Tomatoes

 When I was growing up, we let our tomato plants sprawl. That took up a lot of space. In sqf, tomato plants get 1 square foot. I dig a deep hole so almost the entire seedling is buried. They will send out roots along the entire buried stem. I put in several crushed egg shells for each seedling. The calcium helps prevent blossom end rot, as does not ripening on the ground. In the book, he makes vertical frames of fence posts and string. That didn't work for me. It's too windy here, I guess. I use 6 foot garden stakes and a 3 foot by 4 foot piece of chicken wire. Push the stakes through the wire a foot apart. Then set the posts at the 4 corners of the tomato square.

 They go about 2 feet deep, leaving not much space between the ground and the bottom of the wire. The open side faces the north side of my garden. The plants "lean" toward the sun and away from the open space.

 A blossom stem. Future tomatoes.

 A new branch. Sqf says to break these "suckers" off so the plant will focus energy on fewer tomatoes. I leave them until a month before first frost date, mid august here. 2 weeks before first frost, I break off all the new growth tips and blossom stems which haven't yet set fruit. This focuses energy on ripening fruit. Green tomatoes at frost don't do any good. I always pick every one before frost is predicted. Some of them ripen, but many wind up on the compost.

The last few days of waiting for ripe tomatoes always seem so long!