Warm days alternating with cooler night can retard ripening of heat loving tomatoes and peppers. Give sad plants a blanket at night, wrapping cages with clear plastic (leave tops open). Tomatoes taste best when grown on the dry side. Excess water dilutes the flavor of tomatoes. It also promotes plant diseases, especially if you use an overhead sprinkler.
The key to growing terrific, tangy, sweet-tart tomatoes is compost. All vegetables taste best and grow best in soil that's rich in organic matter. Compost from Emu Topsoil is the best I've seen on Bainbridge this year.
For great tasting crops, feed peppers and tomatoes with mild organic fertilizer like a 5-5-5. Like excess water, high nitrogen fertilizers reduce tomato flavor and diminish the potency of peppers.
I also use Maxi-Crop weekly (this seaweed and kelp extract improves the performance and flavor of all fruits and vegetables).
Like compost, kelp meal or liquid kelp encourage the development of natural sugars called brix. High brix counts mean flavorful fruits and vegetables, from cherries to chiles.
To give tomatoes a proper start, add fish meal and kelp when transplanting seedlings indoors. When they go outside, use a moderate fertilizer like Whitney Farms Lifelink (4-5-3), with beneficial microbes that feed both plants and soil.
At planting time, bury several inches of each main stem under compost to encourage a husky root system. If plants seem tippy, bury as much as a foot of each stem, which will root nicely under compost.
Tomatoes need full sun all day long. Mine are in huge tubs on saucers with wheels, so I can roll them under cover at night and back into the sun every day.
Heat loving tomatoes and peppers should remain protected with plastic wrapping until night and soil temperatures remain in the 60's. Placing red plastic sheets under tomatoes and peppers increases root growth, resulting in larger fruit and bigger yields.
To keep tomatoes compact and disease free, prune them hard 2-3 times each season (right now is a good time). To keep fruit off the ground, train your tomatoes on frames or tie them to wooden posts, using twine or soft ties that won't cut stems.
Taper weekly feeding in late July, feeding only twice in August. To keep foliage healthy, keep it dry, and don't use foliar feeds.
Water every 5 to 6 days through mid August, then taper to 7 to 9 days to encourage fruit to ripen. By late September, water only occasionally. Slight wilting of foliage promotes ripening of late fruit.
If your plants are troubled by blight, grow them even drier. In rainy summers, tomatoes and peppers will thrive in an open sided hoop-house with a plastic roof. That allows plenty of air circulation, but keeps foliage dry, which often prevents blight. The extra warmth will be appreciated at night, and you'll get far better crops of large slicing tomatoes than you would in open ground.
Ann Lovejoy can be reached at 8959 Battle Point Road, Bainbridge Island, WA 98110.
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