Its coming up on September and here in Colorado that means frost. Shutting off their water and killing them probably. Mine are loaded with green, about 110 days since they were set out. They burn onions with flame throwers..would that help? How about a quick shot of weed killer? I am joking about this, but this year is rediculas.
KennyP

What is your first frost date? I see zone 7, you've probably still got some time left.

One way to encourage toms to ripen is to stress the plant. Stop watering, if you are. I haven't watered my garden all year due to heavy rains.

At the end of the season you can pull up the plant and wrap the root ball in a brown paper grocery bag and hang it upside down. Some inderteminates might be difficult to do this.

My plan for the end of the season is to top them about the first of October and pick off any small fruits by mid October. My first frost should be mid November, and I'll just pick any thing still on and put on the counter.

I won't bother trying the root ball hanging, I'm going to cut off at the base and compost the plants leaving the root ball in the ground to decompose on it's own. I did hang them last year, but this years plants are much to gangly.

I agree that in zone 7 I'd let it go for now, but if it gets close to first frost time then there are two things you can do.

One is to pull up on the plant a bit while twisting it, which severs the feeder roots and that stops a lot of water and nutrient uptake, as in stressing the plant, which usually does result in ripening.

The second method is basically the same as the first and that's to take a square blade shovel and cut around the plant, a few inches down, and maybe a foot or so out from the main stem, and that accomplishes the same as above.

Just think of us poor tomato deprived folks here in the cooler zones when frost could come at any time. So far I've got ONE cuke and two grape tomato fruits. Sigh.

Carolyn

I was wondering this myself. I had no idea stressing the plant would help.

I topped off my plants 2 weeks ago and have been keeping my eye on any new growth or flowers and nipping them in the bud. I want my full size greenies to ripen. I don't have any hope for my smaller greenies on the big guys to reach thier full size and ripen, but I would think unless I get frost with-in the next few weeks, the smaller green cherries should have a chance to finish. My BFT, Momotaro, and Big Beef have started to finally blush. Still waiting for my Hazelfield Farm(LOADED WITH FRUIT) and Chianti Rose (only 6 large tomatoes) to start to ripen.

Melissa1977

Hey Kenny,

I'm also in CO and definitely feeling fall in the air. My situation sounds very similar to yours - big huge plants, lots of green fruit.

A couple of weeks ago I did my best version of "topping" the plants as some have suggested here. I've also reduced/stopped watering.

But here's another suggestion. I doubt this is backed up by scientific evidence, but I observed on all of my plants that the fruit that got some sun on it ripened sooner. So, in addition to topping, I thinned out a lot of the branches, particularly those low on the plant and those that were clearly not getting sunlight and contributing to photosynthesis. After doing this step, a lot of the fruit began blushing. Again, not saying this step brought about the ripening, just offering a suggestion based on my own experience. I'm getting a lot of nice, ripe fruit now that I didn't think would come around.

Good luck!

P.S. You can always do what I'm planning, which is make a LOT of green tomato pickles.

thanks for all your help guys, i dont think i would have thought to stress the plants to encourage ripening! Awesome!

My story. We had frost 2 nights in a row. I cut off many tomatoes today and more tomorrow. The heat will be back up to 85-90 degrees in the day instead of 75. Hardly any red ones. I put the greenies in a box in the house. I will stop watering as suggested above, thanks, I am a newbie. I pruned last week but not too short. I covered the toms on the expected frost nights but they needed thicker covering. The frost got the top leaves...good thing I left some growth on the top or it would have gotten the tomatoes. Plants look great still except for the top few leaves. I hope to have them all brought in in a week if the temp drops back down. I am in zone 5. I read earlier on another site that toms wont ripen if the temp stays at 60 degrees or above 85. And you can put a few greenies in a paper bag with a banana to ripen them but check often and replace the banana as needed. I will try that when I get some bananas.

I had a plant that turned brown on me over night. I suspect sunburn since I had removed some mammoth sunflowers that were in front of it. It's neighbor a black from Tula is loving the extra sun. Any ways a week ago I used Carolyn's method and put a shovel down about a foot away(probably less) and severed the feeder roots. I've had about 6 toms blush in the past few days, and just two left to turn.

I won't be hanging plants by the root ball this year, but I will be using this method around the end of October, while pruning any new blossoms that appear after the second week of October.