SFG and tomatoes

[Tarielena]

Just got a copy of Square Foot Gardening yesterday, the new and improved one. However, according to his graph you can plant 4 tomato plants in one square foot area! Not that I doubt him, cause I've heard nothing but good, but I just thought I'd double check to see if anyone else has done this. I guess the plants would just kind of grow together?

[lucy_v]

I was surprised and optimistic when i first read SFG a few years ago, and we set up our boxes based on his recs. For me, though, the tomatoes just didn't work out according to the sfg plan. The plants didn't produce as much fruit, and we had more trouble with insects. Maybe if you prune the plants to a single stem, but I've never been able to bring myself to cut my tomatoes that much! One problem with the system regarding tomatoes is that he says to put down landscape fabric or something on the ground under the soil mix, to prevent weeds from growing up into the box. Tomato roots grow pretty deep and wide (here's a great article about them: http://www.soilandhealth.org/01aglib...10137ch26.html), so maybe that's why it didn't work out. What has worked better for us is putting only two tomato plants in a 4x4 box, with no fabric underneath, and we also built our boxes up to 14" high (the soil isn't as high though, maybe 10-12").

Of course, I'm not an expert, and who knows if the weather, or an insect, or something else we did/didn't do affected our plants in the years it didn't work so well.

Overall, SFG worked really well for us, and while I don't strictly adhere to the "rules" anymore (e.g. I don't mark out the squares, but I basically know where they are now), it's a great way to learn to think about gardening.

On a side note, we've been hit by the tomato hornworm caterpillar a few times, and I just learned something exciting: If you plant dill near the tomatoes, the caterpillar will opt for the dill before the tomatoes!!! I'm definitely going to try that this year!

[nurturedbirth]

I just happened to have the book right next to me on the desk and I see he says that "bush tomatoes" need a 2' x 2' square and that "vine tomatoes" only need a 1' x 1' square. We tried one year to fit our tomatoes in really tight and prune them down to one stem but I don't feel like it worked out very well. This year we'll prune some of the suckers and still stake them but I think we'll try for 4 plants in a 4' x 4' section and see how that goes.

I had to edit this because I was using the abbreviation for inches rather than for feet. Square inch gardening anyone? Ha ha.

[Owen'nZoe]

I'm with Lucy_V - SFG is not my favorite way to garden tomatoes. I use my raised beds for other veggies, and have the tomatoes in rows with Florida weave poles in another section of the garden.

[Chicky2]

I've yet to see how it's going to work out, but I am doing SFG for the first time this year. I do not actually have the book, but a friend does and she looked up a few things for me. I just did some research on the net and combined it w/the supplies I have readily available. I didn't use Mel's mix, I didn't plant everything according to the rules, etc., but mostly got it "right", I think. I only planted one tomato/sf, though. I have never grown my toms up a trellis before. I've always used cages and hated them, lol. I have alot of hope this year.

ETA: I am thinking about building a box the size of the tomato area and putting it on top so I can add more soil/mulch to make it a bit deeper.

[KristyDi]

4 tomatoes per square foot is a typesetting error.

This is from the official SFG site.

Q: I heard that there was an error in one of your books on the tomato spacing, what is up?

A: You are right to be a little confused. When the All New SFG Book was published that year, we were horrified to discover that the typesetter had made some errors and the spacing that you mentioned for squash and tomatoes comes from this. It has now been corrected in a later edition.

The spacing for vining tomatoes (indeterminate) is 1 per square foot and the plant is trained to grow up a vertical frame. A bush tomato (determinate) needs a 3'x3' (9 square feet) space to grow and spread out. Squash is the same spacing as a tomato except that the big winter squash that would grow up a vertical frame is planted at 1 per 2 square feet.

[tankgirl73]

Last year I grew vine tomatoes in my (brand new) SFG. I put two side-by-side in each square foot. They did well -- NO problems WHATSOEVER with the shallow rooting issue. I did a 'florida weave' support structure for them as their "vertical frame" and it was BRILLIANT, loved it.

However, I think they were too crowded and this year I will do only one per square foot.

I also had major problems with septoria spot, and later in the season, blight (started in the potatoes around the corner of the house but worked its way over). The overcrowded tomato plants probably hastened the spread. We also had a TERRIBLE growing season, wet and cold, and I had a late start, and we have a short season to begin with -- so in the end, I had 30 pounds of green tomatoes ripening in my basement, many still not fully grown.

But they were yummy! And the yield was still really high!

Oh I also had one determinate plant, which I didn't realize was going to be a bush type... I grew all my tomatoes from seed except this one that I bought, a Roma bush. It spread and spread and spread... holy canoli!!

[Chicky2]

tankgirl, what did you do w/the one that spread (determinate)? I realized today that I planted one determinate in my sfg, and want to give it more room.

Here's another issue, though. The tag says determinate. It is a Celebrity. I have been reading, though, that Celebrity were considered a semi-indeterminate variety. Anyone know anything??

[Tarielena]

Thank you for the correction, KristyDi, and for all the tomato hints everyone else!