Grow Cherry Tomatoes in a Container

do you love cherry tomatoes but the only way you can grow them is in a container but you're not sure how to do that because they get so huge in this video I'm going to show you how the first rule of growing cherry tomatoes in a container is the bigger the better container that is and that's really because it is difficult to keep containers moist and tomatoes need consistent moisture otherwise you're going to run into things like Blossom and rot containers are also difficult to keep the amount of nutrients in there that you need because they do leech nutrients out every time you water so for both those reasons the bigger container is better I would not go less than a 5 gallon container for a cherry tomato this is actually bigger this is 10 gallons this would be an ideal size especially if you live in a climate that is on the drier side in the summer like I do cuz like I said the bigger container is going to hold more moisture in another tip is if you're using a black pot especially put some plants around it to shade the black pot because the sun's going to beat down on this black pot in the summertime and it's going to dry it out faster so I've got the pot filled with potting soil and I've got a pink princess cherry tomato grew this for the first time last year and I was not disappointed it's a pinky red cherry tomato that is even sweeter than Sun gold if that's possible so I've got it growing here from seed in my Solo Cup it's got a great root system on it not too much you don't see a lot of spiraling around the bottom so I really don't have to tease the roots out at all now we want to add some nutrients to the soil to get the plant started off right you can use any granular organic fertilizer I'm using Neptune's Harvest crab and lobster and uh kelp meal that's two different products but I've got them mixed into the same bucket just for ease so a couple handfuls of that that's going to give the tomato plant the uh nutrients it needs right in the beginning to blast off with a lot of growth in the beginning now cherry tomatoes any Tomatoes really they actually grow roots all along their stem and so those roots can further feed the plant so when you're planting tomatoes and this is one of the only crops you can do this with you want to plant it deep so I'm just going to twist off some of these leaves here and leave that top amount then I'm going to dig a hole that's going to accommodate the root ball and majority of that stem just like that so now we've got the ability to grow a ton of roots to bring in a ton of nutrients now there's a couple more nutrients I want to add to this container one of the biggest problems or one of the biggest diseases that tomatoes are prone to get is Blossom and rot and if you've ever seen anything looking like this where the blossom end has a brown or black spot that just kind of looks like like it's rotting that's Blossom and rot and that's caused by a lack of calcium in the plant not necessarily a lack of calcium in the soil especially if you're growing in the ground the biggest contributor by far to blossom end rot is infrequent watering or uneven watering when the plant doesn't have enough moisture in the soil it can't suck that calcium in and use it in the plant and therefore you'll get the blossom end rot so because pots tend to be on the drier side anyway and because we're not sure how much calcium this mix actually has in it we're going to add some I just use a bit of gypsum there's a lot of calcium in Gypsum just going to sprinkle it around here mix it in good and when you water it'll take it further down into the uh potting mix here so that plus the crab and lobster that I've gotten here is going to give it a good amount of calcium so there shouldn't be any issues with Blossom IND rot as long as I keep these pots pretty consistently moist another nutrient tomatoes need a lot of is magnesium magnesium is what makes those big juicy fruits that we all love a laam magnesium means less fruit and less and not as good tasting fruit so to give some magnesium to this pot I'm going to be using Epsom salts now I know Epsom salts if you look online they're the be all end all they'll fix anything in the garden I honestly don't use epsom salt for anything other than tomatoes in containers I don't use it in the ground at all in the ground there's plenty of magnesium and actually magnesium will fight with calcium to uh they'll compete for uptake into the plant so the only reason I put it in pots is because there might not be enough magnesium in that pot so same as with the gypsum we're just going to sprinkle some around here you don't want too much because it is salt you don't want your soil too salty all right the next thing we want to talk about is watering like I already mentioned keeping a consistent moisture level in the soil is of utmost importance especially in pots they can't send their Roots further into the ground to get the moisture they need you have to supply it and In The Heat Of Summer that could mean Watering your plant twice a day if you have the ability to set up a drip system I would highly recommend that that way it takes all the focus off of you and it just does it itself if you're watering by hand you just want to make make sure that every time you water you soak the soil completely and you don't want to let it completely dry out between waterings or it's going to be really difficult to get wet again and what happens is the water will inside the pot will just run down the sides and out the holes and they it won't even move through the soil so the potting soil I actually started with was slightly moistened just so we don't have that issue from the Geto now when you water you want to make sure that you water until you see it coming out the bottom botom of the pot unless like I mentioned the soil was completely dry already and then it might start running out as soon as you put the hose in there um in that case if you have hydrophobic soil and it will not soak up water you want to set the entire pot in a bucket fill that bucket up fill the pot up and keep going until you put your finger down in there and you can see that and the pot is drastically heavier than it was you can feel that moisture and then don't let it dry out that much anymore so another thing to add to keep that moisture level in the pot is a layer of mulch and yes you can use mulch in pots it's not just for inground gardening and you can use anything you've got you can use straw pine needles um wood shavings wood chips I'm just using this pet bedding here nice good 2 to 3 in layer it's going to keep that soil nice and damp throughout the summer now let's talk about how a cherry tomato grows they grow like crazy uh they are an indeterminate most cherry tomatoes are indeterminate meaning they grow and grow and grow and produce the entire season until they die with the frost or or cold winter so you will see me and if you've watched any other videos of me growing tomatoes in determinate type I grow them up a string single stemmed i' pinch off any of the side growth and just focus on that Central stem because the side growth more or less tends to be uh green growth and not a lot of fruit cherry tomatoes are the exact opposite most of that side growth is going to produce a lot of fruit so rather than single stemming these we're going to let them grow kind of wild for the first two or three uh armpits and the armpit is just where the stem meets a leaf in that armpit is typically where the side growth comes from so starting at the the bottom I pluck out the side growth on about three leaves and then that's it I don't pinch anymore for the rest of the season now to grow them I just use a regular heavyduty tomato cake there are some tomato cages that fall apart before you get them home don't get those but uh we want to take that tomato cage of spread those points out get them near the edge of the pot push them all the way down in now as it grows up through the center and kind of branches out you can tie some of the branches onto these Circle parts and that will really secure the whole thing so even if you have strong wind uh the whole pot might topple over if it's not watered and heavy but the actual plant won't break over the only pruning that you want to do now because like I said most of the growth on a cherry tomato produces tomatoes so you're only going to prune it to keep it in bounds in the shape and size so it's not encroaching on other on other container plants um otherwise you can just let it go completely crazy if it's just on a patio by itself and just like a shrub when you cut it back it will put back out and produce so don't be afraid to you know prune it in whichever way you see fit in a couple of months when the plant is pretty tall you're going to see the leaves at the bottom start to yellow turn brown look wilty that's totally normal that's not necessarily a disease um however those are the the leaves that can foster disease so I always just take off any any leaf that looks discolored and uh throw it in the trash if you live in a humid climate then you might want to do some inter pruning of the plant these plants can get pretty dense and it's going to hold a lot of moisture in there and Foster fungal diseases so you know every month or so just kind of look through the middle and pinch or or cut out some of the the thicker growth you want to be able to see a little bit through the plant you don't want it to just be a huge mass so if you keep up with that you're going to cut down on a lot of disease issues if you want to know about a household item that you probably have in your medicine cabinet right now now that will ward off so many of these humidity causing diseases click the video right here I'll see you guys next time

Channel: Next Level Gardening

Views: 89,301

Keywords: how to grow tomatoes, tomato growing tips, grow tomatoes not foliage, grow tomatoes not leaves, growing tomatoes, organic, fertilizer for tomatoes, tomato plant growing, gardening, how to grow tomato plants, how to prune tomatoes, tomato growing secrets, growing tomatoes in containers, planting tomatoes, tomato tips, grow tomatoes in buckets, organic gardening, how to grow tomatoes at home, container gardening, vegetable gardening, cherry tomatoes

Id: aBNBG0DtA8I

Length: 10min 10sec (610 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 16 2024