[Ian_P]

Three of my five tomato plants are misbehaving.

Each is a different variety. Each has been doing well and is up to 4 or 5 set trusses, and I have started to stop them.

Three of the plants have started to grow what look like side shoots, and fast and big, about 12 inches in a week. But here comes the best bit....

They are growing straight out of the ends of a trusses, and are weighing them down to the pont where they look about to break off.

Now I can cut them out, but I have never seen anything like this.

Any clues what I did wrong please?

[Gwiz]

i dont think you have done anything wrong, it just happens! i had the same problem last year

[John]

I have had this happen as well, I usually cut the stem off about a couple of inches beyond the fruit truss.

It's not that you've done anything wrong - it just happens..

[Oliver]

Certain varieties just do this. Cut the bits off, just like you would when you 'sideshoot' at any other time. It usually happens if you have stopped the plant after (XNo of) trusses. Thats what she does, anyway.

[GrannieAnnie]

Hi Ian, I get it as well.  Was out til 10pm last night taking off side shoots, end of truss shoots and some grow out of the ground as well.  Another posting on here mentioned that you can plant the shoots that grow out of the ground as they have little roots on them, but I don't need anymore, even if I get rid of the misbehaving yellow brandywine toms, I'll still have 100 plants!!!

Just keep taking them off!!!! (side shoots that is!!)

[John]

I planted a couple of side shoots last year as I had some virus in the tomatoes and the fresh growing plant missed it .
You've got enough tomatoes, Annie to open your own tomato puree plant!

[GrannieAnnie]

LOL John, I still need to find a cheap freezer.  The little one we have is no good for lots of stuff, and I don't know if you remember an earlier posting, but my big freezer broke down last year and I lost 40lbs of frozen tomatoes which were going to be my year's supply of pasta sauce and tomato soup!!!!

[John]

I read somewhere that 70% of fridges discarded were actually in working order - just looked grotty.
Could be that there are people throwing away perfectly working freezers?

Do you have a local freecycle group? Our small chest freezer was our best buy - A rated Whirlpool that holds a rock-steady -20 for £40.00 from the local free paper.

[Heather_S]

The advances in effiency with fridges and freezers has come along by leaps and bounds. Generally speaking, even if the fridge/freezer is still running fine, if it's over 5 years old, you're probably paying a stupid amount in electricity to keep it going. My inlaws have stopped running one of their freezers because of that, though they've not throw it out yet. It's in their conservatory and they figured out they were paying heaps of money because it gets so hot in there in the summer. They're considering running it in the winter, though, when it's colder in there.

[Sadgit]

can someone tell me what a truss is? Stupid question i know... as i have 9 tom plants grown with loads of toms on.. i've searched all over and no real example (pics) of a truss..

cheers
sadgit

[Sadgit]

ok is a truss the vine they are on?

"When four trusses have set fruit, remove the growing tip to hasten ripening."

As I have some with 10+ sets of toms/flowers, and what is the growing tip?? Sorry for all the questions.

[GrannieAnnie]

Hi SG, yes the truss is the vine they are growing on and the growing tip is the top most tip of the plant.  Its the one that makes the tomato plant grow upwards.  Only be caeful when you remove the side shoots as sometimes the top side shoot is as big as the tip.  

OH said to me the other day, why are those tomatoes shorter than the others, are they bush toms?  I said I didn't think so, but he was right, one particular variety all 7 plants wasn't growing at the same speed as all the others.  Well I can remember on one or two that I broke off the growing tip instead of the side shoot because they looked the same, but OH had done it too, so all 7 are shorter!!! lol  But they are still growing, and when I looked, you can see where the growing tip was taken off and the stems are growing a bit wonky because a side shoot is now the growing tip.  If you see what I mean???

[GrannieAnnie]

OH and All my tomatoes are either in the polytunnel or greenhouse, so I leave 6 trusses on them, I don't stop them at 4.  I've not grown ay outdoors for 2 years as they got blight and I lost most of them, but my greenhouse ones are always much better.

[Oliver]

what is a truss

Take a look at the second picture in this link - that is a good example of developed tomtoes on a truss (each tomato was once a flower)

EXAMPLE OF A TRUSS OF TOMATOES

[Sadgit]

thanks for the replies... so if I have 10 or so trusses that is bad?

I nipped out a side shoot (one of many) today and noticed it had tiny flowers starting to grow, those darn side shoots are hard to spot sometimes...