Are You Ready to Start Planting Tomatoes?

Planting tomatoes in your garden should be done no earlier than 2 weeks after the last expected frost in your area. Tomatoes are usually ripe and ready to pick 70-80 days after planting them in your garden, depending on the variety.

Tomatoes should be planted 3 feet away from any other plant in your garden, including other tomato plants. This should give you enough room to walk around the plant when fully grown. It will also lessen the chances of diseases developing. Furthermore, a tomato plant will develop a large root ball and will use lots of nutrients in the soil. If the plants are placed too close together, they will end up fighting for these vital nutrients and the quality and quantity of fruit will suffer.

Take the tomato seedling out of the container (roots and soil too) and place it in the center of the hole. The seedling should stick up about 2 inches above the level of the ground at this point. If it sticks up higher, you need to dig a deeper hole. If it doesn't stick up high enough, add more dirt on top of the rocks until the plant sticks up high enough. Once the depth of the hole is right, fill in the sides and top of the hole with dirt. Continue adding dirt to the hole until it is level with the ground, tamping it down lightly. When done correctly, approximately 2 inches of tomato plant should be visible. It seems kind of strange planting tomatoes so deep, but there's a good reason for this; the part of the plant that is below the ground will change and become part of the root ball. This will produce a much stronger tomato plant because the root system will be more extensive. The larger the root system, the easier it is for the plant to absorb water and nutrients from the soil. A stronger tomato plant can focus more energy on producing fruit, rather than just trying to stay alive.

If you are planting tomatoes in a container garden, choose at least a 5 gallon container and follow the same steps listed above.

Always remember, when planting tomatoes - PLANT THEM DEEP!

After planting tomatoes, water them in carefully so that none of the soil is washed away. Hold off using any fertilizer or plant food at this point. An accidental overdose of plant food now would make for a very large, lush plant that won't produce much fruit. Better to wait until the plant gets a little bigger before fertilizing. You should also wait a few weeks before using tomato cages or stakes.