Tomato Pruning Techniques 🍅 How to Prune Tomatoes (2024)

FAQs

Tomato Pruning Techniques 🍅 How to Prune Tomatoes? ›

One way to prune suckers, other than simple pruning, is to pinch them off at the tips rather than the base of the shoot. By leaving a few leaves, you allow the plant to produce more energy for ripening tomatoes, plus you give shade to ripening fruit. This technique is called “Missouri pruning.”

To encourage a strong stem, I trim all suckers and I don't tie plants to their supports until the first flowers appear. Determinate tomatoes need no pruning other than removing all suckers below the first flower cluster because pruning won't affect their fruit size or plant vigor.

A good compromise is to remove all suckers that grow below the first flower cluster. This helps keep the main supporting stem strong, but it doesn't remove upper suckers that will eventually produce flowers and fruit.

The advantage in removing the lower leaves is that the plants energies go into producing fruit rather than a lot of foliage. Also the lower leaves tend to get powdery mildew so it is good to remove them to stop disease spreading.

Determinate tomatoes, AKA bush tomatoes, produce fruit all at once. After that, they're done. These varieties are basically self-pruning because they're meant to only grow to a certain size and then stop. This is not the type of tomato we're talking about when we debate pruning the suckers.

Do you want your tomato plant to provide its best results? Then it's crucial to know how many leaves should be cut off the plant. While too many cuts might restrict development and deplete the plant's energy reserves, too few can result in a poor yield.

Usually, indeterminate tomatoes grow best with one or two low side shoots; so, remove all side shoots above this. The lower shoots help make the plant more stable and is where they bear fruit. With beef tomatoes, on the other hand, leave just one side shoot at most other than the main shoot and tie them both up.

It is ideal to clip within a few inches of every fruit cluster. If this puts your clips close together it is alright, more is better in this situation. As long as you keep your leader vine well supported and ensure the plant has enough leaves up top to provide canopy, your vines will continue to produce fruit.

When you water, do not wet the plant leaves. Wet leaves invite infections that can cause your plant leaves to spot, yellow and wilt before the plant has a chance to produce any of the tasty tomatoes that you are so anxiously anticipating. Water early in the day.

If your plant is being exposed to too much sun, too hot of temperatures, too much wind, or a lack of water, the leaves will curl up to protect themselves. The leaves are like mini solar panels, so when the plant has a sufficient amount of sunlight, they close in order to prevent sunburn on the leaves.

Should I remove lower yellow leaves of tomato plant? ›

Frost damage on tomatoes can harm the leaves in a few ways. You may notice yellowing, wilting, spots between leaf veins, or blackened leaves. If the frost was mild and the plant's stem is still healthy, you can simply remove the damaged leaves and let the plant recover.

Try to remove suckers when they're small enough to pinch with your fingers, so you don't leave a gaping wound on the stem. If you do have to cut them, use a sharp knife or pruner blade to make a clean cut as close to the main stem as possible without damaging stem tissue.

To grow the strongest tomato plant possible, prune side stems below the first fruit cluster. As a tomato plant matures, its lower leaves begin to yellow. Pinch or prune yellowed leaves to prevent disease, improve the tomato plant's appearance, and help the plant keep its energy focused on fruit production.

Remove flowers until plants are 12 to 18 inches tall, so plants can direct more energy to the roots. Remove all leafy suckers beneath the first fruit cluster so they won't slow the development of the fruit.

Prune. If the tomato seedling has grown too tall and spindly, you can prune it back to just above the first set of true leaves. This will encourage the plant to grow new shoots and become bushier.