good, and a real novelty in the garden.

Hi maggiemae

I haven't even seen these before. Where do you find them? Any info on them as to name, type (determinate, indeterminate) etc.?

Shauna

Hi Luv--I was in theInterlake area in eastern Manitoba, a lady was growing them in her garden. I was totally amazed at the growth habit, and there were nice fruits on them, so being a "dedicated gardener" I politely asked if I could have a tomato, took it and extracted the seeds, and planted them next spring along with all my other tomatoes. They certainly grew tall, in fact my stake was not tall enough and the tops started falling down. Nonetheless, they did produce, and I've been saving seeds and growing them every year for about 5 years now. Don't know anything else about them, got no other info, so can't help you there. It sure is a novelty. Marg

Well figured I'd chime in here with my favourites for buckets or big planters. These seem to do well here in the cold short seasons we have.

Gold Nugget Semi determinate yellow cherry tomato (a real sprawler but great taste and incredibly productive)

Silitz Determinate beefstake type with very good flavour. A good producer and a beautiful easy care plant.

I like to add extra calcium or bone meal to all the pots of tomatoes to protect against blossom drop or the catfacing or rot on the blossom end of mature tomatoes.

Tomatoes are my favorite plant to grow and eat.I have always grown Sub-artic Plenty for their earliness and Manitoba for their yield. I like to can my own tomatoes. This year I am also trying Parks Whopper, as a neighbor suggested that it was his favorite. I also started Jetsetter because one of the seed catalouges said it was a favorite of theirs. I have 6 Sub-artic in the ground already with Kozy Coats that I purchased from Lindenberg seeds. Hopefully I have some earlier tomatoes to eat.
Shelley