Terrific tomatoes

tomatoes terrific

Harvesting your very own tasty tomatoes is one of life’s joys. They can be picked at their sun-ripened and sweetest best and go from garden to plate in a matter of minutes.

It’s time to sow tomato seed and get your tomato patch or pot off to a flying start. There are lots of delicious tomato varieties to choose from, including flavour packed bite sized cherry tomatoes, large juicy beefsteak tomatoes and Italian tomatoes that are perfect for cooking and sun-drying.

HERE ARE SOME TERRIFIC TOMATOES FOR YOU TO GROW AT YOUR PLACE:

Yates ® Tomato ‘Tommy Toe

Heirloom’ is an old favourite with a reputation for delightful tasting tomatoes. It sets a heavy crop of glossy bright red apricot sized fruit. Superb in salads, bruschetta or just pick and enjoy straight from the truss. It’s a tall grower that must be staked and is best grown in a vegie patch in full sun.

Yates Tomato ‘Patio Mini’ is a compact dwarf hybrid, tailor-made for pots on the deck or tiny gardens. It’s a vigorous cropper that produces red medium-sized fruit on deep green bushy plants. Staking is optional as

Patio Mini only grows to 70cm tall.

Yates Tomato ‘Roma’ are Italian heirloom tomatoes which produce deep red pear-shaped fruit. They have drier and thicker flesh than slicing tomatoes and are famous for hearty sauces, rich tomato paste and soups and are also perfect for sun drying. Tomato seeds can be sown direct where they are to grow, or seedlings raised in punnets of Yates Black Magic ® Seed Raising Mix and transplanted when they’re around 5cm high. Only transplant seedlings into the vegie patch once the risk of frost has passed. For best results, dig some Yates Thrive ® Natural Blood & Bone into the soil before sowing seed or transplanting seedlings. This adds valuable organic matter to the soil, improves soil structure and attracts earthworms and beneficial soil microorganisms. Once the seedlings are established, apply a tomato specific plant food, like

Yates Thrive ® Tomato Granular

Plant Food, to help promote healthy leaf growth as well as lots of flowers that will turn into delicious, juicy tomatoes.

Green thumb tip:

Indeterminate tomatoes, such as Tommy Toe, are tall growers (versus determinate tomatoes which are ‘bush’ type tomatoes) and will continue to grow and produce fruit throughout the growing season. To help improve tomato yields and reduce the incidence of disease, ‘suckers’ along the stems of indeterminate tomatoes can be removed. Suckers are the small shoots that develop between the main stem and side branches. Pinching these off reduces excess leafy growth and allows more sunlight into the plant.

Top tomato growing tips

Keep your tomatoes healthy and productive by controlling some key pests and diseases during spring:

To quickly and easily protect tomatoes from the most common insect pests, like caterpillars and aphids, spray with Yates ® Nature’s

Way ® Organic Citrus, Vegie &

Ornamental Spray. It contains an effective combination of natural pyrethrin, from the pyrethrum daisy, and vegetable oil and is approved for use in organic gardening by BioGro NZ. Tomatoes can be susceptible to a range of diseases, including leaf spots (blights) and powdery mildew. To avoid splashing disease spores from the soil up on to the foliage and to help keep the leaves dry, water tomato plants gently at the base during the morning. And if diseases develop, Yates Nature’s Way Fungus Spray contains a dual combination of fungicides to control diseases like mildews and blights.

Monitor plants for signs of tomato/ potato psyllids (TPP) or their damage. TPP is a tiny sap feeding insect that causes leaves to yellow and curl, plants can wilt and sooty mould can develop due to the psyllids producing honeydew.

Yates Mavrik ® Gun Insect & Mite

Spray can be sprayed over tomato plants every 7–14 days to control TPP.