I read an article about a guy...in CA I think, doing a sustainable farm. He dry farmed his tomatoes and restaurants couldn't get enough because they tasted so good. He acquired new land, with a higher water table and the same varieties did not taste as good. My guess is your tomatoes have more flavor than his. I can't speak to fertilizing. I will be following to see what the advice is.

I agree about the watering. Tomatoes have the ability to produce a certain amount of flavor compounds and no more. Excess water will water down the flavor, turning your tomatoes into big watery bags of mealy flesh with no little to no flavor. The best-flavored tomatoes are dry-farmed, or raised as close to dry farming as possible. I water my plants as little as possible in order to preserve the flavor. You walk a fine line between watering little enough to preserve the flavor and not watering so little that your fruit develop blossom end rot. How much water the plants need and how often they need it depends on many factors---your soil, your air and soil temperatures, even the wind....and how fast it is drying out the soil and the plants.

People who water anything growing in the ground daily are wrong, wrong, wrong. Daily watering almost always is shallow watering for a brief period of time. Shallow, daily watering encourages the plant roots to stay in the uppermost soil levels where both the soil and the roots dry out very quickly.....and then the plants require and, in fact, demand daily watering because they are too shallowly rooted to survive without it. Thus, daily watering is a sort of self-fulfilling phophecy or self-creating issue. Once you start shallow, daily watering, the plants come to need it....and it is absolutely a problem and it is a problem the grower has created.

I try to water deeply, so that the soil is moist (not wet, not soggy) 8" or so below ground about once a week, maybe twice weekly in the absolute hottest, driest weather. You have to stick your fingers down in the soil to see how much moisture you feel. If your soil dries out and crusts over and you cannot stick your fingers down several inches in the soil, then pound a grade stake into the ground. When you need to check for moisture levels, pull out the stake, stick your fingers as far down into the hole as you can, and feel for moisture. If the soil feels moist, don't water yet. If it feels dry, water. This is the right way to water---only when the soil needs it, not on any sort of a schedule and certainly not every day.

Fertilization is more complicated and hinges on what sort of fertility you have in your soil in the first place. As long as the tomato plants are making foliar growth and are blooming and setting fruit, I don't worry about fertilizing them. My goal is to give the plants rich garden soil that is well balanaced and contains nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium in forms available to the plants, and in the right ratio (roughly 1:4:2--yes, highest in phosphorus). Unless you do a soil test before planting, you have no way of knowing if your soil contains the macronutrients the plants need in the right ratio, but if you grow your plants in the same soil, always enriching it in the off season, and you get good results year in and year out, then your past plant peformance assures you that you've gotten it right with the soil and don't have to tinker with it much. Once you get the soil right, all you really have to do is add compost every year. Some people top-dress with compost seveal times every year, but I only top-dress at the beginning of the season because I have a huge garden and not enough compost for continual top-dressing throughout the season. I like to use Tomato-Tome both at planting and to top dress at least a couple of times during the period when fruit set is occurring.

No one can tell you to use a specific brand of fertilizer with a specific NPK on a specific schedule because no one knows your soil, what it has in adequate levels versus what it is missing, what sort of rainfall you're getting or irrigation you're using and how often it is occurring, how closely your plants are planted to one another, how heavy of a load of fruit they are carrying at any given time, etc. You have to learn to read your plants and understand them and determine what they need. When you are growing in the ground, unless you have incredibly quick-draining sand, you shouldn't have trouble with nutrients leaching out of the plants' root zones. In containers, that is a constant issue because the frequent watering (sometimes daily and even more than once daily in the hottest, driest weather) leaches out nutrients every time you water. Many folks who grow in containers, use a water soluble fertilizer cut to 1/3 to 1/4 full strength every time they water.

If your plants are a nice, healthy green color, are growing taller and are spreading out wider, are setting fruit and enlarging/ripening the fruit steadily, then you have happy, healthy plants that are off to a good start. To keep them happy, you probably are going to have to feed occasionally---but this is not something you can do by schedule or formula. You do it as needed. Watch your plant foliage---the lovely, rich green you see in Spring that darkens slightly as the main part of the season sets in is the color you want to keep. If your plants are fading to a paler green, or a yellowish green or if their growth stalls, they need to be fed. If blossoming and fruit set have dropped off significantly even though you are in the right temperature range for them to occur, your plants likely need to be fed. If you feed the plants and the foliage turns a very dark green that is almost a bluish-green, you've likely overfed them nitrogen and are going to have a lot of foliar growth for a while at the expense of fruit set. You want to avoid that, and the best way to avoid it is to avoid using a fertilizer with high nitrogen.

The plants do not care if you feed them a fertilizer that is synthetic in origin or organic in origin. All that matters to them is that nutrients are available to them. You can feed a water-soluble fertilizer as needed or, if desired, mix in a pelleted slow-release fertilizer into the soil and let it feed them over a period of weeks. Osmocote makes such a fertilizer, and so do Vigoro and Dynamite. I don't know their NPKs--probably 10-10-10 or 13-13-13 or 14-14-14. I don't know if these would provide too much nitrogen compared to the P and K, but doubt it would.

To feed with a water soluble fertilizer, you can use the one of your choice, synthetic or organic, but avoid things like the All-Purpose Miracle Grow, which is (I think) 24-8-16 and likely to give you huge monster foliage and less fruit. There is a Miracle Grow for Tomatoes, and if they haven't changed it, its N-P-K is 18-18-21. That still seems like too much N to me in comparison to the P and K, but I don't use it, so it is hard to comment on what I "think" it would do. There is a MG Bloom Booster that is 10-52-10. If I was feeding my plants right now (which have great green color and tons of fruit and flowers, so I don't think they need feeding now....but, if they did, I'd be tempted to use the MG Bloom Booster to get big fruit set before it gets too hot for fruit set. I wouldn't use it all the time, but right now, when most plants already are a good size and have set fruit (well, mine are a good size---mostly 4-5' in height with nice width and have set a good load of fruit already, have y'all's?), then I'd use it once. I'd watch how the plants respond. They ought to respond by giving you pretty good foliar growth and huge fruit set. After that, all you need to do is keep them well-watered and watch for their foliage color to fade to yellowish-green. If you see the foliage fading, then you might need to feed with a fertilizer that has a higher N amount than the Bloom Booster did, but you might not need to feed again---depends on your soil fertility, rainfall, growing conditions, etc.

I try hard to improve the soil and add Tomato-Tone pre-planting to get the plants off to a great, early start. If I've done my job well, by mid- to late-May the plants are approaching shoulder to head-height (I'm short, though, only 5'3") and are loaded with fruit. I often never give them a supplemental feeding or, if I do, I tend to top dress with Tomato Tone or foliar feed with an organic fertilizer. Keep in mind, my tomato plants' most important job is to produce a ton of fruit in June and July for canning. After that, I am not worried about what they do. Once the canning is done, I yank out most of the plants, and keep only a handful for fresh eating. Clearly, we don't need to keep 80 or 90 tomato plants at max production all summer long, so there's no reason for heavy feeding. If I were a commercial market grower, I'm sure I'd fertilize them more often in order to keep them going all summer long, provided I was getting fruit set. I bet that, were I a commercial grower, I'd incorporate a 13-13-13 or 14-14-14 balanced fertilizer pre-planting to keep the plants in great shape for a while, and how long would depend on slowly that given brand fertilizer releases the nutrients. Most packages will tell you "feeds for 30 days" (or 60 days or whatever) assuming normal rainfall and irrigation conditions are occurring. You know, once extreme heat sets in and no new fruit set is going to happen, you and the plants can coast through the summer until cooler temperatures are coming your way in late summer or early autumn.

Fertilizing is a two-edged sword---while it is true that the more you feed, the more the plants grow (up to a point), that also means that you're creating big monster plants that will demand tons of water to keep them happy in the hot summer weather .That's a game I don't even want to play. It also is possible to overfeed and create issues. Plants that are overfed nitrogen are higher in carbs and attract tons more pests. The first thing I think about when someone says they are having a huge pest infestation is that the plants likely were overfed nitrogen.

You want to feed your plants the way you want to feed yourself---good nutrition for good health, but not too much or the plants (or people) get fluffy (fat).

If you were hoping for an answer like "feed your plants Brand X fertilizer in this amount every 2 weeks", I'm letting you down. Sorry. Real life gardening is more complicated than that. Your plants will tell you if they are happy or if they are hungry. Learn to read the clues they give you. Experiment. The only way to learn what works best for you in your soil, your growing conditions and your specific rainfall/weather is to experiment and learn what works and what doesn't work. What works for the guy next door may or may not work for you. This is where you get to be your own mad scientist, do the experiments and learn from the results.

Dawn

Exactly what I needed thank you. I knew there wasn't a schedule I could follow although some people do. I just want reassurance that it's OK not to follow mainstream lol. Never been much good at that anyway.

Some of my plants seemed stalled so I am going to fertilize them and leave the others alone.

This old time gardener is a real pill to deal with. He has his way and ridicules most new ideas. Even said it was dumb to think I could make a living selling tomatoes. Hmmmm well shucks I have been called worse lol.

Kim, I went through that with a bunch of old guys I called the Old Farmers/Old Ranchers crowd when we first moved here. According to them, I was doing everything wrong....starting with building raised beds and amending the soil ("Why, you can't even drive your tractor through that garden with all those boards around the raised areas") to being organic ("you're a fool, the bugs will destroy your plants") to interplanting veggies with one another and with herbs and flowers ("you need to get all those weeds (the herbs and flowers) out of your garden--your family can't eat those weeds"), ad nauseum. I bit my tongue, gritted my teeth, refused to be baited into arguing, and told them firmly over and over that I was an experienced gardener, I knew what I was doing and that the way I was gardening was best for me, while the way they gardened was best for them.

After a while, they backed off---largely because my garden always consistently produced the first harvest of every veggie and they had to shut up when they witnessed my continued success. I always cheerfully shared the first tomatoes, first corn, first melons, etc with them---and that meant they found it hard to criticize me when I was beating them at their own game and sharing the produce with them. lol.

Of course my garden produced the first harvest---raised beds warmed up first so I planted earlier than they did, and rain didn't deter me---I could plant in those raised beds despite heavy rainfall since I wasn't waiting for the garden to dry up so I could use my tractor (which, lol, would have been a neat trick since we did not have a tractor) to plant. Over time, most of them backed off, and the one who didn't---I just tuned him out.

After 3 or 4 years, they started asking organic questions "what did you do for grasshoppers last year?" or "what do you do for corn earworms", so in the end, I felt somewhat accepted. I never tried to change them, and it irritated them that they couldn't change me, but we all survived. Fred was the first one to come around, but for the long time he wouldn't admit it. He'd tell Tim "She's really smart, she knows what she is doing" but he never ever once said that to me himself. Stuborn old goat (and I say that affectionately, you know, because he and I are friends to this day).

So, ignore the naysayers, kill them with kindness, and just do what you want to do and need to do. Over time, you'll even win them over or they'll get bored and go find someone else to bully. I had a triple whammy against me---a city person born and raised, a woman, and an organic gardener. Somehow, it didn't kill me and it didn't kill them. All of them but Fred have passed away. most of them long ago, and I miss all but one of them....and he almost always was a real jerk that I just had to tolerate because he was our neighbor. I kinda miss him, but I really miss his dear sweet wife. It isn't always easy to turn the other cheek and put up with people who treat you like you're a fool, but you're not a fool and you're doing great and you will show that guy and the others who are like him!

Dawn

I have been following The Dawn Method (TM) this year as much as I can, and I have to say, so far I'm seeing the difference from last year. Early plants zealously protected that set the first fruits (yep, and next year I'm trying the 'drag into the garage when it freezes' trick). Started my own seedlings (happy, healthy plants that are the varieties I want). And, letting my plants tell me what food they need, when. At least, the in-ground ones I'm doing this way. My container plants get fed once weekly, to replace what washes out. But the in-ground plants I'm letting dictate the feeding schedule. They got Tomato Tone or Mater Magic at planting, and a dose of MG tomato food right before the weather warmed up. They've taken off! I do have one in-ground that has some light green leaves on top that I need to get a diagnostic picture of, but it looks great in every other way. So, I'll vouch that she really does (obviously) know how to grow veggies, lol. And, now that I have the idea to give them all a gulp of bloom booster before we go back to sunny days again...

Kim, You're doing great. Sometimes those old farmer guys just like to hear themselves talk.

Rebecca, Oh the Dawn Method (TM) had me rolling on the floor, laughing. You flatter me.

I'm glad you're having so much success.

Let's hope this week's weather is kind to us and our gardens.

I just want some rain to fall, for crying out loud, and not too much at once because I have tons of tomatoes right at the breaking color stage...or pre-breaking color, where the color could break any day and we don't need 3 or 4" of rain to ruin their flavor at this critical point in their development. I already picked all the ones breaking color today, and if it doesn't rain too hard overnight, I'll check for any new breakers tomorrow.

Elk City got hit hard by a tornado tonight, especially on the south side of town. The power is out, gas lines are broken and there's some injuries, some death of livestock, damaged homes, and the damage on the news video looks pretty dang bad. I've been watching FB for any word from our dear Windsurf Girl, Lynn, but then with power out, I guess I shouldn't expect to hear anything soon. I just hope she, her DH, their home and the livestock and the greenhouse, etc. are okay. Let's keep all those folks affected by the storms today and tonight in our thoughts---to me, it seems odd to sit here and casually talk about gardening when there are people in our state out there now in the darkness searching for anything the storm might have left behind for them.

OK weather can be so cruel!

Dawn

Rebecca, I forgot to add that this week the tomato plants reacted badly to having 90+ degree heat and full sun after having had cooler weather and lots of clouds (albeit, without rain) during the previous week. The newest foliage at the top of the plants was discoloring to a pale green and kinda wilting by mid-day, though it perked up and looked fine again by the next morning. As soon as the sun started to go down, it began to obviously perk up, albeit slowly, so I knew the sunlight and heat were part of the problem, but also knew our rainfall has been nearly nonexistent for the last 60 days and I hadn't watered very much at all, so I knew I needed to do something.....

I had to water them a couple of times and feed them once to put a halt to that crap. I wasn't worried so much about the top foliage, but used it as a clue to guide me that the plants might be having trouble absorbing and transporting adequate moisture....which could lead to BER. So, I watered deeply twice, three or four days apart and then fed the plants. It has been a couple of days since I did all that, and the plants look fine and none of the fruit I checked is showing any BER. I'm glad I was paying attention. When I watered late last week, I thought that would be enough for a while, but then the plants didn't improve all that much, so I dug down in the soil about 8" and it was as dry as a bone all over the garden. So, I watered and watered and watered.

I probably ought to feed the onions. Their color isn't great and I don't like the way they look. This whole lack of rainfall thing is getting on my nerves.

Dawn

The elk city tornado was terrible. It is the only news I heard about. We have had terrible hot wind and no rain since the dribble Saturday. I normally water Sunday but waited until today because I thought it was going to rain Sunday Monday Tuesday. I could hear the sigh of relief when I turned on the drippers.

It was terrible. The video and photos are horrible. I feel so sorry for the man who lost his life, and for all who lost their homes and other property.

Tomorrow and Friday look equally bad for parts of the region. If I remember, I'll post the updated Convective Outlook in the morning.

Our tomatoes looked a little bit happier this morning after the overnight rain, but the ground is so dry that it won't help much if more rain doesn't fall.

I watered everything pretty good today. I hope it holds them with this heat and wind.

I didn't have to water yesterday because we are supposed to get a couple of inches of rain over the next three days. If we don't get that rain, if it somehow misses us, I'll be out watering like a maniac. It needs to hit us today/tonight or I'll have to water tomorrow anyway while waiting for the Fri/Sat rain to come, and likely I'll have to go ahead and water the containers today anyway. Fortunately, I don't have a lot in containers this year---just ornamental plants along the front garden's shady west fence line and a very few herbs---lemongrass, mint, rosemary and oregano. Oh, and a couple of citrus trees, one fig tree and the brugmansias and Texas lantana. All the signs here are pointing to drought and more frequent watering than I've had to do the last two Spring seasons, so rainfall this week will be a big indicator of how bad things could get. If the rain misses us this week, then in garden terms....my plants are in trouble.