A charming tomato bush with a strong, thick stem, lush, juicy green foliage, but no flowers, no ovaries... There are no pests or diseases, and the upper leaves are curled. These signs indicate that the tomatoes are fattening (this happens quite often in a greenhouse). What are the reasons and how to get rid of the scourge?
Why do tomatoes fatten?
Abundant, thick tops of tomatoes are a consequence of “overeating.” As a rule, the phenomenon is accompanied by a violation of the development of the root system. Instead of going deep, it expands in the near-surface layer of soil. This can happen both in open beds and in greenhouses. The main reasons are overfeeding seedlings and generous watering.
For greenhouse tomatoes, there is an additional reason to fatten – high humidity, combined with a lack of light. The last factor has a significant influence if typically southern varieties are grown in a greenhouse at temperate latitudes.
Planting seedlings too thickly and untimely removal of shoots and lower leaves also encourage the crop to increase its green mass.
The soil of greenhouse beds, saturated with organic matter, feeds tomatoes with nitrogen. An excess of this substance actually promotes the growth of foliage and lateral shoots, but not the formation of a flower cluster. Even if seedlings are planted quite rarely, fattening is inevitable.
For this reason, when preparing the soil for tomatoes, organic matter is added in strictly recommended quantities. It is better to subsequently add nitrogen to them if the need arises.
Agricultural technology provides for extremely sparing watering or its complete absence in the first two weeks after planting seedlings. This is necessary so that the roots of the plants go deeper in search of moisture and thereby create conditions for flowering and fruit set. Abundant watering relieves them of this need, and many roots are formed located near the surface of the soil. Tomatoes are not “puzzled” by procreation and happily grow tops and lose resistance to diseases and pests.
Tomatoes grown from purchased seedlings are often fattened. It is important for the seller that it has a marketable appearance, and the consequences are indifferent to him. It is almost impossible to help such plants, so it is better to purchase seedlings ready for planting from trusted suppliers.
How to fight fat gain?
To prevent fattening, watering is carried out strictly according to the schedule with mandatory ventilation of the greenhouse.
If it is difficult to solve the problem with a lack of light for technical reasons, they resort to removing some of the leaves. First of all, those that directly shade the flower brushes are plucked off. But removing all the interfering leaves at the same time is extremely undesirable: severe stress can simply destroy the plant. The procedure is carried out intermittently, removing one leafy branch from the bush every 2-3 days.
Wood ash, rich in potassium, added to the soil reduces the likelihood of tomatoes fattening in the greenhouse and open ground. When burning grass, potato tops, oak or birch firewood (branches, leaves), a substance with a high content of the necessary element is obtained.
If the tomatoes still become fat, proceed to a comprehensive solution to the problem.
- Take a break in watering for 10 days. During this period, strict constant control is established over the thermal regime of the greenhouse: daytime temperature is maintained at 25-27°C, night temperature – approximately +23°C.
- Ventilation of the greenhouse is stopped during this period unless it is required to maintain the temperature.
- Fertilizers containing nitrogen, even in minute quantities, are excluded from the diet of fattened plants.
- When feeding tomatoes, emphasis is placed on potassium and magnesium-containing complexes.
- Spray the plantings with a solution of superphosphate - 3 tbsp. l. fertilizers per 12 liters of water. The effect of fertilizing will be felt immediately, but the effect is short-term. The best time for processing is from 19:00 to 9:00.
- The above solution is applied at the root - 1 liter for each bush. Phosphorus inhibits the growth of tops, but helps the formation of flower clusters and the setting of tomatoes.
- Pollination of existing flowers is carried out forcibly, shaking each bush. It is advisable to reduce the number of possible ovaries by about a third.
- Remove the leaves growing below the first cluster and some of the upper ones.
Optimal feeding for the recovery period:
- wood ash with high potassium content;
- potassium salts - saltpeter, monophosphate or chloride;
- magnesium salts - sulfate or monophosphate.
When choosing a variety for greenhouse cultivation, pay attention to the manufacturer’s recommendations - whether the variety is intended for cultivation in protected ground or not. It is also taken into account that low-growing tomatoes and tomatoes that form a short raceme are least prone to fattening.
Often, after spraying, gardeners remove almost all of the upper curled leaves and leave a couple of strong stepsons. Shoots begin normal growth and development. With a well-established schedule of watering and fertilizing, such shoots are able to form fruitful clusters and produce a harvest.
In some regions of Central Russia, if the tomatoes have become fattened, they use a very original technique: a wood log is split into thin splinters, a longitudinal cut is made in the stems of the fattening tomatoes, into which a sliver is inserted. Dry wood takes on some of the liquid that rises up the stem, freeing the plant from excess nutrients. The additional stress received by the tomato stimulates it to continue the species - the formation of a flower cluster.
What is shoot overgrowth and how to deal with it?
Sprouting is a form inherent in hybrid varieties, when new shoots appear from flower brushes, also interfering with the full development of already formed ovaries. Occurs due to the same reasons as fattening.
Coping with the growth of unnecessary shoots is as follows:
- Remove the overgrown shoot.
- Pinch the upper brush, leaving several large ovaries on it.
- Reduce watering.
- Unscheduled feeding of bushes with potassium and phosphorus.
It’s quite easy to deal with fattening of tomatoes, but it’s better to avoid it altogether. No matter how much you would like to give your plants more organic matter, you need to remember that nitrogen is needed only in the initial stages of growth, and then it negatively affects the yield. It is easier to follow the rules of agricultural technology right away than to correct mistakes later.
Fattening of tomatoes is a common phenomenon, especially for greenhouse tomatoes. In comfortable conditions, the plant stops worrying about reproduction and begins to grow lush foliage, a stem two fingers thick and a bunch of unnecessary branches. In this case, the setting of tomatoes either does not occur at all, or it is delayed for a long period. What to do if tomatoes become fatty, and, in fact, why tomatoes become fatty – we’ll talk.
Powerful stems, bright green leaves curled inward, prolonged ripening of fruits - the main signs of fattening tomatoes
Tomatoes fatten: main reasons
Tomatoes fatten for two main reasons:
- overfeeding with nitrogen fertilizers
- incorrect, too frequent watering.
There is an ironclad rule for tomatoes: “under” is better than “over”. , and other organic fertilizers, as well as nitrogen mineral fertilizers - this is great, but everything should be in moderation. Organic matter is rich primarily in nitrogen. Nitrogen is the strongest stimulant for the growth of green, vegetative mass. The application of nitrogen fertilizers instead of phosphorus and before flowering of tomatoes has a negative effect.
With an excess of nitrogen, all the plant’s forces go into the greens, and the tomatoes fatten, that is:
-the stem becomes unnaturally powerful and thick
- leaves become dark green and curl
- a large number of new shoots and stepsons grow
- the tomato produces a weak flower cluster with few or no flowers
- tomato ripening is delayed
Frequent watering is another disservice you can do to tomatoes. Due to frequent watering, the plant relaxes, grows a superficial root system and cannot fully provide nutrition on its own. Therefore, tomatoes need to be watered rarely (once every 5-7 days, or less or more often, depending on the weather), but abundantly. In the first 15-20 days of life, the young plant does not need to be watered at all: the water that you pour into the hole is quite enough to support the life of the plant. A slight water “starvation” will only make the plant stronger and allow it to grow a powerful root system.
Tomatoes are fattening: what to do?
Overfed tomatoes You can’t return it to its original state, but you need to try to direct the plant’s forces in the right direction, that is, into the formation of fruits.
Are tomato seedlings fattening? Not scary. When replanting, limit the amount of nitrogen fertilizers, and increase the amount of phosphorus and potassium fertilizers What can you do if your tomatoes become fat:
1)Eliminate nitrogen fertilizing, replacing them with phosphorus and potassium. Before flowering, add phosphorus-containing additives, as well as a little potassium (potassium will slightly inhibit the supply of nitrogen, besides, this element for tomatoes is a signal for the formation of ovaries. Potassium fertilizers for tomatoes are best done after the 5-6 clusters bloom) and magnesium. As a phosphorus fertilizer, you can take superphosphate - dilute 3 tablespoons of fertilizer in a bucket of water and feed each bush with 1 liter of the mixture. The same solution, only twice as weak, should be applied to foliar feeding of tomatoes, that is, treated with a sprayer. You can feed fatty tomatoes with ash.
Nitrogen is a mobile element, so on light, sandy soils it can be wash out of the soil. To do this, ONE TIME, but with a large amount of water (a bucket and a half for 1 bush), “wash” the soil of nitrogen, and it will be washed into the deeper layers of the soil. After this, the plant is not watered for about a week, gradually accustoming it to a water-free diet. But on heavy, clayey soils, for obvious reasons, it is better not to conduct such experiments.
Will slightly weaken the effect of ordinary nitrogen loosening the soil(extra ammonium will escape into the atmosphere).
The rapid growth of obese tomatoes will help calm down removing bottom sheets, and shoots located above the inflorescences, which shade the sun's rays from the tomato bunches. It is recommended to remove one, maximum 2-3 large leaves below the first flower cluster once - this stress will be enough for the tomato to switch to fruit production.
If tomatoes are fattening, it means that they are already behind the normal ripening cycle and are unlikely to feed all the ovaries. Therefore it is possible thin out the flower brush, removing excess ovaries, and also decapitating the bush by pinching the top.
Fattening tomatoes need help with pollination– just gently shake the plant, holding it by the trunk.
Thanks to such simple techniques, overfed tomatoes will restore the balance of minerals, which was previously “skewed” towards increasing green mass.
Tatyana Kuzmenko, member of the editorial board, correspondent of the online publication "AtmAgro. Agro-industrial Bulletin"
Fattening of tomatoes in a greenhouse can occur if the method of growing them is violated. You should study the question of what to do if tomatoes are fattening, and whether this can be somehow corrected.
Fattening of tomatoes in a greenhouse can occur if the method of growing them is violated.
Vegetables grown in greenhouse conditions are finicky. Temperature fluctuations, changes in humidity or lighting immediately cause deviations in the formation and growth of tomatoes. And any deviations not only affect the appearance of the plants, but also reduce the yield.
Externally, fattening tomatoes look great: powerful, juicy, well-developed bushes with beautiful dark green leaves. The upper leaves tend to curl.
However, these powerful bushes will not produce a good harvest. This is due to the fact that all the abundance of nutrients is aimed at the formation of green mass, to the detriment of the formation of ovaries and fruits.
Signs of fattening are underdeveloped flower tassels and a very small number of inflorescences on plants.
But you can see a strong growth of green mass.
Of course, you shouldn’t immediately discard these tomatoes; you need to carefully inspect the plants and try to find the cause of this problem.
Another sign of fattening in greenhouse tomatoes is the appearance of new sprouts. This typically occurs on hybrid long-cluster and indeterminate tomato varieties. You can't expect a harvest from these greenhouse tomatoes.
Causes of the phenomenon
Greenhouse tomatoes are responsive to good care and timely fertilizing. But excessive application of nitrogen fertilizers leads to the fact that tomatoes begin to fatten.
Overfeeding with nitrogen, for example, fertilizing the soil with bird droppings or humus in excess, stimulates the growth of green mass, while impairing the formation of inflorescences and fruits.
Plants stop accumulating nutrition in buds and fruits and all the nutrients needed for fruiting are redistributed into green foliage.
In addition to excess nitrogen fertilizers, tomatoes become fattened for other reasons, for example, due to frequent and generous watering or high humidity in the greenhouse.
Externally, fattening tomatoes look great: powerful, juicy, well-developed bushes with beautiful dark green leaves
You need to know that waterlogging does not contribute to the formation of a strong and powerful root system, but causes the upper small roots to grow wider. And this makes plants unstable to external negative influences.
Good and proper special lighting in a greenhouse is of great importance. Tomatoes immediately begin to react to lack of light.
Another important reason for fattening of tomatoes in a greenhouse may be too dense planting of plants with a simultaneous lack of lighting.
How to fix the problem
There are several methods that allow you to quickly get rid of fattening in greenhouse tomatoes. First of all, you need to stop irrigating tomatoes for at least 7-9 days.
After foliar feeding, you can notice the result of spraying the very next day. To consolidate the result, you additionally need to fertilize the roots with superphosphate.
It is carried out using superphosphate extract. It is prepared as follows. You need to take 100 g of double granulated superphosphate and pour 1 liter of boiling water, stir several times and leave for a day until completely dissolved. Then take 20 spoons of this composition and dissolve it in 3 liters of water. After this, take 150 g of this new solution, add 1 bucket of water and water the plants at the root. Apply 1 liter of fertilizer to each bush. But before that you need to water the plants abundantly.
Additional measures
In addition, you need to completely eliminate fertilizing with nitrogen fertilizers and monitor the temperature in the greenhouse.
Increase the temperature to +25°C during the day, and at night it should not fall below +22°C.
It is also necessary to remove all leaves growing above the flower clusters and covering the ovaries from light. But this should not be done immediately, so as not to cause stress to the plant, but gradually, removing no more than 2-3 leaves in 1 day.
In order to prevent tomatoes from fattening, you need to promptly free the plant from stepsons. They should be removed when they reach a length of 3.5 cm. If this is not done, the plant will direct all its efforts to their growth, and the development of the fruits will lag behind. Stepchildren must be removed completely, and stumps should not be left behind.
All these measures will stop the growth of green mass and redirect nutrients to the formation of tomato buds and fruits.
Greenhouse tomatoes are responsive to good care and timely fertilizing. But excessive application of nitrogen fertilizers leads to the fact that tomatoes begin to fatten
Prevention of fattening
The composition of the soil, the amount of fertilizing and their quality are of extreme importance when growing tomatoes.
An excellent anti-fatifying agent for tomatoes is ordinary wood ash. It is rich in potassium, and this will prevent plants from fattening. Also, do not neglect regular inspection of tomatoes, and when the first symptoms of the disease are detected, you need to carry out all the above measures as quickly as possible.
Their implementation will not require much work from the summer resident. You just need to prepare the soil in the fall: dig it up, treat the soil, add a sufficient amount of fertilizer, adjust the microclimate in the greenhouse and adhere to the method of growing tomatoes.
In addition, the greenhouse must be regularly ventilated to avoid high humidity.
It will be useful for gardeners to know that there are tomatoes that are not prone to fattening - those with a short tassel. When choosing tomato varieties for growing in a greenhouse, you should pay attention to them.
Now, if the tomatoes in the greenhouse are fattening, you know what to do.
Very often, especially in greenhouses, flowers appear on tomatoes, but there are still no ovaries. Over time, the flowers fall off, and there is no talk of any harvest. What to do to get tomatoes to set? Let's try to figure it out.
No ovary on tomatoes: unsuitable temperature
In tomatoes, pollen ripens at night, and pollination occurs during the day. However, for pollen to ripen, it needs an optimal temperature - not lower than 15 degrees (otherwise it will not ripen) and not higher than 25 degrees. During the daytime, the temperature should not exceed 35 degrees, otherwise the pollen will become sterile, will not be able to germinate, and the plant will drop its flowers.
What to do if the tomatoes in the greenhouse do not set due to the temperature? In hot weather, ventilate the greenhouse often and leave it open at night. You can also whitewash the roof - this will protect the plantings from overheating. If the tomatoes do not set due to low temperatures, water the tomatoes with warm water, place dark containers with water in the greenhouse - they “collect” daytime heat well. In critical cases, heaters will have to be installed.
Ovary stimulants will help tomatoes overcome the heat - traditional boric acid (1 gram per 1 liter of warm water), or the preparations Ovary, Bud, Gibbersib, Tomaton, etc.
No ovary on tomatoes: unsuitable humidity
Again, it’s often impossible to breathe in greenhouses. High humidity causes pollen to clump into clumps and not be able to escape from the anthers. And due to low humidity, pollen cannot germinate on the pistil. In the first case, ventilation will help, in the second, spraying the tomatoes with water in the morning (can be combined with the same Bud, boric acid or phosphorus fertilizers, which tomatoes need during fruit set).
Be sure to help the plant pollinate: in the morning or afternoon, walk around the greenhouse and lightly shake the tomato by the stem or trellis; if there are not enough tomatoes, you can individually pollinate each plant with a brush (one tomato flower can pollinate not only itself, but also other flowers). In windless, humid weather, this procedure can be done with open ground tomatoes.
Are the tomatoes not setting? Help them get pollinated Tomatoes don't set: they fatten
Overfeeding tomatoes with nitrogen fertilizers creates such comfortable conditions for the plant that it forgets to even think about its offspring: powerful stems, malachite foliage, and little or no ovaries (sometimes even flowers). It is necessary to create a stressful situation for the plant: remove unnecessary shoots and stepsons (but not all at once, 1-2 at a time), on light soils, shed the soil once so that excess nitrogen goes into the lower layers of the earth, then stop watering for 5-7 days, remove nitrogen fertilizers and give phosphorus-potassium fertilizers (ash, superphosphate, etc.)
Tomatoes won't set: it's all about the variety/hybrid
If last year you purchased a tomato hybrid (F1), received an excellent harvest, collected seeds, grew seedlings from them, and tomatoes bloom but don't set- Nothing strange. When re-grown, many hybrids do not produce offspring.
It may also be the inability of a particular variety to bear fruit well in your climatic conditions. For example, hybrids have already been bred that can withstand heat of more than 35 degrees, and for some varieties even 30 degrees is a critical threshold. The only thing that can be recommended here is to do your own selection and grow proven varieties and hybrids.
A successfully pollinated tomato flower can be recognized by its curled petals. For what other reasons are there no ovaries on tomatoes:
- some diseases (in particular, rot)
- excessive treatment of tomatoes against diseases with chemicals that affect the quality of pollen
- lack of phosphorus and potassium and “distortions” in nutrition in general
- lack of moisture
- dense plantings, lack of light
- sudden temperature changes
- heavy liming of the soil
We looked at the main reasons why there is no ovary on tomatoes and why the ovary on tomatoes falls off. Be sure to pay attention to the weather, the presence of wind, sun and help your tomatoes, spray the tomatoes for ovaries, apply the right fertilizers for the tomatoes in a timely manner - and you will definitely have a good harvest!
Hello, dear readers!We always try very hard when we look after our plantings, babysit them, cherish them like our own children. And it often happens that we overdo it. to the manure bed, we expect them to produce a great harvest.
But, unfortunately, tomatoes are not cucumbers, and excess nitrogen-containing organic matter in the soil can have the opposite effect. In these cases, the plant produces a new shoot from its formed crown. When you have never encountered something like this, you don’t know what to do in such a situation.
It’s not for nothing that a common phrase among gardeners is: “it’s better to underfeed than to overfeed,” as when growing seedlings, in order to avoid blackleg, “it’s better to underfeed than to overfeed.” This means that moderation is important in everything!
When overfeeding, a tomato simply reaches for the sun like crazy. Look, with his green power he will soon proudly carry the greenhouse roof on his heroic lashes. This tomato will grow fruit, but it’s scary to imagine how much effort the plant will spend on forming young shoots. This behavior is called fattening. How and why this happens remains to be seen.
What is fatliquoring?
This is a disease caused by excess nutrition when the plant is simply over-fertilized. Gluttony, you know, has a pathological effect on humans, let alone a delicate plant. Tomato varieties and hybrids with long flower vines are more prone to fattening. And, of course, those tomatoes that are grown on fertile soils well fertilized with manure.
In addition to a possible nitrogen excess, fatliquoring can be triggered by high air humidity, which invariably occurs with heavy watering without use. As well as a lack of light and concentrated feeding of seedlings. Seedlings often do not have enough light on the windowsill of an apartment, and we mistakenly overfeed them, confusing hunger with a lack of lighting.
The tomato bush looks magical and impressive, however, it practically does not bloom, and therefore does not produce ovaries.
The leaves become juicier and thicker, eventually curling.
In tomatoes, the leaves of which, when fattening, point upward at an acute angle, flowers fall off.
Tomatoes with a short flower vine and determinate varieties are practically not afraid of fattening. But if this does happen, then the brush must be pinched, leaving about 6 fruits - a larger number will still not have time to fill.
How to stop fattening of tomatoes
Not every summer resident knows what to do if tomatoes become fattened.It is important to reduce watering as soon as shoot growth is detected. It is worth immediately feeding the tomatoes with potassium fertilizer, for example, or phosphorus-potassium fertilizer.
Another type of fattening is the curling of the upper leaves of a bush with rapid growth and a powerful exterior. You shouldn’t expect a harvest from such a tomato; it devoted all its energy to forming a powerful green mass. The flower brush of such a bush will be weak and may be left without a single flower.Here again, abundant watering with the application of nitrogen organic fertilizers is to blame. Sometimes the culprit is poor lighting and dense planting.
A strict diet will help. Watering is stopped for ten days, or better yet for 2 weeks. We close the vents in the greenhouse and open them only when necessary to reduce the temperature to 25 degrees. At night it should not rise above 22-24 degrees.
The plant is treated with phosphorus- and potassium-containing fertilizers on a leaf basis. You can take an extract from superphosphate by mixing 3 tablespoons of the substance in a bucket of water. And with the same solution, at the rate of 1 liter per root, feed the plant in the circle around the trunk. Eliminate nitrogen completely; potassium will stop nitrogen nutrition, but magnesium nutrition, on the contrary, is necessary here.
Potassium monophosphate, potassium nitrate, potassium chloride or liquid wood ash are suitable for feeding. Dry ash scattered over a furrow will not help here, although it does not contain nitrogen. Superphosphate contains phosphorus, calcium and magnesium - it will act as an assistant to potassium fertilizers.
If this situation occurs during dry and hot weather, then watering will still be necessary. You should water it with warm water directly under the root, and loosen the soil all the time.
Some of the leaves from the bush will have to be removed so that it receives more light, but do not tear it off mercilessly, but remove only two leaves from one root. Removing greenery is traumatic for a plant, so it needs to be done in portions, once a week. The leaf that may block the light of the flower brush is removed.
Fattening bushes will have to be forcibly pollinated. Why in warm and dry weather, after 11 am, but before one o'clock in the afternoon, you need to shake the flower branches thoroughly.
In this case, foliar feeding will provide immediate assistance to the plant, and root feeding, simultaneously with foliar feeding, will consolidate the result and stop excess growth. Fatliquoring will stop, and the development of the tomato will return to the right direction.
Usually these actions are enough for the tomato to come to its senses and begin to develop properly.
Work on mistakes
Sometimes the thought occurs to me how many times you can make the same mistake until awareness comes and the skill strengthens. It's funny to watch when a neighbor struggles with the same problem year after year, trying different technologies to solve it. Or each new season solves the next problem that comes its way. Every gardener, beginner or experienced, goes through this. I went through this over and over again until the simulator appeared. "A bountiful harvest".
Now I’m working on my mistakes again, although the timing and consequences are different. Rather, they are not there at all. I try, I make mistakes, and then I do it all over again. I'm studying. But my garden is now my clean plan, where everything is predictable and understandable.
Subscribe to my blog, and my next articles will be even more useful and informative. I am all aimed at benefiting you and your tomatoes. Let's grow correctly and together!
Happy harvest and see you soon!
With all respect, Andrew
Enter your email and receive new articles by email:
