The Rusted Garden Blog — Growing Tomatoes

By Gary Pilarchik (The Rusted Gardener) These cages can be built in 15 minutes. They will allow you to get your tomatoes into the garden a lot earlier. It works. I use a few every year and I am the first in the area with red tomatoes. Try it! Visit my YouTube Channel with over 800 gardening videos: The Rusted Garden Wind-Break They act as a wind-break and keep the plant from chilling from winds. They also allow transplants time to get used to the elements without becoming overly-stressed from temperature changes. It makes a mini shelter for them. Heats...

By Gary Pilarchik (The Rusted Garden) Tomatoes use a hormone similar to salicylic acid to trigger a response called 'systemic acquired resistance' or SAR. This response helps a tomato plant fight off bacteria, fungi and other diseases. This defense response is a naturally occurring internal plant process that can be started manually (so to speak) by spraying your tomato plants with aspirin. The salicylic acid in the aspirin will trigger the tomato's defenses, by mimicking the natural hormone, as if it were being attacked. You can preemptively trigger the SAR response in tomatoes. Why is this a good thing? The...

by Gary Pilarchik (The Rusted Garden) Every year I create new garden videos and often make video series that focus on a specific topic. Last year, I shot a 9 part video series on growing tomatoes and peppers from start to finish and all the steps in between. They are short focused videos that start with well...starting seeds. I cover all the starting basic, transitioning your plants to the outdoors, planting, feeding, tending, pruning, staking and managing pest and diseases. I also add in tomato and pepper tips here and there, like pinching off the tops of your young peppers...

by Gary Pilarchik (The Rusted Garden) Tomato Tip One: Two Types of Tomatoes Determinate and Indeterminate: There are two types of tomato plants. A tomato plant is either a determinate plant or indeterminate plant. A determinate tomato grows to a set height and stops growing. The fruits mature all at once or relatively close in time and the plant dies shortly after the final fruits mature. This determinate type of tomato is great for getting the first round of tomatoes from your garden (as they mature quickly) and they do well in containers. You might be able to plant two rounds...