Lateral Thinking At A Pinch

With my total tomato count resting at 56 plants, all are now safely planted out into the garden.

I have 44 plants in the main garden, and for the first year, I have chosen to concentrate all the plants in one area.This is a bit of an idea to save time when watering and also harvesting as over the past few seasons I’ve had to walk miles carrying the watering cans!

Let’s call this a bit of 5S for my tomatoes!

The remainder are in an assortment of pots, as I like tio have some smaller, bushy varieties close to the kitchen, for those summer lunches when they’re easy to access.

So with the weekly fertilising and warm conditions with plenty of sunshine, the plants are growing rapidly, and bursting out in pretty much every direction!

So let’s check the standard process for “pinching out” the laterals…
Basically, you don’t want too much greenery and less energy for fruit, so as the lateral stems appear at each branch node, you remove them gently.

This is where the pinching out bit comes into play…using finger and thumbs, you pinch them and break them off!

Before…lateral starting to Grow: