Patio Tomatoes - Anyone Can Grow Patio Tomatoes
Patio tomatoes. Are they a tomato variety or a way to grow tomatoes on your patio. Here we take a look at both the variety called patio tomatoes, and the whole idea of how to best grow tomatoes on your patio or balcony.
First, we’ll look at the tomato variety known as patio tomatoes. As you may expect, this is a hybrid variety that was bred to be a good choice for growing in containers, suited for a patio. It has a small growth pattern, more of a bushy type growth, sometimes only reaching about 2 feet in height. It’s leaves are darker than most tomatoes, and its fruit tend to the smaller size, around 2 inches in diameter. Some consider the skin on the tough side. Like many smaller fruited tomatoes, it will germinate and bear fruit in somewhat warmer climates than the larger fruited tomatoes, so this is a popular choice in the Southwest and places like Texas.
These are relatively fast maturing, often getting fruit in around 68 days.
You can often find these seeds at Amazon.
Growing Tomatoes on the Patio
If you are looking for information on growing patio tomatoes, here’s a few suggestions. All of these are
Hanging Tomato Planters
These are quite popular these days, with a few planters that grow tomatoes upside down like the popular Topsy Turvy tomato planter. We’ve reviewed a number of hanging tomato planters before. The advantage to all of them is that they don’t take up floor space and hanging planters generally do a good job of growing tomatoes. The downside is that you need someplace to hang them, and they can weigh a lot, and even at that you can’t grow a huge tomato plant in a container that only holds around 11 quarts of soil. So if you choose to use a hanging tomato planter pick a tomato variety good for hanging planters. *READ MORE BELOW*
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Free Standing Tomato Planters
If you have the floor space, you can grow more tomatoes and larger tomato varieties in a free standing planter. One popular option that is similar to the hanging tomato planters is the Topsy Turvy Tomato Tree. This is a larger version that grows tomatoes from bag that hang down from the side of the planter, and it includes a large stand to hold the planter. Another alternative is the upside down tomato garden that not only will hold 4 tomato plants, but will hold a few plants growing right side up, so you can plant a few flowers, herbs, or other smaller vegetables in the same planter.
One of the best ways to grow tomatoes is a self watering planter. The Earthbox planter is the most popular of these, and it really simplifies the job of keeping a planter watered. The way these planters water from the bottom really gets the tomato plants going strong, and they don’t need nearly the attention. For larger tomatoes you’ll need some type of staking system, they offer one for sale.
Raised Garden Bed Kit
If you have a large patio, you may want o take a look at a self contained raised garden bed kit. There’s a lot of options, but for a large patio an nice cedar raised bed kit that has a bottom shelf for a workspace is a nice way to add a larger gardening area. It’s handy on the patio, and can give you enough room to have not only smaller tomato plants but other herbs and vegetables like peppers.
Growing patio tomatoes is not that much work. Start out small and give it a try.
Filed under Growing Tomatoes by John
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