Pruning

16 years ago

How do you all like to prune or not prune your tomatoes? Do you like to let them bush out on there own or do you prefer to keep them to one or only a few stalks?

This was only my second year growing. Last year a let them bush out and I got a good amount of tomatoes until the plants were a jungle. I had problems with pests. This year I tried to keep them to one or two stalks. They grew like crazy, some reaching 8 to 9 feet, but they didn't produce that many tomatoes.

I cannot blame the pruning techniques for my low yield, because this year I also planted in the ground instead of in containers. The soil I planted in had it own list of problems, VERY poor drainage, probably not enough organic matter, etc. I am learning a lot with every season, and I have a new game plan for the garden plot ( raised boxes.. at least 2' tall)

So, I would like to test pruned versus un-pruned, when I get my soil conditions right. I was just curious to see what you guys had to say about your pruning habits.

thanks,

Rob

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Comments (3)

bigrich
16 years ago
Question for you is: How is the taste of the tomatoes between the two techniques? I've heard pruning focuses the plants energies into the few tomatoes it has to produce tomatoes of exceptional quality. This year I pruned moderately and I think I am going to regret that decision. I have a few 20
digdirt2
16 years ago
They grew like crazy, some reaching 8 to 9 feet, but they didn't produce that many tomatoes.

Yep, that is the price one pays for pruning their plants.

You'll find literally hundreds of discussions here, and even a FAQ, about the pros and cons of pruning. I linked a few of them below. You'll find, I think, that most of us don't subscribe to pruning in general and that the need for it, or lack there of, all depends on the method of support you use.

Personally, I use 5 and 6' CRW cages and only remove any branches below the first truss of fruit, branches that touch the ground.

Dave

PS: oh, and so-called "suckers" (secondary stems) do NOT drain or suck energy from the plants regardless of what you might read. That is old folklore. ;)

Here is a link that might be useful: Pruning discussions and FAQ
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cleo88
16 years ago
My support system is sort of lame - 1 six foot hardwood stake per plant. It's not really sufficient, but I like the way it looks, and my garden is right in my line of site all the time so I am unwilling to do something ugly. (I know, I'm not very hardcore!)

So I have to prune or else everything would be tipped over by now (more than it is). Each one of my 20 plants has only 2 or 3 main stems, which I achieved by removing lots of suckers.

The result has been that they are very tall and don't have tons of tomatoes on them. But that's sort of what I was going for. My family of four couldn't eat the fruit of 20 plants if they were unpruned - just too many. I am trying to figure out what varieties are ones that we like, so getting five fruit from each plant would be sort of perfect for us.

The exceptions are Opalka, which has 12 tomatoes on it so far, and Gigantesque which has 7. The rest have on average 4 or 5 (though there are some that have only 1 or zero - lots of variability). Since we have a short season here, the plants have only been in the ground for 7 weeks, so nothing is blushing yet, but I'm hopeful that will start soon.

If we could find varieties that were the "winners" for our family, I think I might grow them in future years and not prune them, give them special supports and then hope they would produce lots of fruit.