It is pointless to keep your tomato plants growing through the summer. I tried it and it doesn’t work….old tomatoes are just….well old! I ripped out all my tomatoes this week, the tomato fruit still on the old vines was pretty gnarly looking! “Waste not, Want not….so I cut away all the bad parts and juiced them. A little hot sauce and some horseradish and I had a healthy bloody Mary!
The fall crop of new tomato “babies” will start arriving at Nelson’s in late July/early August. Time to get your beds prepared, get it done NOW…then all you have to do is plunk your baby tomatoes in their beds. If you delay prepping your beds (and I’ve learned this the hard way) you will buy your plants, take them home, and then a million things keep you from getting them planted. The baby tomatoes lose a lot of vigor as they wait for their new home to be prepared.
Unlike tomatoes, don’t rip out the peppers and eggplants even if they look ugly and sick. They may not produce much during the hot summer months but once the weather starts to cool….they will gratefully reward your patience with a bumper crop in the Fall.