So, you bought some seeds from my little amazon store. You threw them in the dirt and did what you've always done in the past with all the other seeds you grow and you exclaim "Hey now! My tomato doesn't weight 5.91 pounds like the guy in the photo! What a con artist, that Austin guy is! It's Jack and the Beanstalk all over again, except there's no golden goose!"
Well, maybe you should've gone to the link for How To Grow a Giant Tomato like I mentioned on my Amazon description. Forget everything grandma told you about how to grow a tomato. Its for the best. Do as I do, and I'm sure you'll grow a big one. Then if you want to try burying a whole fish under your tomato plant next year...go for it.
Starting Seeds:
1. I recommend getting the Root Riot Starter cubes, I have had a super high success rate with them
Amazon Link:__________________
2. Find a starter tray like the one pictured below on the left with a humidity dome on top and which the root riot cubes will fit into flawlessly. Amazon Link: _________________
3. Buy a heat mat with controller to keep mat at 85 degrees F.
4. Make a cube drench:
This year I made a liter of cube drench which consisted of: .5ml of Rapid Start (amazon), .3ml SuperThrive (amazon), .3ml Bushdoctor Kelp Me Kelp You (amazon), 2ml Advanced Nutrients Tarantula (amazon), 2ml Advanced Nutrients Voodoo Juice (amazon), 2ml Advanced Nutrients Piranha (amazon), 1ml Orca Mycos Liquid (amazon).
All of those nutrients were put into a liter jug full of Reverse Osmosis water that i heated to 90 degrees. Then I put the root riot cubes into the jug of drench and let them soak up the warm solution.
This is just an example drench that I experimented with. I encourage you to try your own experiments when you have time, let me know what drench formula works for you!
5. Put the drenched root riot cubes into the starter tray and use remaining drench to put about 1/2 inch of liquid in the bottom of tray. put the dome on the starter tray and let the heat mat bring the cubes back up to 85 degrees
6. Then it's time to put the seeds into the warm Root Riot cubes! The Radicle emerges from the tomato seed from the pointy end so I usually put the pointy end of the seed downwards. I push the seed in just enough to be covered by the spongy root riot cube probably less than 1/4 inch into the cube.
Sprouting:
I recommend having an intense led grow light on the seedlings to keep them squatty and short. The seeds on the right above which i am growing for 2019 were sprouted in my window and I'm not impressed with it, but i wanted to try it. Get a good led lamp with some ultraviolet LEDs in it and keep the light as close as you can to the seedlings while sprouting, without frying them to death.
Up-Potting:
After the seeds sprout, 3-4 days after, you will need to take the seedlings out of the seedling tray and put them into small pots. The roots should be visibly dangling out of the rooting cube. Then sprinkle with some Mycorrhizae all around the root ball as pictured below. The light brown stuff is the Mycorrhizae and the white stuff is Azos which i also sprinkle on the root ball at this point. Then i put into a pot of Roots Organic Formula 707 potting "soil". You should do this up-potting procedure at least 2 times before planting in the permanent place.
In the ground or in a pot?
I'm leaving this up to you, but i will note here that i grew the 5.91 pound tomato in a 35 or 40 gallon black fabric pot that I bought on Amazon. It was grown in a circular greenhouse Sunbubble along with 11 other giant tomato plants. The base soil I used was Formula 707, many growers also use the fox farms ocean forest mixture. Most of the world records have been set by plants grown directly in the ground and in greenhouses. For 2019 i am using a mixture of hard sided pots that are 25 gallon size, 7 gallon advertised size (more like 5 gallon actual) of the hard airpots, and I will plant a few in the Sunbubble greenhouse dome directly in the soil that I hand tilled. The experiments are half the fun!
Compost Tea:
I am using the Wallace Organic Wonder Wow wonder brew this year. Last year I used Bu's Best. You should give each plant about 2 liters of compost tea every 2 weeks. I use a five gallon bucket with a Tealab kit i bought on amazon. Just put one activator packet in and the teabag in and I let it bubble for 2 days and then it is ready! Sometimes I will add a little kelp or a little stinging nettle leaf to it, maybe some worm castings and garden cane molasses.
Fertilizing the Tomatoes (Important):
This Needs to be done every other week. I like the PH Perfect Advanced Nutrients products
Watering the Tomatoes:
I have found that you should have the tomatoes on a sprinkler system with consistent timing and that is one of the most important things. Consistent watering will help you avoid blossom end rot (BER) developing on your tomatoes and ruining your chance at a giant tomato.
Pruning the Tomatoes:
Every day you should be checking on the tomatoes to make sure there aren't any "suckers" growing between the leaf nodes. They should be immediately cut or pinched off the plant. And after identifying the tomato you want to use you should lop off all growth above that tomato. My California record tomato plant was only about 3 feet tall , but it did have two primary vines because I couldn't decide which megabloom would take and there was one on each side.
Identifying the Flower that will give you a Giant Tomato:
You are looking for the flower that is much bigger than the others. This is called a Megabloom and without a megabloom your hopes for a giant are slim. I have seen instances where the megabloom was growing on the very top of the plant like a sunflower. After you identify the bloom you want to grow, the next step is getting it pollinated and to be sure it gets pollinated i suggest vibrating behind the head of the flower with an electric toothbrush or something similar (be the bee Link) and making the pollen eject out onto a black plastic spoon. Then use a brush to collect the pollen and paint it onto the tips of the stamen. You'll know it pollinated after it starts getting bigger. i suggest doing this to the same flower repeatedly, and use other giant tomato flower's pollen if you run out of pollen in the flower itself.
Hammocking the Tomatoes (is Hammocking a word?):
Use your nearby stake, cage or the like to cradle the heavy tomato in something like pantyhose (a breathable fabric). I've had them fall off the vine and it is so devastating to lose the main tomato after you have pruned everything else away.
