My Experiments & Experiences with Tomatoes

For a couple of reasons I just love growing tomatoes! You get a lot of varieties to try out; they are quite hardy, and even kids love to eat them. All they need is sun (the more the better) and a little care.

I got some organic seeds from Navdanya from their newly opened store in South City 2, Gurgaon. I have tried a local variety from a nearby nursery, but I am more anxious about some seeds I received from Bangalore. One gentleman had posted about them on a gardening email group and on my request was kind enough to send them to me. Gurgaon’s weather is little different from Bangalore, so I wasted some seeds as the weather was not appropriate enough (in August) for this variety to germinate.

An interesting – and hopefully successful (!)- experiment I am doing is with upside down tomatoes. Here is a picture – hope it is clear enough to give you an idea!

Surprisingly, it was very easy to grow this sapling upside down and it grew better the normal ones. I don’t know if gravity had any role to play here.

Another thing I was testing this time was to grow tomatoes in different sizes of pots to see the difference in growth. Similar saplings were grown at same time and I concluded that tomatoes like bigger pots that have lots of space for roots to grow. The bigger pot plant has grown almost double the size of the one grown in small pot.

About the problem of pests like aphids and also the problem of curling leaves, I have tried spraying them all with neem sprays and garlic sprays, details of which can be found at http://www.esvasa.com/?q=organicpesticide. I still have a lot of problem insects on my plants and sometimes I have to resort to removal of aphids by hands, but it’s all worth it when I am able to see some small tomatoes in my plants.