re: 2019 Garden Thread

I plan on sowing in March so no

Almost all of them have made it to 4” peat pots. Put them under the lights since it’s supposed to be cloudy the next few days.

Miracle grow seed starter potting mix.

Lowe’s

Talked to a nursery guy yesterday, and he was saying Celebrity tomatoes were his top choice. I typically plant Super Fantastic and start my own seeds, but thought I'd experiment this year for comparison. His nursery didn't sell tomato seeds, so I went all over town yesterday looking for Celebrity seeds, Lowes, three nurseries, wal mart, tractor supply. Most stores had 10 or 15 varieties, but no Celebrity seeds anywhere. I didn't want to order online (but ended up having to), so just thought I'd pick up locally. Anybody know why Celebrity's are impossible to find? Are they just not popular anymore, or is there some kind of proprietary issue?

Thanks, yes I’ve seen them in plant form but I’m just talking about seeds.

Yeah, I had ordered my seeds too. Don’t recall ever seeing the seeds sold anywhere locally.

The only time I prune tomato plants is when leaves are touching the ground, diseased, or leaves are over abundant. I think I used too much nitrogen last year and had extremely bushy tomato plants. This year I’m going with low nitrogen fertilizer. You want to grow a lot of fruit, not a lot of leaves. As far as celebrities in particular, I haven’t grown some in a long time and I don’t recall ever needing to do a lot of (if any) pruning.

ETA: Just got of the phone with my pops. He said since a Celebrity is semi-determinate, you can let it get bushy by not pruning. Or, you can prune and pull suckers and it’ll act more vine like. He stakes them, prunes, and tops them off at about 5 feet. He always makes a ton, so I’ll probably just follow his method.

Topping can grow fuller plants with more lower fruit or better tasting fruit since the plant doesn't need to supply energy to a tall plant.

In regards to Nitrogen, its good to give a tomato plant lots of nitrogen before it starts to produce blossoms and then you stop the nitrogen. Then you switch to phosphorous which helps promote lots of blossoms. I use an electric toothbrush to shake blossoms which increases tomato yields.

Indeterminate plants should be pruned to the second bloom cluster and Determinates to the first.

You prune to avoid soil contact and to focus the plant on fruit production.

Just placed an order for seeds from reimer. Got the following coming in.
Sweet Million (tomato)
Cherokee Purple (tomato)
Big Beef (tomato)
Sweet Slice (cucumber)
Blue Lake (beans bush)
Bull Nose (sweet pepper)
Carmen (sweet pepper)
Black Beauty (eggplant)
Yellow Crooked Neck (squash)
Clemson Spineless (okra)

Hale's best jumbo (cantaloupe)
Crimson Sweet (watermelon)

If anyone thinks something is missing, feel free to drop some suggestions. As you can see I'm planting alot of what has already been talked about. I'll grow anything that people like. Hell, I don't really eat vegetables besides cucumbers, I just like growing and giving away stuff. Now the watermelon and cantaloupe...the wife and can do some work.