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Farmville, Virginia (mfowler@hsc.edu)

I have staked my tomato plants and they are now almost head high and still growing. Will it hurt to prune the tops back? Will it increase fruit growth if I do?

Mark

6/21/2007 8:57:59 AM

Ohio

I always pruned the suckers off,that come on in between the main stem and the leaf.We always had 2 main stems then pruned off all the suckers after that.You may not get more tomatoes, but you will get nicer,bigger tomatoes.The truck patch my family runs has done it this way for years.

6/21/2007 10:57:14 AM

Wi

I have several mater plants and and am dumb when it comes to pruning. You say between the main stem and the leaf...what leaf is that you refer to? There are lots of leaves :)

6/21/2007 11:14:06 AM

Ohio

When you follow the main vine,About 5ins or so you`ll have a leaf.Now between the main vine and this leaf, if its still there, you should have a sucker, just grab it and snap it off.Make sense? You should be able to do ttis all the way uo the plant.I always leave the first sucker,so i can have 2 main vines, then cull all the suckers from there.I guess you could say the suckers are a lot like are secondaries off the main vine on the pumpkin's.

6/22/2007 12:12:23 PM

Northern Arizona

I have friend that works for a large commercial tomato grower and he says that they have a certain number of leaves per tomato bunch and that they remove leaves all the time to keep the tomato plants producing fruit. But i am not sure that it is nessasry for the home gardener.

7/23/2007 9:29:14 AM