Your friend is correct. Here in Florida we have root knot nematodes that can decimate tomato plants. You need to rotate your plants around your yard every year. They can't go back to a previous spot for the next 3-4 yrs.

You could also just grow them the way I do. I have 17 gallon grow pots that I full with Lamberts potting media. I insert wire cages into the media sink in my seedlings, when time to, and water and fertize the way you do any normal container plant.

I have great results this way.

Got it, horse chick! What about other veggies? Can I plant peppers, cucumbers on the same place? Second q.: what do you do with all that used soil? Do you use it for something like flower beds maybe?

Maria

I incorporate the used soil into oak leaves as a passive compost mulch. I also scatter it on low spots in my yard to help enrich my soil.

I have jalapeno peppers growing in the same spot for years with no adverse effects. I don't like cucumbers so I'm don't grow them..LOL If in doubt, it won't hurt to move them around your fence line either. Crop rotation is a good practice to get into down here if you have the space to do it.

Just be aware that you don't want members of the nightshade family in the same spot two years in a row. So you eggplant can't follow your tomatoes can't follow your peppers.

Maria, you can plant other veggies in the spot where you had your tomatoes as long as you take steos to minimize meatodes by removing any old toots etc from the bed and then add lots of organic matter into the present soil. A good idea is to plant marigolds and other nematode resistant plants and plants whose root system prevents nematodes from surviving. Use organic mulch and keep plants watered and under good maintenenceThese plants should be placed close together. Coreopsis, Rudbeckia are just a few of the plants you can use. I have enclosed a link to assist you with veggie choices. Hope this helps, Linda

Here is a link that might be useful: resistant plants

I usually grow maters in containers, and split up and re-ammend the left over soil each season. This year I am expanding my veggies now that I have new planting areas on the "far side" of the wall. Den built me steps and this opens up a whole new adventure for tomatoes and other veggies. I have containers ready for 'maters on one side as well and pumpkin and birdhouse gourds coming up. I twisted together 2 tomato cages to give the Pumps and gourds something to crawl over. Then I have a whole new area on the other side of the steps I am planning to build up and ammend in the next couple of weeks as my 2nd try at heirloom 'mater seeds develop.(sorry treefrog-tomatoes are NOT house plants! lol) Gawd, looking at these pics my garden looks a mess, it's really organized chaos! (I KNOW, Lady, the bananas are too close, got to move one to the other side when I get the soil ready! Raja is growing beautifully!)
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Wow...nice little planting area you have there, Cindeea. Your banana trees look exactly like mine do -- however, my banana tree is going on 2 years of age. I swear, it has only grown about a half a foot in all that time.

I have been fertilizing it every couple of months or so. Any suggestions?

saintp I am new to bananas. Lady brought me a nice lil tree last year and I had it in a large pot. I basically covered the ground with cardboard and news paper. Dumped a couple bags of top soil and a bag of black kow and dug a hole between the cardboard. I dug deep adding soil ammendments. The cardboard is controlling weeds while the roots are digging deep in very well drained soil. I covered it all with pine bark. The ornamental red nanna I got at HD really cheap and it was 1/3 it's size. I need to move it though because it is competing too much with the Raja Puri. I love the look and colors of bananas. I am just guessing as I go.

I've grown Tomatoes, Peppers, Tomatilloes, Eggplants in the same areas for at least 10 years. I have 2 raised bed veggie gardens. They are 24-30" deep, 4' wide and 16' long.

I get around the nematode problem by usually solarizing the beds all summer (covering the soil with plastic so it cooks), and/or I add enough clean, new, organic-rich mix to the beds each year to refill them. The soil level drops every year, as it decomposes. I add topsoil, pine bark, potting mix, allgro and alfalfa pellets.

This year I did not solarize, I let the weeds take over. I now have a healthy crop of weeds 8' tall.(G)

My plan is to remove them, and add new soil as usual, once it cools off a little.

Nematodes don't like rich, well-drained, organic soils. So add lots of chunky pine bark, compost, aged manure, mix well, and enjoy your garden bounty!

Even if your tomato plants don't look as purty as, say, Treefrog's, you can still get an awfull lot of tomatoes from them over fall, winter and into spring.

Lisa

True. *But you can plant tomatoes in the same spot year after year. If you dig a deep (2'), narrow (18") hole, line it with wet newspaper, fill with amended potting soil and compost and a slow release fertilizer, this acts as an in-ground pot. This method has given my tomatoes plenty of time to produce abundant crops before they finally die of natural (or unnatural) causes. And you can use your same gardening space over and over.
Be sure to mulch well too.
The roots do eventually work their way through the newspaper and do get infested with nematodes, but not before you harvest lots of maters.

No Cindeea, tomatoes are not house plants!
Mine are just tiny little seedlings now, with great hopes and aspirations. Sprouting outside on the potting bench like good little maters should. Good luck again. These should thrive. It's time IMO.

Lisa, I agree, I have used a spot or a planter years over, but not until after reworking soil and amending. Nematodes hate rich fertile soil, I really think that is the trick to reusing a space or planter.

Hey Froggy, do you happen to have a couple black cherry and/or red robin seeds left. Just 2 or 3??? Those 2 I really wanted to try but lost em. I am re-trying Brandy Boy, Goose Creek, Burbank and San Marzano Redorata. That's all the seeds I had left. Crap, that with the seedlings Denise brought me, I should not need more...what am I thinking??? lol BarbColeus and I have been talking tomatoes and have decided with all that we are collectively growing, we may have a local tomato tasting day for the local GWers. That is if we can grow all these guys and get them to produce...lol

What do I have to do with the containers from year to year? I will change the potting soil, but do I have to sterilize the pot somehow?

Lisa, I like the idea of solarizing! Black plastic is better, right? Do I have to remove mulch before covering with plastic? And how long it should stay under plastic - is 3 months enough (June-Aug)?

Maria

I have a 1,000 sq ft vegetable garden and I rotate everything. I don't keep a log or anything, I just try to not plant the same thing over in the same place.

And if your get root knot nematodes, you might consider quitting gardening . Those things are nasty. I got them in my S. Carolina garden and I could not grow hardly anything.

Earlybird~I've read that clear plastic is the one to use, it takes several months to heat the soil up to kill weeds and nematodes.
Nematodes live in the sand they cannot survive in fertile soil. As mentioned above ammend, ammend, ammend your soil. There is no need to give up gardening just because you have nematodes. My great aunt told me many years ago that in order to have a green thumb you had to have dirty knees.
I'll be trying the post hole method this year.

One other thing you can try if you find you are plagued with soil, disease and insect problems is to choose your tomato seeds and plants wisely.

IF you want an edge out in the Florida garden, do consider planting types with the shortest DTM's(days to maturity. This way, the nematodes have to hustle to mess things up. Same for the diseases and insects.

Another thing to try is to grow MANY different varieties and then make note of WHICH ones out perform the others in productivity and resistance to the problems your garden faces as well as taste.

Replant the ones that seems to work for you.

Beware though, what may work this yr may NOT work the next But again grow many to see which outperform the others and eventually you will have fine tuned your variety type and wont have to go through the process again.

Best of luck