And So It Begins...

I have never grown any sort of edible plant. Be it herbal, vegetable or fruit. The only plants I have ever grown at all are some "Madagascar Palms" from Dunecraft, and that is still a work in progress. To be honest, I only like tomatoes "so-so". My wife bought the TopsyTurvy planter on a lark back in October and there it sat, in a box.

As it began to warm up, I figured I might as well put the thing to use, or give it as a gift to someone. I sort of figured you just got a tomato plant from "somewhere" and just shoved it in there. A few weeks later, BAM! A bountiful harvest of magically appearing tomatoes! Yes! You know, like on all of the commercials. I don't know how the tomato harvesting part will go, but the prep has taken time and patience. Hopefully it will pay off. If you keep up with the blog, you'll find out, right around the same time I do.

Getting together all of the non-tomato parts was pretty easy. I researched what sort of fertilizer is best for tomatoes. The consensus appears to favor those with lower nitrogen. That's the first number of the 3 you always see on the fertilizer packaging. In this case I looked for options with less than 10%. Any more than that and you great some wicked healthy greenery but less fruit. I chose Mater Magic Organic Fertilizer, which weighs in at 8-5-5. Keep in mind all of this is based on hanging tomatoes upside-down in a bag or pot. I have no idea how that ratio changes if you plant the conventional way. I got a traditional plastic watering can with the blunt end that has all of the holes in it. In retrospect, I'm not entirely sure that was the best choice. I can't really pour it at full speed or too much water and soil and nutrients will drain out the overflow holes. A slower pour results in this annoying backward flowing leak where the blunt cap snaps on the stem. On the other hand I payed about $4 for it. It'll do.

I bought a folding step stool that gets me up about a foot and a half. I bought 18 quarts (in 2 bags: 10qt and 8qt) of potting MIX, not straight soil. The mix assists with drainage and reduces packing. Mine had just a little bit of fertilizer mixed in. Something less than 1-1-1 so I went ahead and added some of the purchased fertilizer upon initial planting. I also used about 2' of nylon cord to lower the bag from where the hanging hook is mounted. For now I'll leave it hanging that way but once it starts getting hot and the plant has grown away from the bag enough, I'll hang the bag directly on the hook to keep it out of the hot afternoon sun.

I planted the plant on the 3rd of April. No tomatoes yet! ;-) In future posts I'll cover how I went about selecting a variety, how I got it in to the bag (a chore!) and some pictures. I'll also post on any development milestones, good or bad. I know there are a TON of blogs and websites devoted to this topic. However, I come from almost ZERO gardening experience. The reason I got those DuneCraft palms were their claim to extremely low maintenance and a love of sun and heat. Supposedly, for a fruit, tomatoes are along those same lines. We'll see.