Debora Griffin

Great feedback! I agree that it may be too hot. It was a fairly mild summer here in TX up to a point but once we hit mid July the temps have stayed over 95 - 100 easily. I will try stressing them a little more. After reading a few things and as one of you suggested, they may have too much nitrogen. Early on we used urine to increase the nitrogen in the soil. It worked then giving them a growing boost but may should have stopped after the first dose or two! :p

Thanks for the reply Joseph. Mine are in an outdoor raised bed garden. Have had lots of bee's and bug action in and around the plants as I have lots of flowers and other blooming veg plants around them. In fact the tree above the bed was just humming for a while. Now they've moved over to the sunflowers that are now blooming on the other side of my yard. It was much more humid earlier in the season than it is now but try to keep them misted or watered daily but careful not to over water. I think next year I'll go a different route than beefsteak!

Can anyone shed light on why my plant's aren't producing any tomatoes? I have 4 heirloom beef steak plants (grown from seed) that are 4 - 5 ft tall, seem very healthy and have ton's of blooms but after months of blooming, still no fruit! I've tried to stress them a bit, pruned them a little and try to keep the suckers off but still nothing! Maybe the soil is too rich and they're just happy to keep growing!

I'm happy to report that after removing topsoil and replacing with richer soil my new seedlings have spouted strong and doing wonderful! Much bigger and stronger than the first go. My tomato plant's need a boost now so will try the pee method and hope for as good results as Roberta's.

All great advice and much appreciated! David you're right, ton's of good stuff on youtube but finding this forum just as helpful. Comfrey tea would be great to have! Dave my son had mentioned trying the urine method or compost tea so may do that. Chip I added a good composted soil my son was using for his 3 sister's garden. I replaced 2/3's of the top layer and reseeded so we'll see if that helps.

Thanks for your valuable 2 cents! I've planted bush beans through out, which are doing very well, to try and help but that will take time I'm sure. There are just so many recipes out there for organic fertilizer. Any tried and true recipes any of you recommend? I'm also ready to add my tomato plants but want to fertilize them first.

Great thoughts and advice everyone! Much appreciated.

David I think you and my son are on the same page. He told me he didn't think I let it bake long enough. I didn't get it completed until October and didn't cover it up for some time after that so I don't think it did.

Pia yes they do both get the same sun light pretty much. Great advice on aerating them.

Robert yes it does seem much more woody than I would have liked. Never have used this type of top soil before so like David said it probably didn't bake long enough to break down. I'm thinking of scraping the first few inches of soil and adding a richer soil and reseeding. May be getting too late but desperate measures....

Justin I think you're right. The bed has stayed too moist with little drying out time due to our very rainy weather we've had this year. Hope my tomato plants have roots long enough to reach the good stuff when I move them outdoors this week.

Thanks again!

Here is a picture of the roots on the spinach and lettuce. Not sure if and expert eye can see an issue but for my untrained eye, this looks pretty weak for a nearly 4 week old planting. Beginning to wonder if it's the seeds.

I have about 4- 5 inches of organic top soil. I have the same in both beds but the second bed with the squash, cucumbers and beans are doing great! Funny that one bed is full of fungus and the other has none.

Thanks for the help. Here are some closeup pics of the seedlings that may be more helpful. After doing some reading perhaps they are not drying out enough in between waterings and staying too moist. But with rain everyday not sure how to control that.