Too late to pinch out tomato side shoots?

Hi all,

I wasn't sure what was meant by pinching out the side shoots, and I left it a couple of weeks before finding out. Now I know, I've gone and looked at my tomatoes to find that the side shoots have grown huge and are now much stronger than the shoots they grew out of. Some seem to be about to make flowers.

Should I cut them out even though they are now huge? Or should I give up on those ones and just focus on picnhing out side shoots that are still small?

And if I do leave them, what damage will it do to the plants? Will I have a smaller crop?

These are grafted tomato plants, Sutton's turbo veg, I think they're all cordon types. I'm new to growing tomatoes!

Thanks hugely in advance

 

Hi They will be ok
What I would do is the lower parts that you have not nipped out is nip out two leaves after the flowers and then re train the top as it grows .
What ever you do as long as you water and feed you will have a crop
My brother always grows bush style he is to lazy he told me and he alwayd has loads

Spruce

 

When I have side shoots that I don't see (where do they come from so quickly? how do they hide so well? :D) I break them off a bit higher up where they are thin enough that it does no damage, and thus the couple of leaves that left add to the plant's "energy engine".

I do not let such side shoots flower as that will result in weight somewhat away from the main plan, and its support, which might be likely to break off. But if you independently support the fruit on the side branch that won't be a problem.

 

Most of my tomatoes I have managed to miss some of the side shoots, I guess they will do what they will do and as there seem to be planty of tomatoes forming I will let them carry on. I'm not to bothered if the fruit are smaller as I quite like smaller tomatoes. I pinch out side shoots if I catch them in time but boy they seem to shoot up all over the place. I figure the plant knows what it's doing and it's only us that try to make it conform to what we want it to do.

Mrs Chopper

 

Totally agree

 

Thanks so much everyone- I'll pinch out any new ones that I see but I'll try to tie up the ones that have run away with themselves. They're in a greenhouse, so I'll see if I can do the cabling idea, thanks Shiney. (I don't suppose you have a photo of yours? Do you tie the string to the side shoot?)

Some of the side shoots that I did chop off that we're over 6 inches long I've dipped in some rooting gel and potted them up. Who knows, I may have a whole lot more tomato plants if they grow, and all by accident!

 

Recently (maybe this week) on Gardener's World, they were showing you what to do in this situation. In essence they said nip out, with your finger and thumb, those side shoots which can easily be removed this way, for those little blighters which have shot up whilst your back was turned and have got quite thick stalks, the advice was to cut them off cleanly '... with a sharp knife' at exactly the same point as you would if they were small - i.e. as close to the conjunction of stem and leaf as possible.

Regarding side shoots - what I do is run a wire along the length of the greenhouse apex then attach long strings between that and whatever upright support you've given your toms. As they then grow, I merely 'encourage' the tips to gently wind themselves around this extra string (which is exactly what Shiney said - just in a different way!) in effect it means you don't actually tie those particular shoots to anything.

And finally - I discovered from members here, that any side shoot above about 1" in length will root. So .... I had a go, just for fun as an experiment, since I've got sooo many tomato plants this year that I really don't need, want or have space for any more. That aside, I let 'em get to about 2" and did no more than literally stick them in a pot of damp multi-purpose compost - no rooting powder, no special compost, no nuffin! They are now (somewhat 'pot-bound') in 4" square pots, are about 12" high and, although they've only got a single stem each, guess what .... they've all got flower buds. :yess:

 

I dropped a few of mine under the plants as i was pinching out so I just stuck them in the groundand they rooted, lol you can't keep em down as far as I can see.

Mrs Chopper (drowning in tomatoes)

PS. Someone said to store tomatoes they just wash them and put them in bags in the freezer, no blanching or anything, when they take them out they are really easy to skin and make an excellent base for spag bol and the like.