Three tomatoes per sq ft?

You seem like you wanted to do determinate (shorter) tomatoes, but even then, those need several sqft each to be manageable.

What you seem to have there are indeterminate tomatoes which technically you can plant one per sq ft if you keep them to one vine and trellis them. Honestly, I'm so surprised that they're doing as well as they are so close together.

You don't seem like you're having much fun with the tomatoes right now. There's not much you can do besides thin them back down, but that's not really feasable with them so large is it. Write off the branch as a loss and let the season ride itself out and try again next year with a bit more space. Either give more space and make sure you're getting determinate plants (which will need some support, but not much above a tomato cage)and give them 3-4 sq ft each or trellis the indeterminate ones by keeping them to one main stem.

Here is a link that might be useful: The Corner Yard

I think you're boasting. It sounds like your tomatoes are doing fine if crowded. Enjoy

I'm sorry you feel I am boasting. I have better thing to do than get on the internet at 10 o'clock at night, like sleep. I'm new here and new to planting in the ground. Its to late to overcome what I should have done. All that being said. Do I cut them down to 5 or 6 ft or let them grow?? Will they produce full size tomatoes. My granddaughter wants to can tomatoes. we want as many full size tomatoes so she can can them. So which answer will help my tomatoes to get to full size?? They are beefstakes tomatoes, Seeds are from the dollar store. I have the same type of tomatoes in containers but they are only 5 ft tall like they should be I think. I'm sure there are other people out there who made the same mistake as I did before they found this forum. Thanks to all who answered my question PoorGranny

If it were me, I'd cull all but one plant per square foot.

But if your plants are doing fine for being so crowded, why bother? You can 'top' them if you want (pinch or break off the growing tip) that way, they won't get any taller.

I don't think the fruits will reach their full potential with regard to size, but then again, you're just going to have more of them.

As Ribbit said, if you're going to use the fruits strictly for canning, I would go with a few determinate varieties. There are plenty listed here on the Tomato Forum.

Good luck and happy canning!

I'm w/ Holly, pick the healthiest plants or favorite varieties, or what ever seems to be most prolific at the moment and cut out some plants. 1 per 4 squares unless you want to do some serious pruning.

The removed plants could be hung upside down in the garage or outside, just wrap the rootball in a brown paper bag and it will eventually force the green toms to ripen. Then compost the whole plant.

i would cut back the one's that have suckers, the branches that have like two branches growing where only one should, google it, or maybe someone can explain it better. you are obviously doing a great job!! go with it!! and be proud!! **big smile** don't worry about the boasting comment. not all of us think that way. welcome to the forum!! ~Medo

poorgranny,

Your post describes how well your tomatoes are doing. There are several threads in this forum complaining about how poorly -- still waiting for flowers -- the tomatoes are doing. You do indicate keeping them doing well is a lot of work.

If you have as many tomatoes as you want, cut off growing tips and new flowers. If you want more tomatoes, you're going to have to let them grow. According to your description you don't have room to let the plants spread. Therefore up is your only option. I'd advise pruning to avoid crowding, ie. new branches and flower clusters below the growing tip.

I should have added a smilie face when I suggested you were boasting. :)

You have simply woke up to find yourself in a tomato garden of eden. Your mission is to make paths through the jumgle to harvest the most tomatoes with the least damage to the vines. The bounty will be so great that I would not fret over the loss of a single branch. A few branches may bite the dust accidentaly undefoot in the quest to harvest the bounty. Maybe create a few islands of safety from which to stand while harvest basket in hand you redeem the ripe tomatos. The branch that broke off can even be replanted or the green tomatos wrapped in newspaer to ripen later. Tomatoe are a weed that people prune and train to control. Your tomatoes are free, Free, FREE! And as such will reward you greatly even after the first frost. The only draw back will be if they are reined in and subjugated into control. Next year with a highly controlled one tomato plant trimmed to one stem per plant per 4 square feet you may once again wish you were back in your tomatoe jungle. Enjoy it because others do not have such luck and bounty. May you and your tomatos live long and prosper.

Hi there, I'm in the house a little early tonight, I though I should thank everyone for their ideas, suggestion. Thanks. And to say I'm sorry to ljpothis for sounding a little harsh in my remark to his first posted message to me. I was still upset and tired from fighting with my tomatoes. I esp. want to thank eqrunorequinox? for his nice posted message to me and giving me the idea of what I was going to do about my tomatoes plants. He said tomatoes plants are just weeds. I never thought of them as weeds. So I said to my self, self you can cut or trim weeds you do it all the time. I was afraid if I pruned or cut the tomato plant I was going to harm it in some way. So with clippers in hand and my great-grandson behind me. We went to the garden. I was saying to myself over and over, it only a weed, its only a weed, you can trim a weed, no problem.ha ha. A little bit of humor here. My great-grandson ask me, what did you say grandmom?, I said oh its nothing I was just talking to myself. I'm sure all you folks young and older can relate to this. Grand mom, why do you always talk to you self when you are in the garden?? Well I did trim off a foot of the bottom leaves and some suckers. but I'm still not sure if I should trim the tops of the tomato plants or let them grow.On the left hand side of those plants I have 8 more 1x1 square with 4 bell peppers planted in each square. They are just starting to bloom. Well goodnight and thanks again PoorGranny

I know no pictures are *needed*, but I just want to see this tomato wonderland !! Please pictures ?

i'm with angela!!! i mean i only had it last year and it was bliss, this year no deal!! LOL so come on granny!! **big smile** ~Medo

She can't post pictures, I ate all of her tomatoes! LOL

Hi there again I will try to post some pictures ( but not the ones that holly eat)LOL. as soon as I read up on how to do it. Well I hope you folks are right about trimming I got carried away last night, hope my plants will be alright. Once I started trimming I didn't know when to stop. I'm going to let one plant keep growing just to see how tall it will get. I didn't mention that I have 23 other tomato plants just like them, but not as tall because I planted them later,but I screw up on some of them too. In a 3x7, I have 12 tomato plants, 25 sweet corn, 20 pickle cucumber plants on a trellis. 7 honeydue melon on a trellis. Dumb, dumb, I put the trellis in front of the honeydue, now I can't see them because the corn is behind the honeydue. Like everyone else says, we will do things different next year. I hope, have a nice day. poor crazy granny

Come on, poorgranny, that's all you have in that 3x7 bed?

I'm sure you can get at LEAST 25 head of cattle in there too, if you tried. You've been slacking off, I think.

(I'm just teasing ya poorgranny!)

holly, that's too funny!

poorgranny, I suspect your 3x7 might, just might, become a bit of a jungle :-)

Greenbean, I'll bet poorgranny's garden will be the most productive one here! It's always the way.

poorgranny,

Just so you don't think you have the only overgrown garden.

My wintersown tomatoes are in there between my snap peas (forgot to read the package) and my pototoes (who knew they would get that big. I put chicken wire on either side of the tomatoes and hold it open with twigs to give them some light. They are actually growing and there are flowers.

{{gwi:421701}}

A little further along I have my carrot bed. I left the hollyhocks because they are biennial and I thought they were first year plants. No. They are in bloom now and really look pretty. Unfortunately, the carrots shaded by them aren't doing as well.

{{gwi:1279001}}

Hi all, To ljpother, are you sure thats your picture instead of mine. How did you post your pictures with your message?? I know I have over done it. But why didn't some of them die like they are suppose too?? only kidding. My garden isn't petty but its functional. When I started I didn't know about square gardening. I just wanted things nice and neat. Now that things started growing nothing is nice and neat. I even have a pumpkin growing in a playpen to keep it nice and neat, that didn't work out either.it outgrow the playpen.My son was so embarrassed about how my garden looks, he put up a 4 ft. wooden fence to hid me and the garden. I have watermelon and cantaloupe growing up my great grandson's swingset.Because I have a bad back and hip I use my mother's wheel chair to transport water in 5 gal. bucket. My tomato plants are now wilting at the top and the leaves are turning a lime green. Are they in shock from all that trimming and pruning I did? Will they recover? Thanks all. Poor Crazy Granny

I use Irfanview to set the image size to 640*400 and upload
Irfanview free download
to the Garden Gallery. Then I go to recent posts, select my photo, and when it opens I right click the mouse and select copy image location. In the message I type . You can use search for something like "embed image" and you will find several "how to post" messages (that's what I do when I forget or it doesn't work the first time).

The hard part of this message for me was learning how to include html code without it being interpreted.

I used this alot when I was first learning html, now I just type it most of they time.

Irfan view is a great free program, but I actually let imageshack resize them as I'm uploading, it also give's the links for pasting. Lots of free image hosting sites, I also use facebook to hold lots of pics. FB resizes on it's own.

Wow, that must be a jungle of tomatoes. I'd love to see some pictures. I have a 1 1/2' x 8' bed and have 8 tomato plants in it that I tried to keep pruned to 1 main branch each, but they have gotten away from me a bit and each have at least two and a couple have three. I thought my bed was a jungle, I have a hard time telling one plant from the next, all are up to or over my 6' frame. I'm just worried that if I let them grow to dense that they will not get enough air circulation and they may suffer from disease. We have had a lot of rain this year and lots of gardeners in my area are having trouble with late blight. I think it would be much more prone to it if they were very over crowded.

I agree, if you rather have shorter plants you should try growing determinate varieties. If you want them for canning it seems like it would be a much better choice because determinate tomatoes ripen more fruit all at one time than indeterminate plants do.

Good luck and good gardening, Mary

Hi all, sorry about no pictures. I have been having gall bladder problems the last couple of days. The throbbing is too intense for me to think clearly right now. Esp trying to learn something new. Will post pictures as soon as the pain goes away. You folks are sure nice people. Got to go.
Poor "in pain" Granny