Complete Guide to Planting Tomatoes (From Start to Finish)
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In a practice like raising one’s own food that’s full of satisfying activity, there’s little as satisfying as planting tomatoes in your own organic garden.
Homegrown tomatoes taste better and can be something that both experience gardeners and new ones enjoy.
Tomato plants are delicate warm-season crops that thrive in the sun and cannot withstand frost. It’s crucial to avoid planting tomato seeds too early. Except in zone 10, where tomatoes are a fall and winter crop, the soil is typically not warm enough to plant tomatoes outdoors until late spring or early summer.
Learn exactly how to start planting tomatoes in this step by step guide to know how to start from scratch with tomato seeds, what to do if you’re using tomato seedlings instead, and exactly what to do to plant tomatoes the right way.
QUICK & ACCURATE!
Step 1: How to Start Planting Tomatoes
To get a bumper crop, stagger planting dates to extend the tomato harvest (see Harvest vs. Planting Date). Staggered transplant times will also reduce pest and disease problems, though it may not be an option if you live in an area with a short growing season.
For people with longer, warmer growing seasons, start with a small crop — just one or two plants — and then add plants as the season progresses.
That way, you’ll have an early, mid and late harvest rather than having your crop come in all at once.
Check our listing of tomato varieties by growing season, which will help you find the right tomato for the right cultivation time.
When starting tomatoes from seed, give the seedlings plenty of area to grow. This means thinning the seedlings per cell or small pot to a single healthy plant.
Cut off the weaker, smaller seedlings to make room for the one that is growing best.
Crowded conditions limit their growth, which stresses them and eventually leads to plant disease. Once tomato seedlings get their first set of true leaves, then it’ll be time to transplant them into their own individual 4-inch pots.
To make strong stems, tomato plants need to move and sway in the wind. This occurs naturally outside, but if you are starting your seeds indoors, you will need to create some sort of air movement.
Make a breeze by running a fan for five to ten minutes twice a day. That brief period of time will have a big difference to how healthy your tomato plants become
A BESTSELLER!
Step 2: Preparing the Tomato Plants (Hardening Off)
Whether your seedlings are store-bought or home-grown, you’ll need to harden them off before transplanting them into your garden.
Hardening-off means getting them accustomed to the colder and more changeable outdoor environment by setting them outdoors in the shade during the day and bringing them back in (or at least covering them) at night.
Many people who know about protecting young plants from night’s chill are unaware that they also need to be protected from the shock of full sun.
Putting them in direct sunlight before they are ready can give your tomatoes the equivalent of plant sunburn. So start with shade and progress to partial sun before subjecting them to full sun. Learn more about this in our article Hardening Off Isn’t Hard.
Hardening should take anywhere from seven to ten days. This transitional time should leave the plants ready for transplanting.
Step 3: Picking a Planting Spot
Choose a space where tomatoes (and members of their family, especially eggplants, peppers, and potatoes) have not grown in the previous couple of years.
Pick a sunny spot to grow your tomatoes outside. Tomatoes need at least 6 to 8 hours to sun to get the best flavor!
Plan to give each of your tomato plants plenty of space to grow. Strong, long-vined, indeterminate tomatoes should be spaced about three feet apart. You can space stockier determinate tomato plants 2 feet apart.
Step 4: Preparing the Soil (Cultivating)
The term cultivating may bring to mind heavy machinery, but that isn’t what we’re discussing here.
The other image that leaps to mind — hoeing in the heat of mid-summer to keep the weeds back — is also not at issue.
Mulches and close spacing pretty much make hoeing unnecessary.
No, the only cultivating recommended here is pre-season soil preparation. If you’re planting, for the first time, in an area of loose, super-rich, well-drained soil, you can skip this step. If, however, you are mortal, then your soil will benefit from additives.
That said, it should also be noted that the days of mandatory deep digging are on their way out.
Improved understanding of soil structure has led to a decreased enthusiasm for breaking up that structure and disturbing highly beneficial earthworms. A good rule of thumb is therefore to dig only on a need-to-dig basis.
You need to dig if:
- you are starting a new plot
- you are working on an old, tired plot that has not received soil amendments regularly
- your soil is heavy and clayey
- your soil is extremely sandy
- your soil is extremely anything — alkaline, acidic, stony, dry, heavy.
But if you have an established plot with good, light soil, you probably only need to mix your soil amendments with compost and spread them on top of the plot.
The single, key, always helpful addition is compost. Not only is it rich in nutrients and beneficial micro-organisms, but it also improves soil texture, which means that it increases both moisture retention and drainage (see Benefits of Using Compost).
Note that not all “organic matter” is compost.
Peat moss, wonderful for helping soils hold moisture and for making it lighter and easier to work, does not contain many nutrients, and coconut fiber, a similar additive, contains none.
Undecayed vegetable matter (kitchen scraps, lawn clippings, fallen leaves) contains many nutrients, but most are not readily available to plants until they have been broken down.
Some manures, wonderful for gardens after they’ve been allowed to stand for a year or so, can actually damage plants if applied too soon (see Manure: Safe or Not?). Mature, fully decomposed compost is the way to go.
Beyond the “use compost” dictum, most soils benefit from materials that add the three main nutrients plants need. One easy trio is blood meal (nitrogen), bone meal (phosphorus), and K-Mag (potassium).
BOOSTS YIELDS!
Step 5: Transplanting Tomato Seedlings
Seedlings are ready to plant outdoors when they are about six inches tall. Cloudy days are best for transplanting tomatoes, as seedlings are less likely to dry out or suffer from sharp temperature changes.
Wait until soil temperatures are at least 55 to 60˚F and days are in the 60s before planting your tomatoes outside.
You can get them out earlier if you keep them warm using something like an insulated cloche, cold frame, or row covers, but if you put them out too soon, you won’t gain anything.
You will need to stake, trellis, or cage most tomato plants to keep them off the ground. Decide on a support plan before you set out your plants, then add that support directly after planting.
To transplant, pinch off the lower leaves. For those of you who started your plants from seed, this is just what you did when transplanting seedlings into larger containers.
Bathe plants with a weak solution of liquid kelp prior to transplanting. Dousing them with a super-strong, synthetic fertilizer can send them into some botanical version of shock, so go light.
Before you put your plants in the soil, add one cup of kelp meal and one cup of bone meal into each planting hole to give them a turbocharged start.
Kelp is an excellent all-around plant nutrient, which is rich in micronutrients, while bone meal is rich in phosphorus, which promotes flowers and fruits. These are both slow-release fertilizers that will provide nutrients over time, without sending plants into shock as might too much chemical fertilizer.
Both are also rich in micronutrients. One trick old-time gardeners use is to add Epsom salts — one to two tablespoons per hole — when transplanting tomatoes. Epsom salts add magnesium, an important plant nutrient.
Handle plants gently when transplanting. Any bruising or damage will set them back or leave them vulnerable to viruses or pests. Be careful to keep leaves free of dirt, as many fungi and viruses live in soil.
In the north, both the roots and most of the stem should go into the hole. Only the top leaf cluster should protrude above the ground.
Since tomato roots will grow from the stem, the plant will have a larger root structure, which has two advantages: it gives the plant a more stable base, and it allows the plant access to more nutrients.
In the south, it’s best to keep the same soil level, as the buried stem can be vulnerable to fungus. The longer growing season in the south also lets the root structure reach an optimal size without the deeper planting.
Methods of Transplanting Tomatoes
If the plants you are transplanting are tall and leggy, or if you are growing tomatoes in the north, you can use trench planting instead of the traditional hole method.
The trench offers two advantages, neither of which is always relevant: you don’t have to dig as deep a hole, and the entire length of the plant’s root system is in the upper layer of soil, which warms up first in the spring and which usually contains the richest nutrients.
Dig a horizontal trench as long as the roots and stem together. Remove all the leaves from the plant with the exception of the top leaf cluster.
Lay the plant on its side in the trench and cover the root system and bare stem up to the top leaf cluster with two to three inches of soil mixed with kelp and bone meal.
When you’ve filled in the trench, the part of the plant above ground will be lying on the dirt, but not to worry; it will become vertical within a few sunny days.
If you want, you can gently push a rock under it to get it started in the right direction. This is an especially good idea if the weather is likely to be cloudy or rainy.
A third transplanting method involves digging a fairly large, deep hole (a foot wide at the top, tapering to eight inches or so, and up to a foot deep), and then planting the seedling at the bottom of it.
As the plant grows, remove lower leaves, and gradually fill in the hole. This method makes maximum use of the tomato’s ability to root its stems, but it also puts the seedling in much colder earth than other methods do.
To alleviate that problem, dig the holes a week in advance, and put a bottomless milk jug with the top still on in the bottom of each. The jug, acting like a miniature greenhouse, will speed the heating of the soil as well as prevent its collapse into the hole.
When you transplant the seedlings, cover them with the jugs, but as soon as day temperatures reach seventy, remove the tops to avoid cooking your plants. Between the hole itself and the jug, a seedling is well-protected from wind, and as the exposed soil warms, it radiates warmth around all sides of the plant.
This is an excellent technique to use in barrels and containers, where digging deep holes doesn’t involve much labor.
Best Tips for Planting Tomatoes Tips
Solarize the Soil
Because tomatoes love sun and heat, you can solarize the soil, covering the plot with plastic mulch for the entire season.
Soil solarization helps curb or prevent disease, especially verticillium wilt. It’s easiest to do this before transplanting so that you’re not wrestling wads of plastic around delicate seedlings.
Dig in your compost and nutrients, then wet the soil, lay down your plastic, and cut slits or Xs where you plan to set plants.
If you are preparing holes with individually measured nutrients, it may be best to do that preparation before laying the plastic, keeping out only enough earth to cover the seedlings.
Digging a hole large enough to hold two cups of fertilizer, then refilling it through holes in plastic can make an unholy mess. Just be sure to mark where the holes (and nutrients) are so that you can cut your slits just above them.
Mulching the Right Way
By adding mulch to the area around your tomato plants, you may fend off weeds, keep the soil moist, and stop diseases from splashing onto the leaves when it rains. A 3- to 4-inch layer of organic mulch, such as chopped leaves, or finely shredded wood chips is ideal.
In a warm climate, mulching with straw (not hay!) is another option.
Charles H. Wilbur, who has spent his life producing record-sized vegetables using organic methods, including a Guinness Book of World Records tomato plant in 1987, uses wheat straw, and describes his method in detail in his book How to Grow World Record Tomatoes.
In the north, though, straw and other insulating mulches are a poor early-season choice, as they keep the soil from warming up.
Stake Tomatoes While Transplanting
If you plan on staking tomatoes, it’s a good idea to put in the stakes at the same time you transplant. This pretty much eliminates the chance that you’ll drive a stake through the plant’s roots at some later time.
Put the stakes on the downwind side of the plants, so that when the wind blows, plants are not straining against narrow bands of material, but instead lean into the long vertical support of the stake.
Protect Against Cold Weather
For some gardeners living in a cold area where there are any doubts about the possibility of frost, it’s wise to give seedlings some sort of cold-weather protection.
This can take many forms. One DIY way is to use a plastic gallon milk jug with the bottom cut-out which can then be set over each plant, providing a personalized greenhouse with a natural vent at the top.
An old tire also acts as a windbreak and so do floating row covers that can provide frost protection.
Wallo’ Waters, which are set on the ground with a seedling at the center and then filled with water. They act as effective insulators (protecting down to 16°F) as well as superb wind breaks, but can be tricky to handle until they’re full of water. Each Wallo’ Water encircles an 18-inch diameter area and should last 3 to 5 years.
Wallo’ Waters have a tendency to droop or tip when empty or half-full, which makes filling them difficult. On the other hand, when they’re full, they’re much too heavy to handle easily.
It’s best to put a couple of inches of water into each tube before setting the Wallo’ Water in place, and then filling it gradually, not in a circular pattern, but going back and forth across the ring, so that one side never gets a whole lot heavier than another.
How to Water Tomato Plants
Water deeply and frequently while the fruits are developing. Missing a week and then trying to make up for it results in irregular watering, which causes blossom end rot (calcium deficiency), as well as cracking and splitting.
As a general rule, plants should receive at least an inch of water per week, but during hot, dry seasons, they may require more. Give your plants some water if they begin to look like they’re wilting throughout the day.
How to Prune Tomato Plants
There is no need to prune tomato plants. However, any shoots growing between the main stem and a branch should be removed since they sap energy that could be flowing to the fruiting branches.
How to Harvest Tomato Plants
Leave garden tomatoes on the vine as long as possible. Harvest tomatoes when they are firm and very red, regardless of size, with perhaps some yellow remaining around the stem. Harvest tomatoes of other colors such as orange, yellow, purple, or green tomatoes when they turn the correct color.
In general, ripe tomatoes have a deep colour but still feel firm when gently squeezed, though the specific signs of ripeness will differ depending on the variety.
The best place to keep ripe tomatoes is on the kitchen counter, not in the refrigerator.
Picked tomatoes should be kept at room temperature inside or outside in a shaded area. Never refrigerate tomatoes since the rich flavour compounds deteriorate at temps below 55°F. For later use, bumper crops might be frozen, canned, or dried.
Common Pests and Plant Diseases for Tomato Plants
Humid weather creates excellent conditions for fungal diseases like as early blight, which initially appears as dark patches on lower leaves. Throughout the season, make sure to pick up any leaves that appear unhealthy or diseased.
A more severe disease that quickly kills plants is late blight. It can only be prevented by spraying the leaves with an approved fungicide, such as copper or chlorothalonil, and by maintaining a garden free of plant debris.
Additionally, you should keep an eye out for pests.
For instance, large green caterpillars known as tomato hornworms eat tomato foliage in the middle of the summer and occasionally harm fruits. A plant can quickly be stripped of all of its leaves by one or two hornworms!
A variety of other different types of pests are known to attack tomato plants. Some of the most common ones apart from tomato hornworms include aphids, spider mites, stink bugs, cutworms, flea beetles, and tomato fruitworms.
As soon as you see pests, deal with them.
Other Guides from Planet Natural:
How to Prevent and Eliminate Cutworms Effectively
Stink Bugs: How to Identify and Get Rid of Them (BMSB)
How to Get Rid of Flea Beetles
Eric is now retired, but is still a renowned gardener known for his expertise in composting, organic gardening and pest control, utilizing pesticide-free options, such as beneficial insects.
Eric believes when you do something good for the environment, the effects will benefit generations to come.
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