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Amy's tomato-starting query

Amy said,
>I've heard that it's better to buy tomato plants already started, then
transplant.  Is it easier than growing from
>seed?  If I chose to grow from seed, instead of a greenhouse, when should I
start them inside?

Gardening is such a wonderful and complex hobby that newbies can get
overwhelmed easily and lose confidence.  Since I'm a fanatic tomato grower,
here's some advice with which others on the List are free to disagree.

1.  To build your confidence, next summer begin with transplants you have
purchased at your nearest full-service nursery.  Look for stocky,
bright-green transplants that have *not* already started to flower.

2.   Pick varieties whose maturity dates are described on the label as under
80 days (because in Zone 4 you have a fairly short growing season).  "80
days" means it takes about 80 days to get ripe fruit, counting the
transplant-into-the-garden date as Day One.

3.  If you have lots of room and want to make homemade tomato sauce for the
freezer, grow some sauce tomatoes (also called paste tomatoes).  If space is
at a premium and you'd rather eat than cook with the fruits, choose
varieties that make big sandwich-sized fruit and little cherry tomatoes for
salads.

4.  Keep detailed records on what you planted, when, and how each variety
grew.  Pest problems?  Wilt?  Fruit set?  Flower drop?  Taste of each
variety?  After a few years, you'll know which hybrids and heirlooms
(open-pollinated nonhybrids) grow best in your area and soil.

In future years, you will almost undoubtedly want to grow your own
transplants.  You can get hundreds more varieties this way (from seed
catalogs) than you can by buying what the nursery decides to stock.  And
it's enormously satisfying to use the cold, dark winter months to help seeds
spring to life.  Helps *you* spring to life actually.

Gardening is a fairly cheap hobby until you begin going this route.  You'll
find yourself buying a light setup, some growing racks, way more seed than
you can use, sterile soilless mixes for germinating seeds, all manner of
fertilizers, pots, tools, and a bigger electric bill.  Nevertheless, all
this is where at least 40 percent of the fun is, IMO.

Now if you decide to begin veggie seed-sowing for 1998, you might as well
start with the items that cost a bundle in the nurseries:  tomatoes and
peppers.  My favorite local nursery has been charging 79 cents apiece for
seedlings, which I just cannot tolerate.

First, find out from your county extension the latest spring frost date for
your area.

For tomatoes, count back 10 weeks and plant your seeds.

For peppers, count back 13 weeks and plant your seeds.

Peppers are much slower to get rolling than tomatoes, in my experience.
These planting guidelines will give you sturdy, stocky seedlings of both
things ready to go into the garden when your soil has warmed up enough to
accept them without much shock to the plants' systems.

You will actually want to wait at least 1 week beyond the last frost date
before you *think* about putting these tender seedlings into the real world.
Air temp is not as critical as soil temp.  If the dirt is still cold, the
transplants will go into growth shock and just sit there, shivering
miserably and refusing to grow.  Toms and peps are both *slow* to recover
from such insults.  With a Zone 4 relatively short growing season, you can't
afford to offend these veggies.  They won't have enough time to recover and
produce good crops for you.  The second week in June wouldn't surprise me as
an appropriate outplanting date for you, esp. if your site is in a frost
pocket or on the north side of a hill.  Very likely you major harvest will
take place in late August and early September.

Wall-o-Waters can let you create a microclimate for each transplant warm
enough to advance your starting dates by 2 weeks at least.  But WoW's don't
do anything about *soil* temp, which is critical to tomato and pepper success.

Good luck, and keep us posted next spring on your decisions and plans.

--Janet





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Janet Wintermute             jwintermute@idsonline.com

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